Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Tag: Leopard

  • Thursday : Artefact Brewing at the Leopard in Norwich

    Thursday : Artefact Brewing at the Leopard in Norwich

    Back in Norwich and so an uneventful day other than for a couple of highlights that I’ll briefly mention.

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    OK, there are no shortage of photo from Lucy’s on Norwich Market on this blog, but this is really rather lovely food. Those meaty butcher sausages, topped with rich curry sauce and heaps of scraps. What a healthy treat! James and I should really go to other locations for lunch more often, but this quality keeps on calling and we’re not very adventurous.

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    I thought I’d take myself to the Leopard pub in the evening as they had a little bit of a tap takeover from Artefact Brewing from Bury St. Edmunds. I really like concepts like this, although being away so much I miss a fair few of them. They had four different beers on cask and so as I couldn’t decide, I had a third of each. I can sometimes make rapid and sensible decisions like that. They also had three or so keg options, I came back on a different day to try one of those, I think the only one that was left. I had already eaten, and was still full from my delicious chips earlier on in the day, but they had the Mr Ragu food truck type thing outside for those who wanted to pair their beer with some snacks.

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    From left to right (in both photos), these are the Amber Haze IPA, the Ixworth Blonde, the Session Pale and the Dark Mild. All perhaps inevitably tasting fresh, well-kept and at the appropriate temperature, they were all very delightful. Looking back at my Untappd scores, as I can’t remember everything (people like Nathan can tell me without checking what beer they had in 2017 and what condition it was in), I liked the Ixworth, Session Pale and Dark Mild equally, with my 3.75 scores. The Amber Haze IPA was for me the best of the lot, a 6.4% which had a richness of taste to it and a caramel aftertaste, all as good as this type of real ale is going to get for me.

  • Monday to Thursday : Unlimited Chicken Wings at Brewdog Norwich, a Free Whopper and Limited Progress at the Ferry Boat Inn

    Monday to Thursday : Unlimited Chicken Wings at Brewdog Norwich, a Free Whopper and Limited Progress at the Ferry Boat Inn

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    Another one of my little complaints, this is the disgrace (I like using strong words to reinforce my anger, even though it makes me sound inarticulate and odd) of the former Ferry Boat Inn, a pub operated by Greene King until they closed it in 2010. After a series of business plans which fell through, it’s now going to be turned into flats for students. There are so many similar developments in the city that I’m not sure where all these students are coming from. Anyway, the development has stopped again now due to some odd financial arrangements, so the site remains in flux. What this site would have made is a excellent pub which could have been one of the best in the city, with a long heritage since around 1820. Who knew? Anyway, in around ten years there might be some cheap flats here overlooking the river which will probably fall down in around thirty years.

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    My friend James mentioned that there were free Whoppers being dished out around the country by Burger King. I didn’t want him to be lonely when he went to get one, so I accompanied him to the new Norwich branch. I know that since hitting 30 I’ve become old, but I’m sure that Whoppers were better back in the day…… It was quite fiddly to order them using the app, but there was such a queue that anyone could realistically just walk in and say they had ordered one.

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    Inspired by this food excitement, James and I went to Brewdog in the evening for all you can eat chicken wings. I mean, no-one can say that I’m not classy? Whoppers and chicken wings? Very decadent. I’ve worked my way around most Brewdogs in the country, and indeed many Wings Wednesdays, as although it’s not the best food that the chain does, it’s sort of affordable (for them anyway) and I know I’ll eat enough.

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    James can eat more than I can, he’s nearly to 40 than I am (in terms of chicken wings consumed, not age), but they’re delicious, although that sauce is a little vinegary so it soon becomes quite challenging to eat them. We managed to persist for a couple of hours though, with the service being a little sluggish at first although it then picked up and extra wings came flying our way (there’s a pun there) at some pace. They were generous in letting us have two blue cheese sauces, they really something to the chicken wings, mainly by hiding the vinegar taste which is in the sauce.

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    We then shuffled along the road to the Leopard, which I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions is one of the best pubs in Norwich (although the dog is I know annoying more than just a few customers now), with their selection of keg and cask beers. I went for the Have Your Cake and Eat It from Three Blind Mice which was pleasant enough, but it didn’t have enough dessert taste for me to really like it and I slightly regretted getting an entire pint of it. Interesting beer though and the staff here were as friendly as ever, it’s a very laid-back pub and the beer options are well balanced.

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    And in a switch of drinking partner from James (who needed to go home to get over excessive chicken wing consumption) to Nathan (who was propping up another bar in another part of the city), I popped to the White Lion before we accidentally both went to the King’s Head for goodness knows how long. We had to discuss the delights of Gorleston for the big day out that we were planning, although I expect we got distracted and talked about some other unimportant thing that had annoyed us both.

    I’ve noted how food and drink obsessed this blog gets when I’m back in Norwich, but readers will just have to wade through this drivel….. At least the blog marches forwards several days at a time when I’m in the heart of Norfolk life, so there’s less to read.