I am in the process of opening another restaurant, and wanted to get opinions here from the BA. In our current establishment, we have 24 taps, with only 1 nitro tap (Left Hand Milk Stout on since we opened and it is still popular). I am wondering what your thoughts are with regards to having them on draft when you go out drinking. I currently slotted 2 of the 24-30 taps we will have for nitro, but after thinking more, there are just so many good beers out there that arent produced that way, and it takes two taps away from the rotation. Just curious to see how many out there actually seek out beers on nitro, or what your thoughts are on the matter... thanks!
I don't see an occasion where I would order a NITRO beer at a bar, unless it was the only thing available
I agree with your second thought, you're limiting yourself in having 2 nitro faucets... OR, you could do what bars near me do, which is to just run other beers through them and call them "nitro". I heartily disagree with that, especially when the brewer hasn't intended their beer to be pushed that way, but you can see why they're doing it - they're already limited! If you know what you're doing, however, you don't have to be limited at all. It's fairly easy to set it up so that you can run either mixed gas or straight C02 to a specific keg/tap, and switching out the faucet is a cinch (you should be taking them off to clean them all of the time anyway, just cleaning the lines won't get out the gunk that can build up in there). So if you just run some extra hose with shut off valves and mark it properly you shouldn't have to give up anything at all! As to my personal tastes on nitro, I can take it or leave it. I'm a fan of English ales, and a cask-pour is what nitro was intended to mimic, so it's good for those. And I'll often find micros that have done a nitro version which can be interesting, but in general I'll go back to the standard version. To truly answer your question though, if I walked into a bar that had 30 taps, most likely those 2 nitro-tap beers would be the last ones I'd go for.
There are certain beers that are great in nitro, but not so much better than their regular counterparts. If I have a choice of left hand nitro or regular id choose nitro. But if you only had the regular and its what I want, I'm not complaining. The only exception to the rule is Guinness, in which nitro draft is the only acceptable choice... No cans or draught bottles etc In other words it doesn't add enough value if you have trouble stocking quality nitro drafts. Left hand milk stout and the new coffee porter are good on nitro, but not a ton else
Thanks for the comments so far... I think I have my answer, and truthfully, this is where I was leaning anyway after further consideration. Thanks!
I agree with the above, but a good stout on Nitro could be doable and sell well. Now a pump handle on a cask. May want to consider that for a second offering instead of the second Nitro.
I'll play contrarian here as I do enjoy nitro beers. CCB's Vanilla Maduro is awesome on nitro and sells very well here.
Hmmm... now the cask idea is something I havent thought of before. However, I have precisely ZERO experience with casks so far. Where would I go to get some kind of information on what it would require and "how-to's"? Does anyone here have any advice?
