The Vat and Fiddle, Nottingham

A fairly large building fronting The Castle Rock Brewery, handily placed near the train station. There are thirteen handpumps of which the majority were serving Castle Rock beers of course but guest beers are also available, I tried Castle Rock Soft Focus which was fine. Forest were playing at home later in the day so there was a fair sprinkling of footie fans, there was still plenty of room early afternoon but maybe needs to be borne in mind. A decent place.

With time to spare between trains, I decided to take the 3-4 minute stroll from Nottingham railway station to the Vat & Fiddle, which is Castle Rock's brewery tap. It fronts the brewery, but even as a standalone pub, it is worthy of a visit in its own right. Drinking space curves its way around the long bar, which has around a dozen handpulls dispensing both Castle Rock beers and guests. Craft beers are also well represented. A Vault City takeover had recently been held and there was another one from Kernel looming large. Boxed ciders are also available. With plenty of staff on hand, service was fairly quick in the main. Hot snacks were also being served on my lunchtime visit. Standard Castle Rock beers on were Harvest Pale, Elsie Mo, Screech Owl, Preservation & Our House. Also from Castle Rock were Door of the Cosmos & Just Can't Get Enough. Guest ales were Loud Shirt Like Clockwork, Turning Point Swim To The Moon & Light of the Elder, Lenton Lane Pale Moonlights & Pentrich Crimes In Citra. Ciders were Weston's Old Rosie, Snail's Bank Rhubarb Cider, Torkard Floppy Tabs, Sneinton Fifth Element & Newton Court Original Farmhouse Scrumpy, whilst craft beers all from Vault City were Raspberry Blueberry Bubblegum Bottles, Maple Vanilla Choc Chip Stout, Even Cloudier Double Dry Hopped & Strawberry Supernova. My first visit here in just over 5 years, this is quite possibly Nottingham city centre's best pub. It is well worth missing a train for!

The Vat & Fiddle is Castle Rock’s Tap with picnic tables in the car park at the rear overlooked by the brewery behind. Seven of the twelve hand pumps were drawing CRB beers, I went for Bold as Love which was well served. The guests on during a recent Wednesday visit were Little Brewing’s Rambler, Northern Monk’s A Little Faith, Cloudwater & JW Lees’ Piccadilly Star and Redwillow’s Faithless. Standard, premium and craft keg was also available and there’s a food menu, the burger is priced at £13. The staff were all very friendly and I will certainly revisit when next in Nottingham.