The Exeter Brewery Tap Room, Exeter

Only opens Thursday and Friday 5-11pm, surprisingly not on a Saturday. We managed to get in here on the Friday and the tap room was only moderately busy. I thought it would have been packed, it should have been as the beer was excellent. Five handpumps, with four in use, serving Advocet, Darkness, Fraid Not and Fall's Over. The prices were reasonable and from our table near the window, we had a great view of Exeter St Davids railway station and the tracks leading into it. We would happily visit here again.

Brewery tap, struggling for business on a Friday evening, although this was probably due to the beer festival up in the city centre? Anyway, once you've found it by negotiating the brewery corridors, it's a simple but welcoming example of its type with canteen-style tables. With five cask beers available on handpump, I enjoyed an excellent pint of Ferryman (£3.70) before the doors closed.

This is a popular taproom operated by the Exeter Brewery, with a prime location close to St David’s station, albeit with restricted opening hours on Thursday and Friday evenings, closing at 9pm in the Winter (despite a large sign outside proclaiming closing at 11pm). After crossing the road, you first need to negotiate a muddy car park before entering into a small bottle store. Various Exeter Brewery bottles are available here for take out, but you can pass to the left of the counter to follow a series of corridors towards the back of the building, passing the brewery on your way, to eventually reach a rather cosy taproom. It’s a relatively simple bare boarded space with exposed brick walls and a basic L-shaped servery to the right. The bar has a decent tongue and groove counter front and plain mirrored bar back with a load of brewing awards displayed on the canopy, raising expectations of some decent beer. Bench and chair seating skirts around the perimeter with a couple more filling the middle of the room in the space opposite the bar. Rather unexpectedly, every table was booked on my Friday evening visit, but the friendly barman was quick to apologise for the full house and helped me pick a table where the punters weren’t due to arrive for a while. The decor includes some framed images of pump clip designs, a set or two of antlers, a shelf full of old beer bottles, an rather ominous portrait of an unknown bloke and some art relating to the brewery. There were five operational handpulls on the bar, dispensing Exeter Avocet, Lighterman, Darkness, ‘Fraid Not IPA and Ferryman, the latter of which was a decent drop that went down nice and easily. This selection was enhanced by three home-brewed keg options, one or two of which were the equivalent versions of some of the cask range. The place had a good buzz thanks to the full house and felt like a bit of a hidden club thanks to its obscure location away from other pubs. I liked this place and was a bit disappointed that I was only able to enjoy a brief stay due to the requirement that customers remain seated. In an age when you can drink in countless breweries, surrounded by brewing kit and the attendant noise and smells that come with that, it was nice to find a proper taproom in a well presented, separate room, making this well worth a look if you find yourself in this part of town on one of the appropriate evenings.

Official site of The Exeter Brewery Taproom - www.theexeterbrewery.co.uk