"Cheap and cheerful Sam Smith’s pub in town"

Added Mon 11 Oct 2010 by Leila

Finding somewhere you can buy two pints for under a fiver in London is akin to finding a hairpin in a wheat stack, but luckily pubs belonging to the Samuel Smith brewery still provide affordable drinking options.

Sam Smith’s lagers and ales sit alongside imported bottled beers at low prices; there is food on the menu too, but the burgers and chips are more of the peckish when pissed meal type rather than dinner you’d make a special trip for.

Set over two floors, this classic boozer has no flourishes; think old fashioned carpets, dark wooden furniture, partitions with etched glass and wood panelling and bars with shelves containing bottles hanging upside down.

Upstairs, walls are lined with pictures of the pub’s namesake, who was the first person to claim that cholera was a waterborne disease. There is a connection between the pub and this seemingly random fact, as the water pump that aided his research was once upon a time situated here.

Like most neighbouring Soho pubs, it gets filled up of an evening with the local media bods and getting a seat is laborious, even on a Monday. Twentysomething runners from nearby production houses and office workers cram on to the pavement in the summer months, pint in hand.

It may be a simple pub with a minimum of fuss, but if it’s a cheap drink and a natter you’re after, The John Snow is just the place.