Birmingham Brewing Company Tap Room, Birmingham

Sat on what seemed like a fairly desolate industrial estate on a Friday evening visit, the tap room for Birmingham Brewing Company is quite a large affair with plenty of seating, both inside and out. Once inside, it's not exactly easy to find the bar. Turn a few corners and you will eventually find it, unless you take a turn and end up at the toilets or in the brewery itself. We arrived to find all of the pumpclips for the cask beers turned around. Apparently, they were having problems with the cask for some reason. That still left us with an extensive keg selection of Birmingham Brewing Company Gold Brummie, Pale Brummie, Stout Brummie, Bitter Brummie, Hazy Brummie, Single Brummie - Elani, B30 Project Lemongrass Pale, Single Brummie - Nelson Sauvin & Kiwi Brummie & a collaboration between Birmingham Brewing Company and Always Balling called Iron Brew Sour. Unlike the Fixed Wheel Brewery Tap where we had been earlier, the taproom was quite warm and was fairly lively with a fairly young and trendy crowd. As we sat there, a band arrived and started to set up equipment in one corner near the bar. The cask beers also came back on (unlucky for me, as I'd already ordered a cold keg beer). This was Bitter Brummie, Pale Brummie & Single Brummie - Elani. Whilst the location did seem a bit unwelcoming, it's actually not too far from other breweries (such as Attic Brew Co), a few up and coming bars (e.g. Wildcat) and some more traditional pubs (I'm thinking the British Oak), which makes Stirchley a good place for a pub/bar/brewery crawl.

Probably all about timing... a miserable April day... 2pm on a Saturday afternoon and there were few punters. When there is no atmosphere you question why you are drinking in a factory with one other man and a family of four. Street food was available but the staff had given up manning the van and were sat on the benches. Beer was in fine condition (as you would expect) but I cannot think my 2/3 of Strong Mild (their limit, not mine) was going to help back for the electricity to fuel a ceiling mounted heater that could only be described at "Jet Engine". Will try again on a summers day.

Brewery tap out in an industrial estate but an easy walk from Stirchley's high street. The square bar area is almost as high as it's wide or long, but large enough for a small stage for live music (and the acoustics are better than one might expect from a shed). Glimpses of the brewery at the back can also be obtained through a part-glazed wall at the back and from the side corridor. I found three of the four handpumps in use, and I went for the 'kveik yeast special edition' of the Pale Brummie (£4.40). Other options included eight of their craft keg beers, four guests and five ciders.

A short stroll from the main road. Very busy when I called with most tables outside in use. A good range of 3 cask and 5 keg beers. I went for the Bitter Brummie on cask which was excellent. Card only. Well worth a visit.

Visited on 17.4.21. Table booking advisable, but we walked in and they found us a table ok. Plenty of seating in front of the brewery and a beer menu brought out. All Covid regs applied. We chose Beach Bum Brummie, Blueberry & Vanilla Sour, and Yankee Brummie. All were fine. Payment by card.