Brewery Tap Cider Festival


The Brewery Tap in Ock Street, Abingdon is holding a Cider festival this weekend (Friday 25th June – Sunday 27th June).

It will feature 21 different ciders, including a rare breed of ciders from local sources and CAMRA award winners.

The full list of ciders and perrys along with tasting notes can be downloaded here

There will also be a selection of world beers, and a selection of interestingly flavoured sausages that have been very popular at the previous beer festivals.

Sunday afternoon should be good, watching England beat Germany whilst drinking some traditionally made real English ciders.

Various Updates on Abingdon Pubs

The Railway Inn in Culham has The Festival That Dare Not Speak It’s Name this weekend (Friday 28th May – Monday 31st). This is a charity event featuring lots of live music with proceeds going to Churchill Partners Cancer Research UK and Young Women’s Music Project.

The Flowing Well in Sunningwell has its beer festival starting this week (May 27th – June 6th). This coincides with the Sunningwell Festival.

The Brewery Tap was recently awarded Locale accreditation by the Oxford branch of CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) in recognition of it regularly serving beer from local breweries including the West Berkshire Brewery, White Horse Brewery and Vale Brewery…. and this weekend for the first time, Prospect from the Shotover Brewery. They also regularly have live bands on Sunday evenings. This bank holiday sunday they have Parallel Blondie. They will be holding a Cider and Sausage Festival on the last weekend of June (June 24th-27th) featuring around 20 real ciders and seasonal beers from around the world.

The Prince of Wales in Shippon now has 6 real ales served in excellent condition, including beer from the local Shotover Brewery. The kitchen has now been refurbished, and there is also live music there most saturdays, and occasionally some Morris dancers and folk musicians during the week.

The Plough in Stert Street remains shut.

The Broad Face serves 3 beers from the Greene King guest range in good condition. There is a regular jazz music session on Sunday afternoons starting at 4pm and sometimes some live music on thursdays. They are in the early stages of planning a beer festival in September.

The Spread Eagle on Northcourt Road is serving beer from Greene King range in very good condition and also has an interesting menu.

The Boundary House on Oxford Road has built a fenced-in family area, although currently it only features a small sand pit, but it does stop children running off the beer garden into the busy road.

The Old Anchor is having a beer festival in July. I’ll post more details when I get them.

The Kings Head and Bell is in early stages of planning a beer festival on the August bank holiday weekend (August 28th-30th), which will include beer from the local Appleford brewery and Hook Norton and possibly demonstrations of traditional coopers (barrel makers) and Hook Norton’s Shire Horse drawn dray

The Loose Cannon Brewery has suffered some delays getting up and running, but is expecting to do some trial brews over the next month.

Stocks Bar May Day Weekend Beer Festival

The Stocks Bar has a beer festival this weekend, starting on Friday 30th April and running until Monday 3rd May.

They expect to be offering a range of approximately 30 ales and ciders.

You can get more info from their facebook page or main website at www.crownandthistle.com

The Stocks Bar is at the Crown & Thistle Hotel, 18 Bridge Street, Abingdon, OX14 3HS

In recent months following changes of bar management the Stocks Bar has been up and down regarding its beer range, but recently it seems back on track again with a good range of beers including local beers from Witney based Brakspear, Wychwood and Grove based Pitstop, as well as guest beers from further afield such as Jennings. So let’s hope that this beer festival goes well and is a sign of good things to come.

The List of beers is:

  • Snecklifter 5.1%
  • Cockerhoop 4.6%
  • Mans Bitter 3.9%
  • Old Empire 5.7%
  • Fortyniner 4.9%
  • Old Thumper 5.6%
  • Marstons EPA 3.6%
  • Hobgoblin 4.5%
  • Oxford Blue 4.0%
  • Brakspear Bitter 3.4%
  • Dragon Tale 4.5%
  • Boondoggle 4.2%
  • Oxford Gold 4.0%
  • Stickle Pike 3.8%
  • Normans Conquest 7%
  • Golden Arrow 4.5%
  • Grumpling 4.6%
  • SaracenIPA 4.5%
  • Dragon Hill 4.2%
  • Bitumen 10%
  • IPA Indianapolis 7%
  • Star 3.8%
  • Jumping Jack Flash 3.9%
  • Dr Hectors Healer 5.0%
  • Mags Mild 3.8%
  • Gravitas 4.8%
  • Old Father Thames 3.4%
  • Tom Fool 4.0%

Brewery tap beer cider & sausage festival this weekend, 4th – 6th december

The Brewery Tap Beer, Cider & Sausage Festival started this afternoon (Friday 4th December) and will run until close on Sunday evening. The pub is located on Ock Street in Abingdon.

There are 30 different real ales, 8 ciders and 20 different types of sausage, including Steak & Marmite and other interesting flavours.

There will be live music on Sunday afternoon. Additionally on Sunday, anyone showing a CAMRA membership card will be offered a discount on beer prices

The beer list has a good range, including many local beers from breweries such as Pitstop, Vale, West Berkshire, White Horse as well some from further afield. I particularly recommend you try some of the Pitstop beers as they are unlike anything else you will have ever tried (Try the Sump in half pints as it is very strong… and on Friday was amongst the most popular). The complete beer and cider list is reproduced below:

Brewery Beer Name
Morland Original
Hardy & Hansons Bitter
Hardy & Hansons Rocking Rudolph
Greene king Abbott Reserve
Greene king IPA
White Horse Wayland Smithy
White Horse Blackhorse porter
White Horse Rudolph the red nose reindeer
White Horse Village Idiot
West Berkshire Brewery Magg’s Mild
West Berkshire Brewery Alecost
Vale Brewery Grumpling
Vale Brewery Gravitas
Vale Brewery Black Beauty Porter
Vale Brewery Black Swan Mild
Banks & Taylor’s Autumn Porter
Mauldons Black Adder
Lancaster Amber
Hoggley’s Resevoir Hogs
Ossett Big Red
Ossett Treacle
Banks & Taylor’s Two brewers Bitter
Titanic Chocolate and Vanilla Porter
Stonehenge Great Bustard
Cannon Brewery IPA
Hook Norton Steam on
Limestone Stone Cold
Pitstop Sump
Pitstop Grandprix
Pitstop Monaco
Ciders:
Thatchers Cheddar Valley 6.0%
Westons Old Rosie 7.3%
Westons Country Perry4.5%
Westons 1st Quality 5.0%
Millwhites Premium Whiskey Cask Cider 7.5%
Millwhites Organic single orchard 6.7%
Millwhites Single variety Dabinett 8.0%
Millwhites Single variety Kingston black 7.0%

New Brewery for Oxford

Shotover Brewery Logo

A new craft micro brewery called the Shotover Brewing Company is due to
open soon in converted stables in Horspath just outside Oxford. The
owner and head brewer Ed Murray has been craft brewing for over twenty years
and has made the decision to turn his interest into a commercial venture.
It is anticipated that beer will be on sale by the end of November.

There are photos of stables being converted into the brewery on their facebook group and their main web site is at www.shotoverbrewing.com.

I am hoping that one of the Shotover beers will be at the Brewery Tap‘s Winter ‘Beer, Cider & Sausage’ festival on Friday 4th December – Sunday 6th December. This festival promises 30 different cask ales, 5 real ciders. The Big Boys Blues Band will be playing live on the Sunday from 4pm.

Note to any publicans reading this… I don’t intend to only mention the Brewery Tap and the Stocks. There are many other good pubs in Abingdon including Nags Head, Spread Eagle, White Horse, Cross Keys, Punchbowl, Plough, Broad Face. If you have any news, information on guest beers, festivals, etc, then please let me know and I’ll post it here.