Another String to the Bow Bar

Its time for another Bow Bar festival. Yippee. This one runs from the 21st of July to the 31st of July
Once again its a stellar beer list (and i will get to that later)

Now Pub festivals are an odd thing as they generally only have so many taps, so what makes them different from normal days. Well in the case of the Bow bar there is 2 main things, firstly the regular taps are given over to guest beers, so that increases the Guest list from 5 to 8 but much more importantly is footfall.

This may not be obvious at first, but for someone who can nip in most days during the festival you quickly notice that many of the taps seem to turn over about 50-100% faster than normal. So this means that each visit i am more likely to find something new. But the main advantage in increased footfall is in the ability to sell beers that they may have trouble selling during there normal trading. Now im a half pint man generally, but even the most hardy of drinkers tend to switch to a half pint when faced with a 8-10% beer. This means that in order to finish a cask of strong beer, the pub is probably looking at 4+ times the number of people choosing to try a strong beer than an average beer than people will drink several pints of. The increased foot fall means it is much more likely to find enough people who want to drink the stronger beer and since i like strong beer it means the Bow Festival is a great time to visit all be it that theres not quite so many strong beers as the winter festival.


and now the Festival list.

Acorn  - Ginger Nuts 4.2%
Allendale - Adder Lager 5.0%
Angus - Gowfers Gold 3.8% Mashie Niblick 4.2%
Art Brew - Spanked Monkey IPA 6.4%
Atlas - Wayfarer 4.5%
Belhaven - IPA 3.5%
Black Isle - Yellowhammer 3.8% Altered States 4.2%
Blue Monkey - Ape Ale 5.4%
Bristol Beer Factory - Bristol Stout 4.0%
Burnside - Black Katz 3.6% M-Pire 5.2%
Cairngorm - Black Gold 4.4%
Concrete Cow - Cloven Hoof Vanilla Stout 4.5%
Coniston - Bluebird Bitter 3.6%
Conwy Clogwyn - Gold 3.6%
Corvedale - St George's Stout 4.5%
Dark Star - Saison 4.5% Carafa Jade 5.0%
Deeside - L.A.F. 3.9% Talorcan 4.5% Macbeth 4.1%
Fyne - Jarl 3.8% Avalanche 4.5% Fiddlers Gold 4.3% Sublime Stout 6.8%
Green Jack - Orange Wheat 4.2%
Hammerpot - Shooting Star 3.8%
Hawkshead - Five Hop 5.0%
Highland - Island Hopping 3.9% Dark Munro 4.0% Highland IPA 4.8% Porter 9.0%
Hopback - Hop Medley 3.9%
Isle of Skye - Summer Blonde 3.8%
Kelburn - Quiver 4.2% Red Moor 4.3%
Little Valley - Ginger Pale 4.0%
Lymestone - Cowboy 4.2%
Marston Moor - Bee Orchid 3.9%
Natural Selection Brewing - Finch 6.5%
Naylors - Porticus Stout 4.1%
Nethergate - IPA 3.5%
Old Mill - Yorkshire Porter 4.4%
Ossett - Santiam 4.3%
Otley - O5 Gold 5.0% Outstanding White 5.0%
Potbelly - Streaky 3.6% Black Sun 5.0%
Red Fox - Fenwick Gold 4.2% Surrex Gold 4.2%
Rudgate - Niflheim IPA 4.4%
Saltaire - South Island Pale Ale 3.5%
Skinners - Sennen 3.8%
Stewarts. TBA
Strathaven - Lord Kelvin 4.7% Duchess Anne 3.8% Ginger Jock 4.0%
Tempest - Brave New World IPA 7% and (hopefully) some new brews…
Tinpot - Gold Pot 3.8% Marmalade Pot 5%
Traditional Scottish Ales - 80/ 4.2% Glencoe Wild Oat Stout 4.5%
Tryst - THT 3.9% Carronade 4.2% Raj IPA 5.5%
Upham - Nectar 3.8%
White Horse - Saracen IPA 4.5%
Williams - Birds and Bees 4.3% 4th July IPA 5.0%
Wold Top - Golden Summer 4.4%
York - Citra 4.0%

Highlights for me as always will be the Highland Orkney Porter. I just can stress how much i love this beer, and any new beer from Tempest is always worth looking out for. Rumour has it that Stewart will be doing another special beer for the festival so that should be good. Deeside Talorcan is on my ALWAYS drink list and all told there looks to be enough stouts and porters to keep any dark beer fan (me) happy.