Brewhouse & Kitchen, Landport, Portsmouth

Still very much as described in the previous review. Curiously it feels much more like a restaurant than a pub, however it is a very good place to go to consume beer, whether eating or not.

Official site of Brewhouse & Kitchen - www.brewhouseandkitchen.com

Official site of Brewhouse & Kitchen - www.brewhouseandkitchen.com

Formerly Ye White Swan, as detailed on the retained external signage, this is now a brew-pub – part of a small chain with bars in Islington, Highbury and Dorchester plus a Bristol venue still in the pipeline. The Grade II listed pub is on a pleasant street close to the Guildhall and has a wonderfully over-the-top Brewer’s Tudor façade with ship’s figureheads flanking each doorway (some no longer in use). You enter into a large single room with a central island servery and a set of brewing coppers to the right. A good deal of bench and standard seating has been arranged around all sides of the room and included some unusual benches with switchable backs that allow you to change the direction the bench faces without moving it. A mix of old photos and beer and food related posters and items line the walls and we also spotted some hops in a display cabinet and in glasses on the servery. To the rear, there is a fireplace with a partially plastered chimney breast, which looked a bit out of place in what was otherwise a thoughtfully composed interior. One nice feature was the use of sewn together hop sacks to create a curtain which shielded customers from the entrance to the toilets. We visited on Remembrance Sunday, so the place was doing a very good trade with former servicemen who had been paying their respects at the nearby cenotaph, but I got the impression that the pub is usually just as busy on a regular weekend. We stopped here for a Sunday roast and found that it was quite expensive and not the most generous of portions. There were five ales available on this visit, mostly from the in-house brewing operation and I opted for their session bitter which was a decent accompaniment to my meal. I didn’t manage to get a full list of the beers available, but they were detailed on a small blackboard on the bar. The keg range was pretty interesting, with very few mainstream options and there appears to be a decent range of bottled beers on offer too. The staff seemed very friendly and were helpful in sorting out a table for our party. This is a slightly unusual place, pitched somewhere between craft beer bar, traditional brew-pub and restaurant. As such, it doesn’t quite make the grade in any of these categories, but having said that, it all comes together well enough to make this a decent enough place for a good pint in this part of town.