The Gun, Heathfield

Official site of The Gun - elitepubs.com

Official site of The Gun - elitepubs.com

The Gun Inn is a bit out of the way in the East Sussex countryside meaning that it is only really accessible by car so it was no surprise to find a food led pub with a large car park on my recent lunchtime midweek visit. To be honest I was a little disappointed as this is supposedly a 15th century pub, but it has been stripped out and lacks character. Don’t get me wrong, this is still a very pleasant place to have a meal and a pint, but the interior design team haven’t been very sympathetic. The right hand side of the pub is the dining area and the bar, that feels very separate from the dining area, is located to the left of the entrance. There is another seating area by the front windows adjacent to the bar where I sat with the wife whilst my nipper tucked into an ice-cream and wafer that set me back £5, but I shouldn’t have been surprised as the mains in here cost between £10 and £17. The bar supports two hand pumps that were drawing Harveys Best and Old Ale along with a standard draught selection, Amstel, Leffe and Curious Brew Lager Beer, which I’ve not seen before. Being my unadventurous self I plumped for the Guinness that was well served by a polite barman. Harking back to the décor, although bland I also got the feeling that the management had been to a few auctions and picked up anything they thought would be cool and quirky to put in the pub. I say this as there is a butcher’s table with meat slicer on it in the bar area and the seating area by the bar has some wooden carvings and a couple of old pistols along with some lifestyle magazines and horribly dated bottles covered with wax that are placed on the windowsills. In the dining area there is an ornamental cannon and in the passageway to the toilet, that is found at the far side of the dining area, is a large safe with a till on top of it and some crockery on a stand to the right. To be honest it was all a bit random in a minimalist kind of way and the amount of chopped logs everywhere could heat the building for a year. There is a quiz advertised for 20:00 on Wednesday 9th March so this is obviously not a regular occurrence and although there was no TV that I could see there was some low sixties pop music playing in the background. The large car park is located to the left of the building and to the right there is a grassed area with some children’s climbing apparatus and picnic tables to accompany the three that are located on the gravel outside the front of the pub. A sign by a large map of the area at the entrance gives the pub’s opening times as 11:30 until 15:00 and 17:30 until 23:00 Monday to Saturday and midday until 22:30 on Sundays. Food is basically served during pub opening hours, but the kitchen closes at 21:30 Monday to Saturday and at 21:00 on Sunday. If this pub was a little more accessible and had some competition around it that was within walking distance I would return, but due to the location this has to be a destination pub and I’m not sure that it is worth the trip. I would like to make it clear that this is from a drinking and not dining point of view as I did not sample any food and I have no reason to doubt that it is anything but tasty.