Living in Canterbury beer drinkers are fortunate to be able to enjoy the ever-changing range of beers (2 x casks and 12 x kegs) at the Thomas Tallis Alehouse in Northgate. I make no apologies for my spirited defence of this pub in a response to a 'review' last month in the local paper. For drinkers who are not really into their craft beers the New Inn in Havelock Street, the CAMRA District Pub of the Year 2022, offers a good selection of more traditional cask ales. And just outside the city walls there is the Floc brewery and taproom on the Wincheap Industrial Estate blazing a trail with an increasing range of "hop-forward, delicious, flavourful beers". The citizens and students in Canterbury are fortunate to have the full gamut of beer making traditions on their doorstep. But what I want to reflect upon is the popularity and potential of the 'tap takeover' to enhance this beer drinking scene further.
This concept is a product of the craft beer revolution in the US which has spread to Europe and is now quite common. It is the result of microbreweries growing and expanding and the need to get their beers in front of a wider audience. As the name suggests the arrangement involves a deal with a pub to take over all or at least the majority of their taps for a day, weekend, or short period of time. From what you read it is clear not all drinkers welcome a tap takeover which I suppose is a fair criticism if it upsets you that your favourite and familiar pint is temporarily unavailable at your local pub. However, in my quest to sample as wide a range of beers as possible personally I see the prospect of a tap takeover quite attractive. In fact, the inspiration for this piece was a great night out last Friday at the Thomas Tallis where there was a tap takeover by the Heist Brew Co from Sheffield. Heist beers featured on 11 taps and, to be fair, there were still a couple of Kentish ales on cask. I had actually drunk my first Heist beer, a 6% NEIPA, Who did you queue for? back in September and had rated it highly so I knew what was in store. As you hopefully can see from list (below) it was a tempting selection of beers covering a wide range of styles and abvs. I can confirm that nos. 3,4,5, 10 and 11 went down very well - the watermelon sour (Big State Anarchy) and the imperial stout (Do you remember Fandango) being particularly memorable. As with all good tap takeovers the brewers were on hand to discuss and take consumer feedback on their beers. They were very proud of the watermelon sour, sharing photos on their phone of a pile of those huge ripe juicy green spheres that had gone into the mix.
A whole town tap takeover?
A step up from a single pub tap takeover though is when it extends to the whole town. Such events are getting some traction in the coastal towns of the south east of England where the Laine Pub Company launched the Brighton Tap Takeover weekend in 2016. This involved a coordinated takeover at 10 different venues in the town. This year (2022) the Brighton takeover is claiming to be the UK's biggest citywide beer festival, bigger and better than before with 22 pubs and 22 breweries participating over the weekend 11-13 November. A £20 ticket for the weekend gets you 4 free half pints in the pubs, £1 off any pint, and 50p off halves. There have also been citywide tap takeover weekends this year in nearby Hastings (October) and Worthing (April) too. In Hastings 15 craft breweries were paired with 15 participating pubs with an impressive lineup of first class craft breweries. What I like about this is there are no tickets or wristbands you just consult the map of participating venues and devise your own pub-crawl. Here is the map and list of craft breweries for the Hastings event last year. Not bad, eh?
So what about a Canterbury-wide tap takeover weekend in future? Well, here are 7 respected pubs / taprooms in the city that appear on the CAMRA Kent Region website followed by 7 of my favourite UK craft breweries. With a bit of goodwill I'm sure we could partner them up for a weekend of tap takeovers sometime in 2023!
Pubs/Taprooms
- The Thomas Tallis Alehouse in Northgate
- Pegasus Tap Room in St Dunstan's St
- The New Inn in Havelock St
- The Two Sawyers in Ivy Lane
- The Cherry Tree in White Horse Lane
- The Phoenix in Old Dover Rd
- The Unicorn in St Dunstan's St
Breweries
- Downlands Brewery, Small Dole, W Sussex
- MBH Mobberley Brewhouse, Mobberley, Cheshire
- Three Blind Mice Brewery, Little Downham, Cambs
- Burnt Mill Brewery, Ipswich
- Disruption is Brewing, Camberley, Surrey
- Black Iris Brewery, Nottingham
- Wiper and True, Bristol
- DEYA Brewing Company, Cheltenham
- Northern Monk, Leeds
- Verdant Brewing Co, Penryn, Cornwall
- Cloudwater Brew Co, Manchester
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