Pork pies, Scotch Eggs and Timothy Taylor beer? Definitely maybe.

The Beekeeper – Best of Bondi British

The Beekeeper is a modern British pub at Bondi Beach, within a short walk of the sand and surf.

You can turn up barefoot with a board under your arm and a dog – even if you are here to eat a Patchett’s Pork Pie and drink some Timmy T. In other words, it’s a slice of England in Bondi, but you’re not about to see the locals turn up in anoraks.

Bondi’s Oldest Sandstone

Sit outside on the deck at The Beekeper or on Hall Street itself, on one of the big, shared tables and people watch. You can also find a booth if you cram inside (The Beekeeper is heaving on the weekends).

The Beekeeper is inside Bondi’s oldest sandstone building at 45 Hall Street. The pub itself is part of the heritage-listed Fellworth Flats, which dates back to 1910.

Beekeeper History

Pressed metal ceilings and a working fireplace add to the traditional old-fashioned British pub atmosphere.

Owners Ben Campbell and Brendan Darcy, who met behind a Manchester bar – have kept the usual old-fashioned charm of the British boozer alive.

Judging by the queue at the bar when we visited on Sunday afternoon, Bondi locals in sarongs and surf shorts can’t get enough of it.

The two hoteliers have imported menus normally seen in Manchester; the shared plates of Scotch Eggs and chipolata sausages for example.

The Manchester Bee in Sydney

The name itself is a nod to Manchester and its worker bee, the city emblem. The bee represents the hive of industry.

There was once a Beekeeper pub in Beeston, Nottinghamshire, too. That bee has flown, but at Bondi Beach, there is still a new buzz about the name.

A Pub in Old Flat Country

At one point Bondi Beach was “flat country”, as the novelist Peter Corris called it, “with big blocks of flats, small ones and divided houses”, often owned by Eastern European migrants.

Fellworth Flats today is a survivor of that time and The Beekeeper which fronts it, seems likely to run until the beer also runs dry.

The pub scoops up homesick Brits. Hall Street is a huge catchment area for British visitors to Bondi Beach as it is home to the ‘house of parcels from home’ – Bondi Beach Post Office at number 20 – which is also heritage-listed. It dates from 1922.

The street is named for Edward Smith Hall who co-founded the Sydney Monitor newspaper and snapped up the land.

The Bees’ Knees

We enjoyed a round of Bees’ Knees cocktails and some Beef Cheek Bites in the Sunday sunshine outside.

We then moved onto the hand-pumped beer (Keepers Cask, a 5% brew made in Newtown) which was excellent.

The Indie mix music was loud. (Way too loud, so we moved onto the street) but this is a great place to go for shared plates on sunset.

Gaze on the setting sun and enjoy tipples or Timothy Taylor Boltmaker; that famous Yorkshire bitter with its own pedigree.

The Patchett’s Pies on the menu are made in Sydney by Sue Patchett who served her apprenticeship in Yorkshire, bringing her secret recipe all the way back to Australia 40 years ago.

Sue’s hot-water crust pies are also in David Jones. No wonder good food lovers and homesick Brits alike are swarming to The Beekeeper.

Holiday Goddess editors pay their own way, when they play or stay.