The Flower Pot  

This pub is a real gem in the middle of some beautiful countryside. Not far from Hinton Ampner gardens the Flower Pot is home to the Cheriton Brewery (in the car park).

The pub has acres of land with it and in the summer you can use the field as a car park and it needs it as it gets so busy people form an orderly queue to get to the bar that sometimes snakes out into the garden. It really only gets this busy when the village has a fete or there is a special event on, but it tells you just how popular this place is, being only a short drive from Winchester.

There are a number of rooms in the pub, all of which are decked out in country style, which is pleasing to the eye. Seating is a mixture of round and square tables and chairs of both dark and light wood on bare floors. There are fires for winter and the bare cold floors keep it cool in a hot summer.

There is also a 30 foot well in the public bar, but you've no chance of falling into it. The beers served here - all from the Cheriton brewery, are well kept and served from the barrel behind the bar. Prices are keen as the beer doesn't have to travel far to be enjoyed and they are happy to fill four pint jugs. For the wine drinker there are fruit wines by the glass.

Food is served both lunchtime and evenings (not Sunday evening) and is traditional, though baps and burgers are a little more than you expect. A popular pub for food, it sold out of some items when we visited, but this made us determined to go for a second visit.

If you like your beer, a festival is held in August every year.

There is a beer garden out front as well as at the rear and gives this pub a real relaxed feel. Plenty of car parking on both tarmac and grass if need be.

Accommodation available here plus camping by arrangement.

Access for the disabled is possible as the toilets are by the rear entrance, though the spacing of tables can be limiting.

A quiet pub with no music.

Not always shut at 2.30, so ring to find out or just pop in.

Comments
 

The waiting staff at the pub are exceptionally friendly and helpful-often in trying circumstances due to the lack of circulation space! (7/1/05)

The new Flower Pot Brewery is up and running. 

 

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