Riverside Pub in Limehouse: The Grapes, 18+ and No Booking

The Grapes, at 76 Narrow Street, Limehouse, London E14 8BP, does not take table reservations and does not admit anyone under 18, so the whole visit is a walk-in. Doors open at 12 pm every day, closing at 11 pm Monday to Saturday and 10:30 pm on Sunday. The pub says it has stood on Limehouse Reach for nearly 500 years, and it appears, scarcely disguised, in the opening chapter of Charles Dickens's Our Mutual Friend.

The pub's history page quotes the novel directly, describing a tavern of dropsical appearance that has long settled down into a state of hale infirmity. Dickens first visited Limehouse in 1820 to see his godfather and knew the district well for forty years. In the back parlour the pub keeps a complete set of Dickens for further reading, which is a neat touch for anyone who arrives with the book in their bag.

Dickens is only one of the writers the pub claims. Its history page also lists Oscar Wilde in The Picture of Dorian Gray, Arthur Conan Doyle, who sent Sherlock Holmes in search of opium, and more recently Peter Ackroyd with Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem. In Elizabethan times, the page says, Sir Walter Raleigh set sail on his third voyage to the New World from directly below the pub.

The main room is a traditional Victorian long bar with wooden panelled dado and warm burgundy walls hung with oil paintings. It leads into The Dickens Snug, where the author is reputed to have danced on the tables, and then to a small, heated terrace that hovers over the Thames. The pub describes the terrace as perfectly appointed, and it is the seat to aim for on a clear evening.

Upstairs is a casual drinking room overlooking what the pub calls one of the great views of London. Canary Wharf is on the left and the City of London on the right, both reflected in the river after dark. The walls carry a Napier Hemy oil painting of the pub seen from the Thames, watercolours of Limehouse Reach by Louise Hardy and a Nick Cuthell picture titled Dickens at The Grapes.

Two rules decide how you plan this one. The pub states plainly that it is unable to take table reservations, so there is no booking to make and no table to hold. It also says that, due to licensing restrictions, it can only welcome guests over the age of 18. If your group includes children, choose a family-friendly pub instead, such as The Crabtree in Fulham, which lists itself as family friendly.

With no bookings, your tactic is timing. Arrive when the doors open at 12 pm on a weekday, or in the gap between lunch and the after-work crowd, and head for the terrace or the upstairs room before they fill. On a Friday evening or a sunny Saturday expect to stand in the long bar for a while. If it is too full, the pub's own advice is simply that it cannot hold a table for you, so come back later.

The bar menu on the pub's website runs from small plates to its famous fish and chips. Small plates such as marinated olives, fried calamari with spicy aioli, whitebait with tartar sauce and lamb and mint koftas are £5.00 each, and a bowl of chunky chips is £6.00. Toasted sandwiches with chunky chips, such as honey ham and cheddar, are £8.95 and are served Monday to Friday from 12:00 to 15:30.

For a proper meal, the classic fish and chips, lightly battered haddock with mushy peas, chips and mixed salad, is £19.50, the same price as the cheese burger. The pie of the day with chunky chips is £16.95 and the smoked haddock and salmon fishcakes are £18.50. Desserts such as apple crumble with custard or ice cream are £7.50. All items are subject to availability, as the menu itself notes.

If you are choosing one dish, the fish and chips is the logical order in a pub on a tidal river, and the pub itself calls it famous. Skip the toasted sandwich if you want the full experience, since it is a weekday lunch item. Order food and drinks at the bar, and find your seat after rather than before, because the room fills in the order people arrive.

Limehouse was first settled as one of the few healthy areas of dry land among the riverside marshes, according to the pub's history page. By the time of Queen Elizabeth I it was at the centre of world trade, and the explorer Sir Humphrey Gilbert lived there. Samuel Pepys recorded a trip to the lime kilns at the jetty just along from the pub in his 1661 diary entry.

Narrow Street is also associated with painters. Francis Bacon lived and worked a few doors along from the pub, and Whistler painted a nocturne of Limehouse. The Grapes survived the Blitz bombing of the Second World War and, the pub says, retains the friendly atmosphere of a local for Limehouse residents, where visitors are always welcome in the bars and the upstairs room.

The pub's website lists Sir Ian McKellen among its leaseholders, together with Sean Mathias and Evgeny Lebedev, and Paul Mathias as manager. The company behind it is The Pies Pub Ltd. That ownership is part of the pub's appeal for theatre fans, but it is not a reason to expect celebrity sightings, and you should go for the building, the view and the fish and chips rather than the cast list.

The Grapes is at 76 Narrow Street, Limehouse. Pub hours are Monday to Friday 12 pm to 11 pm, Saturday 12 pm to 11 pm and Sunday 12 pm to 10:30 pm. There are no table reservations and no entry for under 18s. The website is thegrapes.co.uk, and it also lists a pub quiz page for regulars.

After your drink, walk along Narrow Street beside the river to look at the other old house fronts and the water at Limehouse Reach. If The Grapes is full, The Gun in Docklands is another Thames pub, and it does take bookings. Save the upstairs window for dusk, when the pub says Canary Wharf and the City sparkle in the reflection of the river.