The Shepherd and Dog in Mid Sussex

I came here Last Sunday and had an absolutely brilliant meal, first we had a pastrami trout to share and the balance between the flavours just matched, I had a lamb roast and my partner had a fish and chips, portion sizes were very worth it for the money, we were both stuffed even from being on an empty stomach. All the drinks are fantastic from wine to beers, being sourced from local brewers, I recommend you go to see which drink you prefer. Overall a superb experience and will definitely be back!

Sunday roasts used to be amazing. Much more mediocre last weekend. Meat done well. Sides, veggie options and puds not nearly so good. Serving staff seem to be aware.

Went for a roast here as I remember the food being great. However, the lamb was so pink it may as well have been raw. That aside, the potatoes were delicious, and they gave you a good serving of gravy which is rare in most pubs! They also do a fantastic non alcoholic beer on tap which is nice as usually it's only small cans in most places and they do a good selection of alcoholic drinks. The dessert was good. Was a little cold in there so take a jumper! Beautiful garden for summer and in a beautiful location. Service was great.

Absolutely amazing service and amazing food !! Had a lovely lunch with my parents and everything was exceptional ! Such lovely and friendly service with beautiful food 10/10

Lovely birthday meal for my son.xx staff and food excellent

Banging root veg crumble roast and cauliflower cheese. Great selection of beer too. The red cabbage was tasty too

Great food and an extensive beer menu service was quick and staff polite. but if can get busy and noisy if you're in the extension.

Sunday roast was delicious, really enjoyed the pork. The potatoes, carrots, red cabbage and Yorkshire pudding were so good! 🤤 I also had the apple crumble, which was a massive portion! The crumbles may need some more butter in the batter but otherwise nice. Service super friendly and regularly checked on us. We came with a dog and they brought us a bowl of water for him. Defiant recommend coming here!

We were met by wonderfully helpful and friendly staff who couldn’t do enough to ensure our visit was a good experience. Being quite elderly our appetites aren’t what they used to be so we asked for children’s portions, this proved to be no problem at all. The pub has plenty of room indoor and out and we opted for the latter as the weather was good and the surrounding countryside magnificent. Service was prompt, the food itself was what one might expect from an establishment with so many covers and that is so popular. A generally good experience.

Chose this pub as it was only a 10 minute walk away. Was hoping for the lamb shank (as on the sample menu) but it was not on the current menu. However, we did have a good meal and good service, and would eat here again.

The small plates were delicious 🤤 and the staff were extremely friendly xx

Lovely little pub in the middle of the sussex countryside , great outside area, staff were very friendly and helpful, food was delicious and we'll presented, definitely recommend a visit, you won't be disappointed

Waited over 30 mins after drink arrived, then had to ask someone to take food order. First ribeye full of gristle. Was replaced with second one which was worse. Refunded meal only after debate with manager. Very disappointing

Beautiful nature all around, hidden historical pub, best Sunday roast. Playground for kids in the garden area. Lovely stuff, good booking system.

Fabulous Sunday roast, the table service was good unfortunately only one person on the bar so service was very slow

Lovely location. Sat in the sun and had a superb meal

The food at the weekend was massively disappointing. I ordered the nut roast which was the worst I have ever had, it looked like cat food. The carrots were hard and the potatoes were missed off the plate. I waited an hour and asked for sauce that never arrived along with the cutlery.

A beautiful setting to sit and eat in the sun. We called and booked as it was recommended. Staff very polite and friendly a bit of a wait but not a problem as the sun was shining 🌞. We both ordered a lamb roast with extra potatoes which we didn’t need as so much meat. The lamb was quite tough and fatty that was our only complaint but other than that was a very nice dinner. Vegetables were plenty crisp and fresh. Would still recommend.

We ate here this evening. I've never felt moved to rate a dining experience before, but the food and, in particular, the service were both terrible. The rudeness and attitude of the Manager was so genuinely shocking that we were left wondering if we'd accidentally stumbled on a Fawlty Towers dining experience by mistake. The pub and setting are both lovely, we've been there many times before, but I would really discourage anyone thinking of dining there at the moment.

Lovely country pub in a great location

Lovely pub, great food in big portions, lots of beers and a nice atmosphere.

Very picturesque traditional pub with great selection of craft beers on tap and a beautiful garden at the foot of the South Downs.

Fab little place with friendly and helpful staff. Food was amazing 👏 well done chef 👨‍🍳

The pub is a traditional English pub with a limited bar menu. Popular with walkers and awash with numerous dogs it is typical of its genre - the smell of chip oil greets you in the car park. Sadly I was very disappointed as the food choices were poor and my risotto was completely tasteless. Husband had the fish and chips - enough said. Glass of white wine was lukewarm and I left half of it. Asked for salt and pepper and the salt-pot was unusable asked for another and they forgot. The worst bit was the toilets which were so smelly - I do not know if they have a septic tank there but they need to do something about the odour.

Went here for a wedding reception. The location is out of the way, but apart from that, it seems like a nice country pub. There is a big range of different beers (although on the higher price scale) And the food we had was top notch. There is a carpark but it has limited spaces. You can park on the roadside though. There is outside seating with a small play park. There is a pathway that goes along a small stream, which kept the kids busy.

Very tasty, safe gluten free food!

Great variety of gluten free beers 🍻 👌 😀

Went for a family occasion, and it was a very special place to have this event.

Excellent Saturday lunch time meal. We didn’t book, turned up and had lots of seating free on a pleasant day. Service was efficient, drinks and food was a fair price considering prices these days. Fish and chips and large camembert were fantastic size portions. Would highly recommend for all the local area and will be going back.

had a .mushroom burger and low alcohol pint which was delicious! l

Great little country pub. Well worth a visit.

Great food in a lovely rural pub. Staff are super friendly and great selection of local ales.

This pub takes the p1ss. They are an awkwardly placed pub but boy do they charge. £4.30 for a J20. £30 quid for a 2 course meal. But they seem busy so there must be alot if Rich 1diots out there.

4.30 for a J2O, 30 quid for 2 courses. more expensive than a central london joint. Busy so I can only assume that their are alot of rich 1diots in the world.

The location is super as is the actual pub and the ale was excellent. The food was dreadful. There were five of us, we all had different things. The steak was like shoe leather, the crispy belly pork, soggy and tough, the chicken salad bland and the fish and chips well it ended up in the dog, so I guess she was happy! Such a shame as it really is a lovely pub in a special location.

Bit of a gem this pub. Great location just off the South Down Way. Starters were a good - chicken wings, mushrooms on toast, baked camembert. My main course was fab - pie of the day (chicken & chorizo) with crispy potatoes and gravy, faultless. Beer on tap was good too.

Had salmon with asparagus salad - simple but delicious. Dined alone and had a glass of wine which was £15.50. I would suggest the customer should be told if the wine ordered is so expensive. Luckily I didn't order a second glass. I ate the day before at a similar pub and the wine was £9 a glass, which is still expensive, but seems to be the going rate.

Lovely walk to this pub. Enormous dinner size. Unfortunately they ran out of fish and chips but the chicken was also really good. Great service from the staff were moved tables 3 times (searching for sunshine).

I think the pub is the victim of its own success in that the staff struggled with the volume of people coming to eat Sunday lunch, which impacted on quality and length of time waiting for food. It’ll be better to have a few less tables. Parking is also very difficult at this peak time.

Fantastic traditional pub in a beautiful scenic setting. The GM & often chef Stephen serves excellent quality food. Highly recommend :)

Absolutely lovely pub - great food, really friendly staff. Definitely book ahead!

They hosted my birthday gathering…18 people in all, and were superb. Food and staff excellent. Despite my messing up the orders they sorted it quickly and without fuss. Highly recommended!

Shepherd & Dog is a great pub and restaurant. The food is really good. Nice variety and options. The drinks are excellent too.

We enjoyed a delicious Sunday roast with pork and beef accompanied by a good beer and a very good Italian wine (noted Spanish by mistake on the menu). I recommend this traditional English Sunday dish, served with roasted vegetables, to-die-for cauliflower gratin and a big sausage.

I was surprised by the high quality of the food. I had the lamp which was cooked to perfection. And I'll have to admit: my French prejudices about English people overcooking meat were wrong (in this case anyway). Great rural atmosphere as well, and quite authentic. My advice: hike your way down from the parking lot at Devils Dyke, it only takes around 30min. Or even better if you're in good shape: hike all the way from Brighton, it's not that far (12km) and it's nice all the way.

I had Sunday lunch yesterday. Although we booked in advance we were kept waiting 40 minutes for our table because someone else was using it. We were told there was no service at the tables outside next to the stream but a few minutes later a waiter delivered food to other people in that area. Having ordered our food (table 20) it hadn’t arrived 40 minutes later. When I asked about it the waiter told me it was my fault because we arrived late!!! We arrived 15 minutes early. He didn’t apologise for the delay and said it was an hour long wait for the food- he didn’t say that when we were ordering. He was laughing and smirking at me and had a very arrogant attitude and clearly didn’t care about customer service at all. I’m not going back to the Shepherd and Dog anymore!

I’ve been coming for many years and Went with some friends for Sunday lunch arriving 15 minutes early for the booking. I asked if we could change our table to one over the stream and was told We couldn’t as food wouldn’t be served there as the garden behind was closed. As people at our table we’re still eating we told the server we would wait elsewhere so we could wait for the rest of our party and they could finish their lunch. On return we walked past someone bringing two Sunday lunches out to the spot we asked if we could move to. Hen we got to the table I booked, other people were sitting at our table and were moved. The food took 40 minutes to arrive leaving us little time to eat before the next booking. Our server told us it was because we were late! Which we corrected. Luckily they moved the next booking. The lunch is high quality if a bit overpriced and was luke warm when it eventually arrived as was the entire experience.

This had so much potential, but was let down by a few things. First, the good bits. Quick service, attentive staff and a great setting. The meat was good and the kids absolutely loved the nuggets (best nuggets EVER apparently). Unfortunately the rest of the food wasn't great. The Yorkshire puddings were dry, like they've been reheated from the day before, the roast potatoes were soggy and the cabbage was chewy. It was really busy and the area we had (conservatory?) was so loud we couldn't have a conversation without shouting. None of us had a particularly enjoyable afternoon. (Maybe some kind of carpeting would help the booming echo of that room...or maybe moving bigger groups to another part of the pub and keep the smaller groups in that area. We all said it had potential, and we might come back in the summer, but wouldn't recommend it on a day where you had to sit inside.

Great food and service, looked after all the family, including the dog on his birthday

Second visit, and once again, a little disappointed. While the pub boasts a nice atmosphere and an impressive beer selection, the menu felt somewhat limited and uninspired. The food itself was fine, but didn't live up to the pub’s reputation (or the price). Service, however, remained excellent.

Gorgeous Sunday roast last weekend. The potatoes were a bit overdone and dry and the lamb was slightly more cooked than I’d prefer but the flavours were great and it all still tasted delicious. The young lady who served us was perfectly attentive.

Really good food and selection of beers

Excellent food in a lovely location and a nice beer and wine selection

Very friendly team, clearly run off their feet as the roast took over an hour. Pretty standard roast, exceptional carrots though.

Amazing food, excellent service. Beautiful location.

Great food and ambience. Very helpful staff.

Lovely food but with a roaring open fire we were unlucky to be very cold at the other end of the room.

Great little gastro pub at the foot of the south downs. Ideal place to visit mid way through or at the end of the walk. Terrace and beer garden if the weather's good. Fantastic beer selection from the local area. Welcoming to dogs and muddy boots. If you want food there's a great selection of small plates. The wings and squid were fantastic although the menu changes. Great mains selection and the roasts on a Sunday are tasty and good value. Welcoming and helpful staff

We came here for lunch as we had family visiting and wanted to try somewhere new in the local area. We were all really impressed and had a great time. The pub was cosy and warm with the fire on, the staff were friendly and the food and drinks were delicious. We'll definitely be coming back. Thank you! Parking was a bit busy as it was a Saturday and is a popular place for countryside walks but we managed to park and there were some spaces on the road if not.

Great pub after a glorious walk. Fantastic roast dinners. Great service from warm friendly staff.

Lovely sunday lunch with a good choice of options on the menu including non-roasts for those fancying something different. Nice warm atmosphere and lovely local area to walk around

We were originally 5 for lunch on boxing day. Unfortunately that reduced to 3. Although the restaurant was notified more than once, they had no record of the change. The table we were shown to was inappropriate for 3 and wouldn't have worked that well for 5. After some discussion the configuration was changed. Cramped but better. The number of choices of mains was very limited and not what was expected. Chips were not part of our order, but the server insisted even to the point of saying " the chef said have them at no charge." The large group on the adjoining table were very boisterous, loud and allowing children to run around. This was upsetting our dog and making communication quite difficult. We decided dessert could wait and we paid and left. A very disappointing experience!

Utterly terrible service and food, truly shocking

Brilliant place, full of atmosphere, friendly efficient staff, food top quality and the prices are fair. Definitely recommended.

Great little pub. Had one of the best burgers ive had in a long time. Resonable prices and friendly staff.

Sunday lunch lamb was excellent, service was slow but they were rammed and we were a party of 15 so understandable I guess. What really irritated me though was a charge of £6.75 for a pint of lime soda and a bottle of J2O. I thought the barman was having a laugh but sadly not. Compared with the drinks the food was a billy bargain!

Jackie was amazing the food was fab and lots of gf options!! Highly recommend

Great stop on our walk, welcoming staff and walker friendly. Love this pub

The food was excellent! Service was superb!

Food was great, good atmosphere, nice chats with the staff and locals. Everything you could possibly want from a pub!

The history of this pub is fascinating, riddled with tales of contraband, black market dealings and possible bewitchings. I’m more than slightly spooked to confirm that dirty dealings are alive and well at the Dog and Shepherd to this day. After trying to enjoy an expensive but mostly edible Sunday lunch while my two kids made gravy potions, adjusted the pub decor and eschewed their fish & chips in favour of eating old food off the floor, we gave up and rammed the remains into cardboard boxes to eat later and left our table clean for the next group. These guys operate a tight ship on Sundays, woe betide you should you overstay your welcome - thankfully we didn’t! That, ladies and gentlemen, was where the post dining entertainment on the terrace began 👏 we were told that we’d be charged a hefty fee for extra people who were never even part of the group booking!! An honest mistake, a mixup on comms, easily resolved you say? Not here. Instead, we were treated to the most aggressive, threatening performance by the main guy ‘Steve’ who mentioned calling the police more than once and spun a web of lies so baffling that I think we’re all a little concerned for his health. Honestly the most shocking experience ever! Sending strength to the team who work here.. and pray for Steve! Really though, watch you don’t get stung by incorrect charges on group bookings here by clarifying everything in writing NOT over the phone - we lost close to £100 despite spending nearly four times that and we were treated horribly which has left a nasty taste in quite a few mouths. Such a shame!

Lovely country setting, nice welcoming atmosphere, we had the roast which was really delicious, this is one of our favourite venues. Lovely ambience today (Sunday) despite a large party causing problems for staff by turning up very late for their booking etc. we really felt for them but they coped with it really well and look forward to our next visit.. it’s 5 stars from us and very well earnt on this occasion.. many thanks once again.

All our Yorkshire puddings were burnt and the cut of lamb they gave me had the most fat and gristle I've ever seen in a pub roast. Then my two year old kicked me in the head whilst I was trying to eat a tougher than average roast potato, which I can only assume he did for wasting our money in this pub. However, I assured him that we were having a lovely time with a big group of our wonderful friends, so it didnt matter that the food was a bit off and that we'd have been just as happy chatting away with a piece of dry toast and some tepid coffee in a chipped he-man mug from the back of the cupboard. That was until the end of the meal, when we were lied to by the staff and charged extra for people who didnt even show up, despite never confirming those people in the first place. I cant knock the gravy though. The gravy was great. The gravy was two stars great. After licking my own and someone elses plate I necked the rest of it straight from the jug and wandered out of the pub sucking lumps of it from my awful Dr.Robotnik 'tasche whilst trying to ignore the belligerent staff honking at my friends and ruining the atmosphere for everyone.

An extremely unpleasant experience. Very rude and stressed out staff. I had made a group booked and was constantly being told we need to leave by 2pm (which we were always going to do!). I had confirmed for 19 adults and some children and we had 18 people arrive. We were charged an extra £70 for missing people despite having paid over £350 for our food and drinks. Food was quite nice and the pub is in a lovely location it is a shame it was ruined by being treated very aggressively.

Really awful staff. There's a rude, aggressive, stressy and frustrated energy flowing through that place that needs urgent attention

Some of the worst service I have ever experienced. It’s a shame because it could be a lovely pub under different ownership.

Love this place..so close to Brighton but another world, but dies get busy. Love the squid

Peaceful friendly pub in a beautiful setting

Wednesday lunch with friends after a drive through the beautiful Downs, friends demolished 2 half chicken with vegetables, so I guess it was delicious,us not so hungry so we shared a Ploughmans only tiny criticism was cheddar cheese a bit meagre and uninteresting it would have been better with a choice of chunk of tasty stilton or maybe brie as £18 quite expensive for a slice of ham cheese, dips and crusty bread, but an enjoyable lunchtime, would go again, staff very nice, also a doggy friendly pub.

This pub is very pretty and in a perfect location to base yourself for a walk. Unfortunately I think they have capitalised on this and as a result overpriced what is average food. The service was incredibly slow. A ploughman's lunch was £18, so I was expecting an extremely nice ploughman's. However what I got was average at best. One of those bake in the oven baguettes, 2 bits of cheese, one slice of ham, a few crisps and some salad, two little bowls of pickle. Not even any picked onion! So, one ploughman's and a coke came to £21. I know it's hard for restaurants at the moment but I would have expected at the very least, some really nice bread on that ploughman's. My friends had a goats cheese tart and fish and chips which again, were ok but nothing to write home about.

Visited for a weekday lunch. Booked in advance but did not seem too busy when we arrived. Drinks served quickly but our starters took 45 mins to arrive. The fried squid tentacles and goats cheese tart were both very enjoyable. Our main dishes arrived about 20 Mins later. The fish and chips turned out to be three quite thin fish slices in coated in a thick batter. The chunky chips were very oily. My partners cheese burger was equally underwhelming.

Very relaxing atmosphere, polite and fast service, delicious food for a good price. Recommend

Top level walk and pub garden spot. Beer cracking and food good. Took well over an hour to get food served though, they were busy, I think they might have forgotten as it came out super fast after we raised with staff and arrived with lots of apologies. That aside we had such a nice time and weren’t bothered by the wait given the views in the background and great atmosphere. We’ll be back for sure

Lovely sunny day. Sat outside and had a drink in the tranquil garden, which has a stream running through it. Great pub, certainly will be returning soon.

chips and stuffing where scrumptious as was the cider :) Beautiful setting and friendly staff.

Great pub, fantastic beer garden

Lovely afternoon lunch for 6 of us. Not been for a while, so it was great to see an old favourite is as good as ever!

Lovely location. Characterful pub with good food and good selection of Sussex beers & friendly staff. Pretty garden with plenty of outdoor seating too.

Lovely garden and great choice of beers. The food was good and the staff friendly. Well worth a visit, especially welcome after the walk down the downs!

One of my favourite Sussex country pubs! Quaint and quiet with a massive selection of craft beers.

We stopped by for lunch and it was delicious. The staff were super friendly. We will be coming back.

Good quality food. Not cheap, but lovely garden in a great location. Park at Devil's Dyke and walk down.

Popped in on the off chance Saturday lunch time and were surprised to get a table. Good selection of local drinks ( some quite pricey ) with two ciders. Uncomplicated menu with most tastes catered for - we had half ribs and fish and chips which were a good size and well presented. Top garden shut but views are lovely this time of year

Was a birthday lunch unfortunately the flies around our food put us off! the meal was x2 ploughman's 1 portion of chips 1 pint local larger and a j20 which came to 52 pounds hmmm drinks arrived after food ploughman's wasn't great asked about the flies and was told due to the local stream hmmmmm just really disappointed as been told it was a great place wasn't really busy for a Monday young man serving us was very polite just don't want flies around my food which where all gathering by the window inside spent time walking my other half to get rid of flies just didn't seem clean sorry but that's how it was very expensive for what we had .....

Toast for breakfast Ryvita for lunch Cesar salad at the Shepard and Dog 2 hours after raging food poisoning. Not rushing back anytime soon.

we met at this pub yesterday and enjoyed location sitting outside on terrace menu very limited but am told good for vegans Waiter Will was very friendly as they seem to have more than one staff vacancy would return but not at weekends as parking a problem

Over 90 minutes before we got our 'booked in advance table' and the food arriving. But it was delicious. My advice. It's worth a visit but if eating take an early slot

Service slow, but it was very busy

Lovely pub tucked in the shadow of the South Downs. Great food a nice selection of beers as well as friendly staff.

Amazing pub with really good food and beer. The fish and chips, veggie burger, chicken wings were delicious. The pub has some tables outside and we had a great time