by Adam Williams

A new Kent brew will be on tap at a Canterbury city centre pub from today (Friday).

Fortitude, an amber-coloured bitter from Hersden micro brewer the Wantsum Brewery, will be served up at the Phoenix in Old Dover Road.

Landlady Linda Barker took delivery this week of the first set of casks from head brewer James Sandy.

She said: “We always have plenty of guest ales available here and many come from local brewers, so it’s great to be helping out another new name.
“Fortitude is a very smooth pint, with a nice hoppy finish, so I reckon it will go down well with customers here.”

Father-of-five Mr Sandy, from Sandwich, made the career change into brewing earlier this year, after 16 years as a team leader at Pfizer.

He said: “I took redundancy in May as I was kind of at the right age and decided to give brewing a real go as it’s always been a passion of mine.”

Three other brews from the Wantsum Brewery are also on the production line, including an IPA called 1381, due to be in 10 pubs across Canterbury, Dover, Deal and Sandwich in the next couple of weeks.

Mr Sandy, 44, said: “All being well, all four of my brews should be available in pubs by the end of this month.

“Along with Fortitude and 1381, there’s Turbulent Priest, a coffee and chocolate flavoured ale, and Black Pig, which is adapted from an original imperial Russian porter recipe.

“They’re all at various different stages of the brewing process at the moment, but 1381 will be available at the Phoenix in a couple of weeks time.”

For more information on The Wantsum Brewery, call 0845 0405980 or emailwantsumbrewery@googlemail.com