Fat Cat's latest in new Norfolk heritage

Norwich and Norfolk, city and county, have suffered from the ravages of acquisitive national brewers more than any other area of Britain.

But flowers can blossom in a desert: there are now 20 small breweries in Norfolk and I had the pleasure of opening the latest one in Norwich last week.

The Fat Cat Brewing Company is the brainchild of Colin Keatley, owner of the acclaimed Fat Cat pub in Norwich that has twice won the National Pub of the Year accolade from the Campaign for Real Ale - the only pub to pick up the trophy twice.

Colin, an experienced licensee who ran large establishments in London before settling in Norwich, built a deserved reputation at the Fat Cat for serving as many as 15 regular cask ales along with a wide range of Belgian beers on draught and in bottle.

Now he has teemed up with legendary brewer Ray Ashworth, founder of Woodforde's Brewery. Ray was the man who put brewing back on the map in Norfolk when he launched Woodforde's in 1981. He had to retire for a while as a result of poor health but, thanks to his pioneering efforts, Woodforde's has grown to the status of a small regional and has won a dray-load of awards for the likes of Wherry Best Bitter, Nelson's Revenge and Headcracker.

I was delighted to see Ray back at the helm last week, looking fit and full of enthusiasm. His five-barrel plant is alongside Colin Keatley's latest pub, the Shed in Lawson Road in Norwich. The brewery is also known as Norfolk Cottage and Ray will fashion beers for other pubs in the region.

But, at present, he is concentrating on Fat Cat (3.8% abv) and Top Cat (5% abv) for the Shed, the Fat Cat and its sister pub in Ipswich.

The history of the Shed mirrors part of the sad history of brewing in Norfolk. The pub was owned and run for many years by Lacons, a large brewery based in Great Yarmouth that fuelled the throats of thirsty fishermen and holidaymakers. Lacons also sold beer in London and coastal towns along the east of England.

Lacons was taken over by Whitbread and, in the fashion of national brewers in the 1960s and 1970s, was promptly closed. Worse things were happening in Norwich, which enjoyed three substantial breweries, Bullards, Morgans and Steward & Patteson.

They were bought by the aggressively-expanding Watneys group in London, which itself was taken over and became the brewing arm of Grand Metropolitan. Bullards and S&P were quickly closed.

Morgans was dubbed the Norwich Brewing Company but when that site was also axed, NBC was transferred to that famous East Anglian brewing town of Northampton.

Watneys wasn't content to close just breweries. It went through Norfolk like a plague of locusts, closing pub after pub, often depriving large villages and small towns of all their drinking places.

The village of Stiffkey on the north Norfolk coast has gone down in folklore as the village that lost its three pubs and in quick succession its cricket, darts and football teams.

Meanwhile, the pub that is now the Shed was for several years a Whitbread outlet. When the group quit both brewing and pub owning, Adnams ran it as the Wherry for several years before selling to Colin Keatley. It has been renamed the Shed for the very good reason that, from the outside, it looks for all the world like a large shed.

But inside it is remarkably spacious, with a raised area where jazz and folk nights are staged.

The two beers brewed by Ray Ashworth for Colin Keatley are fashionably pale, and rich and fruity due to the use of American hops. Ray plans to produce some bronze and more traditionally English-style bitters under the Norfolk Cottage label.

Norwich, a fast-growing city, also enjoys the offerings of the Chalk Hill, Tipples and Winter's breweries, with Reepham, Wolf and Woodforde's just a few miles away.

As every schoolboy knows, a vacuum has to be filled. Watneys and Whitbread destroyed Norfolk's proud brewing traditions but only for a decade. Now beer is back, brewed by people fired by enthusiasm rather than a lust for profits.