It’s taken me a little while to start writing these up, but a few weeks ago, the delightful Roy and Jen, as well as myself, went to a number of pubs in Norfolk and to delight my two loyal blog readers, I thought I’d better write them up. This is the Black Lion Hotel and it has been a licensed premises since the mid eighteenth century. For a long time this was a Bullards pub, it got swept up in the Watney Mann estate before eventually being taken over by Enterprise Inns. It’s now owned by the small pub Pickled Inns company which also operates the Carpenters Arms in Wighton.
The earliest I can find the pub mentioned in newspapers was in the Norfolk Chronicle on 2 May 1778 when a meeting was held at the Black Lion to discuss how to deal with horse stealers. This is the historic equivalent of cars being stolen and it was a serious issue at the time, which explains why there around 80 subscribers to the committee who wanted to tackle the problem in the area. It’s easy to think that little changes, but on the same page on the newspaper there’s an update on the French joining in the American War of Independence.
On 4 April 1908, the pub was advertised by Bullards to let in the Downham Market Gazette with the text:
“Large posting trade. Good stabling accommodation and yard. Fine bowling green, bar, smoke room, commercial room, usual domestic offices, nine bedrooms”.
I’m not sure when it was decided to get rid of the bowling green, but there were regular matches played there in the early twentieth century.
There was a friendly welcome from the team member and there were bar snacks visible, which is always a positive start to proceedings. The front bar is more for drinkers and there’s a larger room at the rear which was busy with diners. I liked how they’ve differentiated this space so that drinkers and diners all felt that there was a place for them. The food menu is mainly traditional pub meals and the price point is towards the higher end of the scale, but it’s all generally well reviewed.
There were three real ales, although as this was such a warm day I did wonder how the pubs would cope with the beer temperature. This is a real challenge for pubs as even if the cellar is kept cold, there’s the danger that the beer in the lines gets warm before it’s poured and that’s even more evident for people like me who order half pints.
I opted for the Cheeky Jack from Moon Gazer, a rather lovely local brewery, and the beer was perhaps very slightly warmer than I would have ideally liked, but it was hoppy and had a pleasant orange flavour to it.
The front bar and it was all clean, tidy and organised. The pub also has six bedrooms and looking at the website, these looked comfortable and well appointed.
This was all a rather positive first pub of the day: decent beer, a choice of ales, a clean and comfortable environment and a friendly welcome. Most remarkably, Jen hadn’t annoyed me yet. Admittedly, it was still only the first pub.