please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
Comfortable Fuller's pub, football was on but not too intrusive. Would go back in the winter when it's probably quieter.
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The Horse & Groom is located in the centre of Alresford, a nice town. It's a Fullers pub with an emphasis on dining. Seating is arranged around a central bar, with some more secluded seating areas. There is an outdoor courtyard at the rear. All of the 4 ales were from the Fullers range, with London Pride, Oliver's Island & HSB supplemented by Front Row.
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Bland soulless interior, strange menu, expensive, slow service and small portions. We went into the open area at the rear and watched a rat wandering around, when reported to the bar staff they just said 'oh we've had a problem with those.............'. My friend ordered a diet coke and the soft drinks mixer wasnt working correctly (no gas). Definitley will be going elsewhere when I return to Alresford.
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its been done up, but now is expensive, lacks FUN , dosent seem intrested in using its late licence!! has lost all its good atmosphere, back in 2008 this place was the place to be! ok It lost its way after the landlord and landlady who knew what they were doing left, but unless your a toff or dead will never be the place to be again, such a shame. this place had such promise, but is now a typical chain pub :-(
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Return visit was unsatisfactory, HSB has been withdrawn, menu was fussy and fanciful and won't appeal to most clients. What a shame, this is an attractive pub
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A Fullers pub, varied well kept beer with a sympathetic and comfortable refurbishment. Separate restaurant area, but good and reasonably priced food could be consumed in the lounge bar area. Worth a return visit.
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First visited the pub in Sept 2011 and found the place a little tired and in need of freshening up with an uninspired Beer choice.
Go back in March 2013 and it's a completely different place. Bright, without being dazzling, clean and fresh. Deservedly popular and despite being a Fullers pub does have a (local) guest beer, though I went for Fullers six nations seasonal beer, which was very good.
Worth a detour off the A31 as the town is also well worth exploring.
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November 16th 2012
A clearly expensive and thorough refurbishment by Fullers has restored this pub to its rightful place as the best pub in town.
The friendly atmosphere has been restored too, with women again feeling free to visit on their Thursday nights out with friends.
Well done Fullers!
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This pub is still not a patch on what it was about 5 years ago. Beer choice is ok,price and quality reasonable but the whole place needs something more than it currently offers. oh and the hand drier in the Gents still doesn't work.
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Nice place with friendly staff. Would say this is the pub for the younger drinkers in Alresford, Choice of Ale limited but London Pride was in good condition and would definately visit again.
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Old inn right in the centre of the village. Despite a plethora of old beams and being a genuinely old building, inside it has the feel of a lively, modern pub with big screen tvs and a youngish clientele.
Ales on were Spitfire, Pride and Ringwood Bitter. The Spitfire was in reasonable condition. There is a carvery but be warned, it closes at 15:00 on a Sunday afternoon.
There is an area of seating in front of the pub and a small, shady beer garden at the rear. On a minus note; the hand dryers were not working in the gents'.
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Glad to hear its picked up. Spent many happy days in the doom during my youth!
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The Horse and Groom is what makes a good evening or afternoon out.
Great home cooked food, refreshing beers, including local real ales. They have live entertainment on a regular basis, including local Live Bands and Karaoke nights. They have an exceptional group of friendly staff who always make you feel very welcome. About 18 months ago, under previous owners, the pub went into a bit of a downward spiral, as other comments on here have indicated, but since the current owners took over in the middle of 2010 they have turned the pub around and made it what it is today, which is the best pub in Alresford with the most wonderful staff and a great service. Long may it continue for years to come. :)
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Poor, slow service, the barman would rather hand out menus than deal with customers who have been waiting some time. Dreadful pint of Itchen Valley Fagins. Flat, insipid and served well short of a pint. Food service would appear to be disorganised chaos. Some improvements are required to bring this place back to what it was several years ago.
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Having lived in the village for a number of years I can truly say this is one of the worst pubs in Hampshire. Like a Wetherspoons with more beams it serves lots of lager to lots of rowdy men in football shirts and is rough as old boots. Only one beer when I was it (Pride) extra cold as everyone is drinking Fosters whilst their girlfriends drink luminous alcopops. There are a couple of old bar flys who have been there for years and routinely get drunk and I can only imagine cannot see what a dump this is. A great shame, however there are some truly excellent pubs within 10 miles - just a shame I can't get a decent drink in my village.
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Having lived in the village for a number of years I can truly say this is one of the worst pubs in Hampshire. Like a Wetherspoons with more beams it serves lots of lager to lots of rowdy men in football shirts and is rough as old boots. Only one beer when I was it (Pride) extra cold as everyone is drinking Fosters whilst their girlfriends drink luminous alcopops. There are a couple of old bar flys who have been there for years and routinely get drunk and I can only imagine cannot see what a dump this is. A great shame, however there are some truly excellent pubs within 10 miles - just a shame I can't get a decent drink in my village.
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Quite simply an appalling pub.
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As an older member of the town who has been using the pub for many years I would like to put a few things straight about the place. Good Pub, Good Beer, Good Food, Polite Staff and best of all I don't feel out of place. The pub is used by vastly differing age groups ranging from 18 to 80 and beyond and not once have I ever felt threatened. The management recently employed the use of Doormen as I believe there was what could be described as a minor scuffle. Well that was wrong wasn't it. The pub haters brigade (normally the ones who buy a house next to a pub) felt it brought the image of the town into disrepute. So they're damned if they do and they're damned if they dont. I know some locals who have complained about the noise outside of the pub in the evenings. It wasn't the pub who made them smoke outside, was it? Yes they make mistakes, they are human and they cannot please all the people all the time but in general the current owners and management are in my view doing a bloody good job. It is a place I would recommend and will continue using the pub as I am at the moment.
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Went into Aylesford for a day out, the town was heaving with tourist, shoppers and rail anoraks�. At 1200 decided to go for lunch and have and try one of their range of local ales, and had Itchen Valley, We put an order for a meal - see details from Somerset Man. My comment that the beer I had was slightly vinegary, a tip for manager, who was not in at that time, make sure the bar staff, in the morning pull several pints through from the cellar, so the first customer, possibly me does not get the previous night beer, it reflex�s on the outlet, and also the brewer which is not his fault. I left my beer behind and went
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Not to be recommended. Staff seemed not to have a clue how to run a pub lunch service. Called in to what looked an interesting pub on a bustling summer Saturday for a good pub lunch. Menus on tables. Ordered beers then to be told after sipping beers that Chef decided not to cook any hot meals that day. Bar sandwiches only! No explanation. No manager on hand and staff whilst polite hadn't a clue. This forced our hand as we had already ordered drinks and would have meant drinking up & going on to another pub for a hot meal and thus buying further beers to accompany any meal (pushing me over over drink drive limit)
Making best of an unscheduled change in our lunch plans we then orderd 3 baguette rolls from bar instead. Barman asked if we had a pen because he hadn't got one!. He wrote the order down so we sat down to wait for meal and when it came it was the wrong order. Asked to speak to someone as things were going from bad to worse. Offered excuses and not apologies. No-one in the pub seemed to know how to deal with things when they went wrong and the manager hadn't turned up!! Asked for a refund and left.
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hurrah for the doom & groom!! at last a decent review............
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A lovely pub with a recently decorated restuarant. All the rumours of a rowdy drinking pub were unfounded and the staff were friendly and welcoming. Food is good old fashioned pub food at really good prices. The new Manager seems to really have got to grips with all the bad behaviour.
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This pub used to be the best pub in the town.
Its now the worst, with fights swearing inside and out and a total lack of control of the worst customers.
The neighbours of this pub are totally fed up with the behaviour of customers and would dearly like the current management to accept that their lack of management is unacceptable in a quiet market town.
Please leave and let us get our town centre back.
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Aggghh!! Although the new owners seemed to make a good start this pub has gone even more downhill than before. Bar staff act like they have never been behind a bar before and the beer is rotten. How many times have I been served bad ale here - come on its not that difficult really.
New leather chairs are no substitute for bad service and awful ale.
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Poor service, we waited an age, and the the could not even remember to put a sausage on the all day breakfasts!
Everything was over cooked, and the waitress did not even know if she had brought us diet Pepsi or not!
We then had to wait 15 mins to settle the bill.
There are much better pubs in the town!
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Too many TV screens and tracksuits ruin this pub, do not maximise their food potential as they are sitting on a goldmine the amount of visitors the village gets. Some rum characters watching TVs, although sitting on the street on a summers day is OK. Beer not the best kept mind as they obviously mostly sell lager.
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Well I was here on Saturday Lunchtime & it was fine by me. This is the type of pub that I go in and I say to myself if I lived round here this would be my local and not just because of the pretty barmaid
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Decent meal & drink watching the football, fine by me.
Barra - 15 Sep 2008 14:36 |
the place has died a death recently, it seems unless your a coffin dodger this isnt the place to go! the local "gay" bar seem to attract the more younger generation these days...... shame at one point this place was like a mini nite club on fri & sat nites.
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A bit tired looking on the inside, but the beer, service and food were all fine on my visit.
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AUGUST 5TH 2007 , saturday nite, 6 people in the garden & that was it !! what has happend? the smokeing ban has clearly destroyed this pub!!!!
anonymous - 12 Aug 2007 13:23 |
this pub is definately getting worse, little or no effort is put into trying to make this place a success any more, even the discos have just dissapered, i think its high time a big change was made befoure what few customers are left go else where!
anonymous - 26 Jul 2007 14:26 |
Went in here Thurs lunchtime whilst visiting the Watercress line there is ringwood & wadworth 6x available & a very good food menu served by very pleasent bar staff an excellent pub.
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Definately not the worst pub in Alresford BUT it's nowhere near as good as the 2 hotel bars just down the street or the Flowerpots down at Cheriton. This pub as anonymous states has deteriorated over the years. My other half used to be a barmaid & this was one of the pubs that she used to work in & it wasn't a nice place to work in then, it's far worse now though. The music that gets banged out is distorted & the TV's are always on. To be hones the pub on my housing estate is better run & cleaner than this place.
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What a shame "anonymous" has painted such a black picture of what is really a thriving pub in an attractive town. Customers young and old are drawn here, and are from all walks of life. Many are visitors to the town - e.g.families coming in for food; many others are regulars who enjoy the atmosphere of the place and find it a conducive place to meet up with friends. There's all sorts in the "Groom". I am neither multipierced or tatooed, but I don't feel out of place!
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As an Alresford resident of over 12 years I've seen this pub and particularly the quality of the clientele deteriorate markedly. The alterations and extensions made just before the millennium ruined the character of this grade 2 listed building in the town's prime location. The introduction of flat sceen TVs on every wall and the cessation of food in the evenings has not helped either. The smoke is awful and with the the total lack of ventilation, there's a third world smell near the loos! Roll on the smoking ban, it may get rid of the multipierced tatooed idiots once and for all!
anonymous - 30 Nov 2006 20:30 |
7/10 rating- interesting. Went here today after visiting the Globe and was greeted by an atmosphere like a shit pub in Farnham on a friday night. Very loud, oppressive and SMOKEY. But i felt that sunday is not a day to see the full potential in a pub. Strangely enough i felt that it may be that sunday is just a day for bums to come out the woodwork and that this pub has more going for it than it showed. It certainly felt like on another day this pub may be quite pleasant, so like the Globe I may give this one another shot.
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This is an OK twee-ish market town kind of pub. Usually they serve decent beer, in the past I've had Ringwood and Brakspear. Old fashioned style: horse brass and big timber beams, that sort of thing. I've not really ever sampled the food.
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