"It's a Tap!" | What is a beer tap?

It’s a tap!

Not long ago, in a '64 Ford Galaxie right down the way…

A friend of mine told me he needed a “tap” for his bar, prompting the inevitable follow-up question: "What IS a tap?"

You see, “tap” means different things to different people in different areas of the universe. With some context, we may be able to decipher the actual required part, but to make life easier, we can reference this handy little chart below.

The On-Going Tap Debate

I believe most folks would assume the “tap” is the thing that you pour the beer out of. Traditionally, a wood keg or cask would have a spigot pounded into the side to get the beer out, making me suspect that the word “tap” might have been coined by the process of striking the spigot with a hammer? The kegs were then tipped onto their side, letting Earth's gravity do the rest.

So is the faucet the “tap” on a bar? Maybe…

A faucet is the modern day “spigot” or valve that allows the beer to be poured. But nowadays we use a pressurized gas to move the beer from a refrigerated cooler to the <ahem> “tap” in most bar’s beer dispensers or long-draw systems. The faucet is nowhere near the keg, and we wouldn’t “tap” the keg with a faucet. So the plot thickens.

So is the keg coupler the “tap”? Maybe…

The coupler is the piece we insert physically into the keg to allow the beer to come out, but there is no way to control the flow of beer with a coupler; no valve. I personally tend to think that the action of engaging the probe on the keg coupler, allowing the release of beer, is “tapping a keg,” but without the faucet, you’d be wearing beer instead of drinking it.

So a picnic pump is a “tap”, right? It has a valve AND inserts directly into the keg! Well, maybe...

I would agree it's likely the closest modern day equivalent to a traditional tap, unless you come across a brewery or tasting room that serves “cask ale” from the original design by pouring it out of a small keg using gravity. But picnic pumps “pump” air into the keg to create the pressure to get the beer out, which is still a little different.

In conclusion, I’m not sure there is a right answer to “what is a tap?”. It seems to depend on the beer delivery system, as well as the perception, experience, and tradition of the person asking. So it’s probably just best to refer to the part you need by calling it something else. And for that, feel free to consult this chart.

Cheers,
Paul the media nerd