Fire Engine pub in Cornwall reopens at Marazion with Matt Ferguson

The Fire Engine Inn at Marazion has been taken over by pub landlord Matt Ferguson and his team, who also have the Queen’s Arms at Breage and, until recently, the Three Tuns at St Keverne for five years.

With views over to St Michael’s Mount both inside and from the beer garden, the St Austell Brewery pub is named after the mine engine house on the site prior to 1780.

Having been closed since just after Christmas, the pub reopened Mother’s Day weekend, with a welcome evening for locals giving them a chance to try samples of the pub’s new menu and a free pint of Tribute.

The bar area at the Fire Engine

Matt and his head chef Matt Hitchens have now launched a full new menu, including a range of locally-sourced meat, seafood – which travels just six miles from port to table, direct from Newlyn – and vegan dishes, as well as pizzas, and a children’s menu created by the landlord’s six-year-old daughter.

Matt said: “We feel privileged to be able to get behind the bar of such a well known and historic pub, alongside all the other quality pubs and restaurants in the town.

“We have received such a warm welcome from local residents already and we can’t wait to get to get to know them better.

“Our ambition is to be a real community pub for Marazion, simply serving good quality pub food and well-kept ales.”

Head chef Matt Hitchens preparing to send out food to customers

By popular request, the Fire Engine is reintroducing pub quiz night, taking place every Monday from 8.30pm all year round, and is already planning a series of event nights during the summer, including music from popular folk singer Will Keating and Irish folk band Black Velvet.

Matt, who lives in Helston, began his career in the hospitality industry aged just 18, and has worked in some of Cornwall’s best known establishments. Beginning as a waiter at the Halzephron Inn at Gunwalloe, he moved on to be restaurant manager and assistant hotel manager of the Nansloe Manor in Helston.

In 2012 he joined the team at the Pandora Inn, Restronguet, as assistant manager, before becoming manager at the Norway Inn, Perranarworthal.

The downstairs Well Bar at the pub

He left in 2017 to take on his first pub as landlord, reopening the Three Tuns at St Keverne after a long period of closure and running it until the tenancy ended in March this year and the pub company took it back in-house.

Matt and his team also ran the Halfway House, between Helston and Falmouth, for a summer before it became a managed house for Punch Pubs.

The Fire Engine continues to have a sister pub in the Queen’s Arms at Breage, run by the same team.