Anyway, to show there were no hard feelings, Dick invited me over to view Nethergate's brand new brewery. The original premises in Clare had been outgrown by the brewery's continuing success so the operation has moved a few miles down the road to Pentlow, just outside Cavendish. This is technically in Essex rather than Suffolk but for obvious reasons Nethergate prefer to be labelled a Stour Valley rather than an Essex Brewery.

The brewery occupies a set of former farm buildings giving loads of space for the brewery itself, the barrel store, the offices and a separate warehouse for Nethergate's flourishing wine business. Some of the brewing equipment has come from Clare but much is new, including a mighty new copper and an underback. Of particular interest are three 25-barrel fermenting vessels rescued from the former Cooks brewery in Halstead where they last saw use in 1976!

An obvious consequence of all this is a vastly increased capacity - they can now manage 200 barrels a week if need be, as against around 80 at Clare. Head Brewer Tom Knox is also convinced that quality and consistency will improve which, given how excellent Nethergate's beers have always been, is an exciting claim for us beer lovers. There is scope too for a degree of self-sufficiency here as there's a borehole which could be brought into use whilst the farmer who owns the 100 acre field next door proposes planting it with Maris Otter Barley. Space has been allocated on the site for growing hops as well.

When I visited at the end of March, brewing had only just begun, the first beer being a new 4.3% affair called Mad Bob. The existing range of ales will all continue as will the regular specials. It's always tricky to replicate tastes when a brewery moves but a brewer of Tom's skill and experience will surely get it sorted.

After the visit we repaired to Clare for an excellent drop of the aforesaid Suffolk County in The Bell, which ironically (given what I said in the opening paragraph) is a Greene King pub (and it was also nice to bump into Nethergate's founding brewer, Ian Hornsey, there).

Paul Ainsworth