The Duke of Wellington, Norwich

Another fine backstreet alehouse to the North of Norwich city centre, the Duke of Wellington is a smartly presented pub with one of the city’s widest ale ranges. You enter into a nicely appointed carpeted room with an L-shaped servery to the right. The bar has a dark wood counter and the bar back allows you a glimpse into the taproom behind. Walls are half panelled with a decent paint job above and there is a brick fireplace over to the right with a beer board above it and various pictures of the eponymous Iron Duke dotted around. A brick chimney breast in the centre of the room hints at a previous layout and has some interesting stained glass panels and brewery mirrors adorning it. A mix of pew, chair and low stool seating fills much of the space and at the right hand end of the bar there is a tiny room, presumably the former bottle and jug, called ‘Kay’s Snug’, with room for just one solitary table. The main room extends down the left hand side, passing a row of windows with books stacked up on their sills and a large wagon wheel used as a partitioning screen, before emerging into a split level space, slightly darker than the rest of the pub, but with plenty more seating options. An attractive, partly covered patio garden can be accessed from back here, where ample seating is available. Music played quietly throughout my stay and the place was pretty peaceful, with just a few old timers chatting away at the bar on my Saturday lunchtime visit. The beer range is pretty daunting for even the most seasoned drinker, with a range of ales that takes a fair bit of perusing before you feel ready to pick one. Here, the blackboard becomes an essential tool, as the handpulls only tell half the story – most beers are racked up in the taproom behind the bar. Options on this visit were Wolf Mad Wolf, Edith Cavell, Sly Wolf, Lupus Lupus, Golden Jackal and Sheep’s Clothing, Slater’s Queen Bee, Oakham JHB, Citra, Scarlet Macaw and Bishop’s Finger, Highland The Duke, Tirrel Old Faithful, City of Cambridge Parker’s Piece, Saltaire Cascadian Black, Herts Lord of the Glen, Coach House Gunpowder Mild, Cheddar Potholer and Bingham’s Brickwork Bitter. Three real ciders were also listed. The beers from Wolf Brewery were all on handpull, whilst the rest were served on gravity. I tried the Queen Bee which was excellent and went down very nicely. The pub also had a banner up for a beer festival which was due to start in the coming weeks, although most would consider their permanent range of up to 22 ales to be a festival in itself. This is a great pub for the beer drinker, offering such a diverse and extensive range of ale that you need hardly seek out any other venue to satisfy your tastes. The place is comfortable, the welcome was friendly and the locals seemed pretty entertaining. This is one of several outstanding pubs in this part of town and deserves more than the one-pint visit I afforded it, in order to fully appreciate all it has to offer.

Date of visit - April 2013 Outside the ring road in a residential area to the north of the City Centre is The Duke of Wellington, a prominent brick built street corner community local. It’s a former Lacons house Inside, we find a comfortable, traditional, low ceilinged carpeted pub with a number of adjoining areas served from a single, central three sided bar counter. There’s something of a slightly old fashioned and worn feel to the place. There’s a few Duke of Wellington photos, but no real attempt to create a theme and, on the whole, it’s a somewhat unremarkable interior. Although I did note a rather unappetising selection of rolls and pies on an old fashioned Perspex covered tray on the bar counter, you’re allowed to bring in your own takeaway food with plates and cutlery provided. Reflecting its community focus, Tuesday night is music night, featuring the Von Krapp Family Band ( I kid you not ) There’s a good selection of real ale here with a number of handpumps supplemented by beers on gravity, kept in an unusual glass fronted tap room behind the bar counter. On my recent April visit, there was a clear emphasis on beers from the Wolf Brewery which included, as special offer beer of the month, Tasmanian Wolf ( 5.2% ABV ) at £ 2.50p a pint. Other beers came from Oakham and Green Jack and also, notably, included London Pride and Sheps Spitfire. Unusually perhaps, for a side street pub out of the centre, there’s a good range of speciality bottled beers. The pub is a CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular and past local award winner. Like a number of Norwich’s GBG listed pubs, it’s outside the City Ring Road and you won’t therefore come across it by accident, but I’d be happy to make the effort and track it down again if the opportunity arose.

Another gem that can't be missed out when visiting Norwich. This proper traditional pub had 14 ales on gravity and 6 on handpump on our visit and their range of ales were to everyone's taste. I rated it a 9 initially, but is most worthy of a 10.

Love this pub that features in the 2013 Good Beer Guide. It is friendly and has a brilliant range of beers. As well as those on the bar they have a whiteboard with a list of beers served direct from the cask in a glass room behind the bar. Very well organised and great beer too. We enjoyed Green Jack Orange Wheat and a stout. They have a quiz night and folk night, and there is an annual beer festival. Number 16 bus from the city serves the pub.

The Duke of Wellington is a pretty ordinary looking pub from the outside but once inside it is far from ordinary. The pub has got one room which is L shaped and goes back quite a bit,the room is carpeted throughout and had comfortable bench seating and had a country pub feel to it. There is what looks like a glass room behind the bar this room houses barrels on stillage 10 on my visit all with different beers on and the bar has got about 6 pumps on which were all in use,i had a drink of Wolf in Sheeps Clothing and this was a really nice well kept drink,the other beers i noted were Salopian Treasure Trove/Red Herring,Oakham Bishops Farewell,Dorset Jurassic,Milestone Lions Roar,Green Jack Summer dream,there were many more beers on most of which i would be happy to try. The pub was fairly busy and had a very nice atmosphere,this is a pub i would happily stay in for a long session. This pub is well worth a visit. Pub visited 30/6/2012