Ale taster

Beer has been brewed in England for thousands of years. As a beer brewing country, it is known for top fermented cask beer (also called real ale) which finishes maturing in the cellar of the pub rather than at the brewery and is served with only natural carbonation.

English beer styles include bitter, mild, brown ale and old ale. Stout, porter and India pale ale were also originally brewed in London. Lager-style beer has increased considerably in popularity since the mid-20th century. Other modern developments include consolidation of large brewers into multinational corporations; growth of beer consumerism; expansion of microbreweries and increased interest in bottle conditioned beers.

History

Romano-Celtic Britain

Brewing in what is now England was probably well established when the Romans arrived in 54 BC, and certainly continued under them.

In the 1980s, archaeologists found the evidence that Rome's soldiers in Britain sustained themselves on Celtic ale. A series of domestic and military accounts written on wooden tablets were dug up at the Roman fort of Vindolanda, at Chesterholm in modern Northumberland, dating to between AD90 and AD130. They reveal the garrison at Vindolanda buying ceruese, or beer, as the legions doubtless did throughout the rest of Roman Britain, almost certainly from brewers in the local area.

One list of accounts from Vindolanda mentions Atrectus the brewer (Atrectus cervesarius), the first named brewer in British history, as well as the first known professional brewer in Britain. The accounts also show purchases of bracis or braces, that is, emmer wheat (or malt), doubtless for brewing. Quite possibly the garrison bought the malt, and hired a local brewer to make beer from it for the troops.


In Roman Britain, brewing, both domestic and retail, must have been widespread: remains indicating the existence of Roman-era malting or brewing operations have been found from Somerset to Northumberland, and South Wales to Colchester. In the third and fourth centuries AD Roman hypocaust technology, for supplying central heating to homes, was adapted in Britain to build permanent corn dryers/ maltings, and the remains of these double-floored buildings, with underground flues, are found in Roman towns as well as on Roman farms.

British brewing is generally thought to have been part of a wider Celtic tradition. Since this was well before the introduction of hops, other flavourings such as honey, meadowsweet (''Filipendula ulmaria'') and mugwort (''Artemisia vulgaris'') may have been used.

Middle Ages: Ale-wands, ale-wives and ale-conners

Beer was one of the most common drinks during the Middle Ages. It was consumed daily by all social classes in the northern and eastern parts of Europe where grape cultivation was difficult or impossible. Beer provided a considerable amount of the daily calories in the northern regions. In England, the per capita consumption was 275–300 liters (60–66 gallons) a year by the Late Middle Ages, and beer was drunk with every meal.

In the Middle Ages, ale would have been brewed on the premises from which it was sold. Alewives would put out an ale-wand to show when their beer was ready. The mediaeval authorities were more interested in ensuring adequate quality and strength of the beer than discouraging drinking. Gradually, men became involved in brewing and organised themselves into guilds such as the Brewers Guild in London. As brewing became more organised and reliable, many inns and taverns ceased brewing for themselves and bought beer from these early commercial breweries.

An ale-conner, sometimes "aleconner", was an officer appointed yearly at the court-leet of ancient English communities to ensure the goodness and wholesomeness of bread, ale, and beer. There were many different names for this position, which varied from place to place: "ale-tasters", ''gustatores cervisiae,'' "ale-founders", and "ale-conners". Ale-conners were often trusted to ensure that the beer was sold at a fair price. Historically, four ale-conners were chosen annually by the Common Hall of the City.

It is sometimes said that:

The Ale Conner was a type of early tax-man whose job it was to test the quality and strength of beer, not by quaffing, but by sitting in a puddle of it! They travelled from pub to pub clad in sturdy leather britches. Beer was poured on a wooden bench and the Conner sat in it. Depending on how sticky they felt it to be when they stood up, they were able to assess its alcoholic strength and impose the appropriate duty.

However, the accuracy of the colourful legend is doubtful.

1400–1699: Rise of hopped beer

The use of hops in beer was written of as early as 822 by a Carolingian Abbot. Flavouring beer with hops was known at least as early as the 9th century, but was only gradually adopted because of difficulties in establishing the right proportions of ingredients. Before that, a mix of various herbs called gruit had been used, but did not have the same conserving properties as hops.

In ''The Book of Margery Kempe'', Margery dictates her story to a scribe, and reports that in the early 15th century she attempted to brew beer in Bishop's Lynn, Norfolk, and makes other references to bottles of beer.

In the 15th century, an unhopped beer would have been known as an ale, while the use of hops would make it a beer. Hopped beer was imported to England from the Netherlands as early as 1400 in Winchester, and hops were being planted in England by 1428. At the time, ale and beer brewing were carried out separately, no brewer being allowed to produce both. The Brewers Company of London stated "no hops, herbs, or other like thing be put into any ale or liquore wherof ale shall be made – but only liquor (water), malt, and yeast." This comment is sometimes misquoted as a prohibition on hopped beer. However, hopped beer was opposed by some, e.g.

Ale is made of malte and water; and they the which do put any other thynge to ale than is rehersed, except yest, barme, or goddesgood hree words for yeast doth sophysticat there ale. Ale for an Englysshe man is a naturall drinke. Ale muste haue these properties, it muste be fresshe and cleare, it muste not be ropy, nor smoky, nor it must haue no wefte nor tayle. Ale shulde not be dronke vnder.v. dayes olde .... Barly malte maketh better ale than Oten malte or any other corne doth ... Beere is made of malte, of hoppes, and water; it is a naturall drynke for a doche utchman, and nowe of late dayes ecentlyit is moche vsed in Englande to the detryment of many Englysshe men ... for the drynke is a colde drynke. Yet it doth make a man fatte, and doth inflate the bely, as it doth appere by the doche mennes faces and belyes.

A survey in 1577 of drinking establishment in England and Wales for taxation purposes recorded 14,202 alehouses, 1,631 inns, and 329 taverns, representing one pub for every 187 people.

1700–1899: Industry and empire

The early 18th century saw the development of a popular new style of dark beer in London: porter. Before 1700, London brewers sent out their beer very young and any aging was either performed by the publican or a dealer. Porter was the first beer to be aged at the brewery and despatched in a condition fit to be drunk immediately. It was the first beer that could be made on any large scale, and the London porter brewers, such as Whitbread, Truman, Parsons and Thrale, achieved great success financially.

The large London porter breweries pioneered many technological advances, such as the construction of large storage vats, the use of the thermometer (about 1760), the hydrometer (1770), and attemperators (about 1780).

The 18th century also saw the development of India pale ale. Among the earliest known named brewers whose beers were exported to India was George Hodgson of the Bow Brewery,

The late 18th century saw a system of progressive taxation based on the strength of beer in terms of cost of ingredients, leading to three distinct gradations: "table", "small" and "strong" beer. Mixing these types was used as a way of achieving variation, and sometimes avoiding taxation, and remained popular for more than a century afterwards.

The beer engine (a simple lift-pump), a device for manually pumping beer from a container in a pub's basement or cellar, was invented by Joseph Bramah in 1797. The bar-mounted pump handle, with its changeable pump clip indicating the beer on offer remains a familiar and characteristic sight in most English pubs. Before the beer engine, beer was generally poured into jugs in the cellar or tap room and carried into the serving area.

The Beerhouse Act 1830 enabled anyone to brew and sell beer, ale or cider, whether from a public house or their own homes, upon obtaining a moderately priced licence of just under £2 for beer and ale and £1 for cider, without recourse to obtaining them from justices of the peace, as was previously required. The result was the opening of hundreds of new pubs throughout England, and the reduction of the influence of the large breweries. One of the motivations of the
Act was to reduce the abusive over-consumption of gin.

Demand for the export style of pale ale, which had become known as "India pale ale" (IPA), developed in England around 1840. IPA became a popular product in England. Some brewers dropped the term "India" in the late 19th century, but records indicated that these "pale ales" retained the features of earlier IPA.

A pale and well-hopped style of beer was developed in Burton-on-Trent in parallel with the development of India pale ale elsewhere. Previously, Englishmen had drunk mainly stout and porter, but bitter (a development of pale ale) came to predominate. Beers from Burton were considered of a particularly high quality due to synergy between the malt and hops in use and local water chemistry, especially the presence of gypsum. This extensively hopped, lighter beer was easier to store and transport, and so favoured the growth of larger breweries. The switch from pewter tankards to glassware also led drinkers to prefer lighter beers. The development of rail links to Liverpool enabled brewers to export their beer throughout the British Empire. Burton retained absolute dominance in pale ale brewing: at its height one quarter of all beer sold in Britain was produced there until a chemist, C. W. Vincent discovered the process of Burtonisation to reproduce the chemical composition of the water from Burton-upon-Trent, thus giving any brewery the capability to brew pale ale.

In 1880, prime minister William Gladstone's government used the Inland Revenue Act 1880 to replace the long-standing malt tax with a duty on the finished product – beer. As a side effect, homebrewers that produced their own beer for "domestic use" were subject to registration, regulation and inspection, and were required to pay a licence fee. Home brewing was greatly reduced.

In the 19th century, a typical brewery produced three or four mild ales, usually designated by a number of Xs, the weakest being X, the strongest XXXX. They were considerably stronger than the milds of today, with the gravity ranging from around 1.055 to 1.072 (about 5.5% to 7% ABV). Gravities dropped throughout the late 19th century and by 1914 the weakest milds were down to about 1.045, still considerably stronger than modern versions.

Continental lagers began to be offered in pubs in the late 19th century, but remained a small part of the market for many decades.

1900 to 1949: Temperance and war

The temperance movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in combination with First World War emergency measures, introduced a number of changes, such as higher taxation on beer, lower strengths, a ban on " buying a round" and restricted opening hours. Most were gradually repealed over subsequent decades.

The First World War measures had a particularly dramatic effect upon mild ale. As the biggest-selling beer, it suffered the largest cut in gravity when breweries had to limit the average original gravity of their beer to 1.030. In order to be able to produce some stronger beer – which was exempt from price controls and thus more profitable – mild was reduced to 1.025 or lower.

English breweries continued to brew a range of bottled, and sometimes draught, stouts until the Second World War and beyond. They were considerably weaker than the pre-war versions (down from 1.055–1.060 to 1.040–1.042) and around the strength that porter had been in 1914. The drinking of porter, with its strength slot now occupied by single stout, steadily declined, and production ceased in the early 1950s. However, Irish-brewed stouts, particularly Guinness, remained firmly popular.

In the early 20th century, serving draught beer from pressurised containers began. Artificial carbonation was introduced in the United Kingdom in 1936, with Watney's experimental pasteurised beer Red Barrel, although this method of serving beer did not take hold in the UK until the late 1960s.

1950 to 1999: Megabreweries and microbreweries

In 1960 almost 40 per cent of beer drunk nationally was sold in bottled form, although the figure was 60 per cent in the south of England, falling to 20 per cent in the North of England. Pale ale had replaced mild as the beer of choice for the majority of drinkers.

Home brewing without a licence was legalised in 1963, and was to become a fairly popular hobby, with homebrewing equipment shops on many high streets. Lager rapidly rose in popularity from the 1970s, increasing from only 2 per centof the market in 1965 to 20 per cent in 1975, with English brewers producing their own brands or brewing under licence. Canned beer was also introduced about this time.

A consumer organisation, the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), was founded in 1971 to protect unpressurised beer. The group devised the term ''real ale'' to differentiate between beer served from the cask and beer served under pressure and to differentiate both from lager. "Ale" now meant a top-fermented beer, not an unhopped beer. CAMRA was to become an influential force, with a membership of over 170,000.

At the time, brewing was dominated by the "big six" breweries: Whitbread, Scottish and Newcastle, Bass Charrington, Allied Breweries, Courage Imperial and Watneys.

There were also dozens of regional breweries, although the number was dwindling as a result of takeovers, and the microbrewery sector consisted of just four long-standing brewpubs. Most pubs were owned by breweries and only allowed to offer the owning brewery's beers ("the tie"). CAMRA also campaigned against the tendency of smaller brewers to be bought up by larger ones, against short measures, for the preservation of historically significant pubs, and for increased choice and longer opening hours for pubs. CAMRA also produced a ''Good Beer Guide'' and campaigned for the preservation of mild ale, which was now seen as an endangered style.

English drinkers became more interested in imported beers during the 1970s and 1980s, partly as a result of increased foreign travel and partly because of promotion of the subject by beer writers such as Michael Jackson, with his 1977 ''The World Guide to Beer''. Newly popular foreign brands included Beck's from Germany, Heineken and Grolsch from the Netherlands, Leffe and Hoegaarden from Belgium, Peroni from Italy, San Miguel from the Philippines, Budweiser and Sierra Nevada from the US and Corona Extra from Mexico. A number of bars specialise in imported beer, with food and decor to match, Belgian and Bavarian themes being the most common.

In 1972, Martin Sykes established Selby Brewery as the first new independent brewing company in England for 50 years. "I foresaw the revival in real ale, and got in early", he said. By the end of the decade he was joined by over 25 new microbreweries, a trend which would only increase in the 1980s. In 1979, Tim Martin opened the first Wetherspoons pub, in Muswell Hill, north London. This was the basis of a national chain of pubs, (over 900 as of 2016) which were to prove influential on the British beer scene, because of their low prices, large premises, and championing of cask ale. Also in 1979 David Bruce established the first " Firkin" brewpub. The Firkin chain consisted of pubs offering cask ale brewed on the premises, or at another brewpub in the chain. The chain expanded to more than 100 pubs over its twenty-year history, considerably adding to the number of brewpubs in England. After a number of changes of ownership, brewing operations were wound up in 2001.

Two pieces of legislation, known as The Beer Orders, were introduced in December 1989, partly in response to CAMRA campaigning. The Orders restricted the number of tied pubs that could be owned by large brewery groups in the United Kingdom to 2,000, and required large brewer landlords to allow a guest ale to be sourced by tenants from someone other than their landlord. The industry responded by spinning off purely pub-owning companies ("pubcos"), such as Punch Taverns and Enterprise Inns, from the older brewing-and-owning companies, notably Allied Lyons, Bass, and Scottish & Newcastle. The Beer Orders were revoked in January 2003, by which time the industry had been transformed.

2000 to present: hops and hipsters

A change to beer taxation, Progressive Beer Duty was introduced by Gordon Brown in 2002. It was a reduction in beer duty based on a brewery's total production and aimed at helping smaller breweries. The legislation had been campaigned for by the Society of Independent Brewers (Siba). In 2009, the combined sales of Siba's 420-plus members increased by 4% compared with 2008. By 2011 the breweries in the UK, were recording an average growth in beer sales of 3% to 7% per annum.

By 2004, the term ''real ale'' had been expanded to include bottle-conditioned beer, while the term ''cask ale'' had become the accepted global term to indicate a beer not served under pressure.

Interest in imported beer continued to rise, with an influx of Eastern European workers making Lech and Tyskie particularly popular, alongside Staropramen, Budvar and Kozel.

A piece of legislation popularly known as the "twenty four-hour drinking", officially the Licensing Act 2003 came into force in 2005. This removed the previous national restrictions on opening hours, allowing pubs and licensed premises to open for any or all of a twenty four-hour period, subject to agreement with the local licensing authorities. In practice, most pubs made only minor changes to their opening hours.

Although its founding father, Michael Jackson, died in 2007, modern beer writing was burgeoning, with beer columns appearing alongside wine columns in the quality press. Beer writing was to evolve into beer blogging, leaders in both fields including Martyn Cornell, Pete Brown, Roger Protz and Melissa Cole.

In July 2007, a law was introduced to forbid smoking in all enclosed public places in England, including pubs.

The popularity of lager fell from 74.5 per cent in 2008 to 74.3 per cent and the ''Observer'' publication suggested that British beer drinkers' "love affair with carbonated beers may finally have peaked". The 2010 edition of the ''Good Beer Guide'' showed that there were more than 700 real-ale brewers in the UK at the time of publication — the highest number since the Second World War and four times as many since the founding of Camra. Iain Loe, a spokesman for Camra, explained a preference for moderate alcohol levels and a perception that real ale was healthier as responsible for the shift.

Since the 2010s, there has been what some media outlets describe as an "explosion" of interest in craft beer. Although, the term "craft beer" does not have formal definition in the UK, it is generally taken to mean beer from small breweries which is highly flavourful and distinctive, particularly "hop forward" beers, delivered in bottles or the keykeg draught formats, ideas mainly deriving from the US microbrewery scene. Craft beer may stand alongside other beers in a mainstream pub, or be retailed in specialist outlets, such as the chain owned by Scottish brewers Brewdog. Craft beers are often stronger than standard ales and lagers, and may be sold in pint and pint measures in addition to the usual pints and halves. A number of commentators have noted that craft beer appeals to a younger clientele, particularly those characterised as hipsters. A number of breweries associated with the craft movement have been taken over by multinationals, prompting debate about
whether they should still be considered "craft".

Although the choice available to English beer drinkers in the mid-2010s is perhaps unparalleled, there are concerns about the future of pubs, with about 30 closing per week. Bucking the trend somewhat are craft beer outlets, the Wetherspoons chain, and the micropub movement

The Wetherspoons chain has expanded to nearly 900 outlets over its 25-year history, most of them being former shops, banks and so on, rather than traditional pub premises. Describing themselves as freehouses, its branches offer a wider range of cask ales than other pubcos, and they have recently begun offering craft beer. Micropubs are small community pubs with limited opening hours, and focusing strongly on local cask ale.

With cask ale having a secure future, the Campaign for Real Ale has () been reconsidering its aims, with the options including focusing on the preservation of pubs.

English beer styles

Bitter

Bitter is the broad term applied to a well-hopped pale ale, from about 3.5% to 7% in strength and pale gold to dark mahogany in colour. English brewers have several loose names for variations in beer strength, such as ''best bitter'', ''special bitter'', ''extra special bitter'', and ''premium bitter''. There is no agreed and defined difference between an ''ordinary'' and a ''best bitter'' other than one particular brewery's ''best bitter'' will usually be stronger than its ''ordinary''. Two groups of drinkers may mark differently the point at which a ''best bitter'' then becomes a ''premium bitter''. Hop levels will vary within each sub group, though there is a tendency for the hops in the ''session bitter'' group to be more noticeable. Bitter is dispensed in most formats — hand-pulled from the cask, on draught from the keg, smoothflow or bottled. Drinkers tend to loosely group the beers into:

*Session or ordinary bitter have strength up to 4.1 per cent ABV. The majority of English beers with the name ''IPA'' will be found in this group, such as Greene King IPA, Flowers IPA, Wadworth Henrys Original IPA, etc. These session bitters are not as strong and hoppy as the 18th and 19th century IPAs (or as an India Pale Ale would be in the USA) although IPAs with modest gravities (below 1.040) have been brewed in England since at least the 1920s. This is the most common strength of bitter sold in English pubs, accounting for 16.9 per cent of pub sales.
*Best bitter have strength between 3.8 per cent and 4.7 per cent ABV. In the United Kingdom, Bitter above 4.2 per cent ABV accounts for just 2.9 per cent of pub sales. The disappearance of weaker bitters from some brewer's rosters means "best" bitter is actually the weakest in the range.
* Premium bitter have strength of 4.8 per cent ABV and over. Also known as ''extra special bitter'', for instance Fuller's ESB.
* Golden ale or summer ales were developed in the late 20th century by breweries to compete with the pale lager market. A typical golden ale has an appearance and profile similar to that of a pale lager. Malt character is subdued and the hop profile ranges from spicy to citrus; common hop additions include Styrian Golding and Cascade. Alcohol is in the 4% to 5% range ABV. The style was marketed in 1989 by John Gilbert, a former brewer at Watney in Mortlake, London, who had opened his own operation, the Hop Back Brewery, in Salisbury, England. His aim was to develop a pale ale that could be as refreshing as lager. The result was a drier and hoppier pale ale he called "Summer Lightning", after a novel by PG Wodehouse; it won several awards and inspired numerous imitators.
*India Pale Ale – although it is often said that India Pale Ale, a strong and well-hopped beer, was designed to "survive the sea voyage to India", modern authorities consider this to be a myth. Twentieth century IPAs were equivalent to a typical bitter, although there has been a tendency to return to 18th century strengths (5.5 per cent upwards), hop rates, e.g. Thornbridge Brewery's Jaipur IPA and Fuller, Smith and Turner's Bengal Lancer, and to emphasise the Indian connection in their branding.

Brown ale

English brown ales range from beers such as Manns Original Brown Ale, which is quite sweet and low in alcohol, to North Eastern brown ale such as Newcastle Brown Ale, Double Maxim and Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale.

Mild

Mild in modern times is generally considered to be a low-gravity beer with a low hop rate and predominantly malty palate. Historically, mild ales were of standard strength for the time (and rather strong by modern standards). Modern mild ales are mainly dark coloured with an abv of 3 per cent to 3.6 per cent, though there are lighter hued examples, as well as stronger more traditional examples reaching 6 per cent abv and higher. The term "mild" originally had nothing to do with strength or level of hop bitterness, but rather as a label for beers that were not "vatted" (aged) and hence did not have some of the tart and even slightly sour flavour of ales that were subject to long aging, which was considered a desirable attribute of premium ales.
The dark colour characteristic of modern-day milds can come from either the use of roast malt or caramelised sugars, or more commonly, both. These ingredients lead to differences in flavour characteristics.

Mild is often thought to be partly a survival of the older style of hop-less brewing (hops were introduced in the 16th century), partly as a cheaper alternative to bitter (for a long time mild was a penny a pot, and bitter beer tuppence), and partly a sustaining but relatively unintoxicating beverage suitable for lunchtime drinking by manual workers. But in reality, mild was probably not hopped differently from other beers of the day, since the term "mild" referred primarily to a lack of the sour tang contributed by age, and not a lack of hop character or alcoholic strength,

Once sold in every pub, mild experienced a catastrophic fall in popularity after the 1960s and was in danger of completely disappearing from many parts of the United Kingdom. However, in recent years the explosion of microbreweries has led to a partial recovery, and an increasing number of mild (sometimes labelled 'Dark') brands are now being brewed. Most of these are in the more modern interpretation of "mild"...a sweeter brew with lower alcoholic strength.

Light mild is generally similar, but pale in colour, for instance Harveys Brewery Knots of May. There is some overlap between the weakest styles of bitter and light mild, with the term AK being used to refer to both. The designation of such beers as "bitter" or "mild" has tended to change with fashion. A good example is McMullen's AK, which was re-badged as a bitter after decades as a light mild. AK (a very common beer name in the 19th century) was often referred to as a "mild bitter beer" interpreting "mild" as "unaged".

Some breweries have revived the traditional high-gravity strong mild, with alcohol content of 6 per cent or so, the classic example being Sarah Hughes Ruby, brewed to a Victorian recipe.

Burton Ale

Burton Ale is a strong ale, produced in Burton on Trent since at least the 16th century, which is darker and sweeter than bitter. It has sometimes been used as a synonym for old ale.

Old ale

Old ale is a term applied to dark, malty beers above 4.5% ABV, also sometimes called Winter Warmers. Many have "old" in the name, such as Theakston's Old Peculier, Marston's Owd Roger, Robinson's Old Tom. Many brewers make high ABV old ales for bottling, some of which are bottle-conditioned and can mature for several years. Some of these stronger versions are known as barley wine