A note about the breweries in this guide

Norfolk is home to many more breweries than the eight featured here. This isn't intended to be a definitive directory of every brewery in the county. Instead, it reflects the Norfolk breweries we currently work with and whose beers you'll find on the shelves at The Norfolk Deli.

Our selection is deliberately quite personal.

As a small independent deli, we're naturally drawn towards smaller independent breweries and beers that give us something interesting to talk about. Sometimes that's provenance — a beer brewed using barley grown virtually alongside the brewery. Sometimes it's a beautifully made version of a traditional British beer. And sometimes it's a brewer experimenting with an unusual ingredient, hop, fermentation method or flavour that makes us think we need to try that.

We don't need our beer shelves to replicate the selection available in a supermarket. We'd rather use the space to showcase Norfolk breweries, interesting beers and the people making them.

So this is not a guide to every Norfolk brewery.

It's a guide to some of the Norfolk breweries we've chosen to work with, the beers we stock, and why we think they're worth discovering.

The Norfolk Beer Guide: Norfolk Breweries, Local Beer & Where to Buy It

Norfolk is famous for its coastline, big skies, agriculture and exceptional local food. But there is another Norfolk speciality increasingly worth discovering: Norfolk beer.

The county is home to an extraordinary variety of independent breweries producing everything from traditional bitters and golden ales to modern IPAs, farmhouse beers, wheat beers, stouts and crisp contemporary lagers.

Norfolk also has something particularly important to brewing growing in its fields: barley.

That means the connection between Norfolk agriculture and Norfolk beer can be remarkably short. At some breweries, barley grown virtually alongside the brewery eventually finds its way into the beer being poured into your glass.

But there isn’t really one particular “Norfolk beer style”.

And that’s precisely what makes Norfolk beer so interesting.

Where can you buy Norfolk beer?

The Norfolk Deli in Hunstanton stocks a wide selection of beers from independent Norfolk breweries, available to buy from our shop and online for delivery across the UK.

Our changing Norfolk beer collection includes beers from Ampersand Brew Co., Duration Brewing, Moongazer, East Quay Brewing Company, Barsham Brewery, Malt Coast, Stump Rat Brewing Co. and Lynn Brewery.

Rather than stocking the same multinational beer brands available from virtually every supermarket, we deliberately use our shelves to showcase independent breweries and beers with a genuine connection to Norfolk.

Because our range comes from small independent producers, individual beers change throughout the year. Seasonal beers arrive, limited batches sell out and breweries regularly create something new.

So, what does Norfolk beer taste like?

There isn’t an answer. And there shouldn’t be. Norfolk beer can be a traditional bitter. 

• It can be a crisp lager brewed beside fields of Maris Otter barley.
• It can be a hop-forward American-style pale ale.
• It can be a stout, wheat beer or farmhouse ale.
• It can even be a lager brewed with Japanese rice.

What connects the best Norfolk breweries isn’t a particular flavour. It’s independence, provenance and personality. These are breweries run by people rather than enormous multinational drinks companies.

• Many brew in relatively small batches. 
• Some grow their own ingredients.
• Others experiment with styles that would probably never survive a supermarket buying committee.

And that creates choice.