1700s – A Good Beer Blog

As The Madcap Slide Into Yuletide Speeds Up Here’s This Week’s Beery News

I am already late. I think that is what Yule really means: “you are late!” I need to still get a few things together… very few… but I already feel rushed. Perhaps this is how “We Three Kings” felt galloping across the Middle East and it’s all part of the lessons of the season. Fretting. I dunno. I need a few of these Caribbean Christmas drinks. No wonder people take winter vacations. To make up for the Christmas vacation. Not as rushed as the holiday-time photo contest kept me a decade ago. That’s the winner from 2012 up there by Robert Gale, one of 36 photo entries I posted on just one day in that long contest period. That was a lot of fun – but nuts, too.

First up, Stan is back and posted his linkfest on Monday after a month on the hollyjollydays – and he noticed something:

Has it really been four weeks since I posted links here? Indeed, and it seems as if it would be easy to sort through the headlines since Nov. 6 and assemble a post of only stories about the craft beer apocalypse. I am left searching for a phrase that is the opposite of “a rising tide lifts all boats.”

Perhaps “Five Feet And Rising“? Just to, you know, keep up with an aquatic theme? Stan explores some of the reasons for the craft beer predicament so go have a look. Even though the exploration and examination of a downturn is valuable and in craft almost fully ignored… I know the feeling but have promised myself to be cheerier this week. I will. It is the holidays or perhaps just the pre-holidays after all. Let’s see if that’s possible.

But first… Jordan has been worked a few paper rolls through the adding machine and come up with for Ontario what can only be called findings:

Will update the map later, but it looks to me like we’re down from 413 physically operated brewery locations to 389 so far this year. There are some ownership situations I don’t know how to express simply in geographic format. Assume that number is high… If you condense ownership structures, we can reduce 67 locations to 27 companies. So… 349 companies total.

Maybe related: low alcohol partying and no alcohol bars? Apparently Sam Smiths is also running no alcohol bars, given that “as many as 120 Smith’s pubs are currently closed“! That’s what’s said in that article in The Times about the Samuel Smith’s of Yorkshire. Not so much about the brewery as the man running the operation. This was a brutal passage:

Back in the 1990s Samuel Smith’s bought and began pouring millions of pounds into restoring the town’s derelict Old Vicarage, which dates back to the 14th century. Great care was taken to go above and beyond rules stipulated by English Heritage… When the eight-year project was complete, the vicar at the nearby St Mary’s Church was informed that her new house was ready. The offer came like a bolt from the heavens. St Mary’s vicar already had a home — one she liked and better suited the needs of her young family. After the invitation was politely declined, the lavishly restored building was locked up.

Enough. It’s the holidays. Here’s some good news. The BBC reports that Welsh brewery Brains has turned its fortunes around… literally… or is it figuratively…:

The company had debts of £76.4m, most of which had accumulated before the pandemic. Mr Bridge worked with a number of banks to restructure and agree repayment of all of the debt, with the chief executive finally feeling confident about the company’s financial health by the summer of 2023. “We’ve managed to navigate those challenging times. And it wasn’t just us, it was the whole drinks and hospitality industry that went through those challenges,” Mr Bridge said. Brains is more than beer in Wales. Having been brewing in Cardiff since 1882, the company is still owned by the descendants of Samuel Arthur Brain.

More with the cheery. What is cheery? History is cheery! And international. Heck, we received a comment in German this week, a footnote to my bit on the Lispenard clan, 1700s Loyalist beer barons in New York. Lord Goog provided the translation. Speaking of lore of yore, the Beer Ladies Podcast had a great interview this week with Dr Susan Flavin, a historian joined in a project recreating a 1500s brewery:

In this fascinating project – link below – the team used a recipe based on a beer once served in Dublin Castle, in order to not only taste it, but to learn more about the role beer played in the early modern period. This one will tickle the beer history nerds and casual beer fans alike!

In more recent history, Boak and Bailey have a great explainer this week on the pub feature called a “snob screen” as helpfully illustrated in the 1963 comedy The Punch & Judy Man where they are used as part of a physical joke:

Hancock, who co-wrote the film as well as starring in it, uses these as the basis for a bit of ‘business’ which, handily, you can see some of in the trailer for the film. He pops in and out of the various windows, taunting and teasing the snobs behind the snob screen. In other words, he refuses to respect (literal) social barriers, and highlights their purely symbolic nature. After all, he and his pals can hear almost every word that is being said a few inches from them, on the other side of the screen. What is slightly odd is that most surviving examples of tilting or swivelling snob screens are there to separate customers from bar staff, rather than from each other.

Neato. And a couple of decades later, the BBC took us back to a Belfast board game of forty years ago and posed the question whther it was glorifying or just identifying actual pub culture:

1981: Scene Around Six explored a Belfast pub crawl board game, named Binge. Controversial enough that many shops refused to stock it, it did at least have the backing of a certain local mover and shaker, Mr Terri Hooley.

And another bit of history. In the same week that it is reported that Diageo is ditching most of its beer brands*, a landmark in craft brewing history is being lost with the closure of the Ringwood Brewery in Hampshire, England after fifteen years in someone else’s portfolio.

In 2007, Ringwood was purchased by Marston’s for £19.2 million. Marston’s disposed of its brewing operations in 2020, selling assets to a joint venture with the Carlsberg Group to create the Carlsberg Marston’s Brewing Company. Mr Davies mentioned that he is “incredibly proud” of the effort and dedication of staff at Ringwood Brewery, adding: “Our priority now is to support colleagues affected by the proposals through the consultation period, which has now begun.”

You know, the official hagiography of craft beer does not properly account for the importance of the Ringwood Brewery which came into being in 1978 led by Peter Austin. As Boak and Bailey discuss in Brew Britannia as well as in their thoughtful obituary for him of almost a decade ago, Austin was one of the few people who could legitimately be called a founder:

His first triumph was building and getting established the Penrhos Brewery on behalf of Martin Griffiths, Terry ‘Python’ Jones and writer Richard Boston. He then launched his own brewery, Ringwood, in 1978, and thereafter came to be the ‘go to’ guy for advice on setting up similar operations. When David Bruce was setting up his first Firkin brewpub in 1979, it was Austin who vetted his designs for a miniature basement brewkit. The two were both founder members of SIBA, which then stood for The Small Independent Brewers Association, and Austin was its first Chair.

Austin also consulted, with Alan Pugsley, brewing bringing his energy into the new brewing movement in North America. I’ve had beers in breweries in Nova Scotia, Maine, New York and Ontario directly carrying on that tradition. The shutting of the Ringwood is the end of an era.

The big news in the world of Pellicle is that I WON the November fitba pool (even though I am wallowing in the nether ranks.) It which was a great surprise that earned me a mug. Oh… yes, and Will Hawkes wrote something well worth reading for Pellicle about London’s pub group Grace Land and the co-owners Andreas Akerlund and Anselm Chatwin:

They met when Anselm took a job as a bar back at Two Floors, Barworks’ bar in Soho, whilst he was at St Martin’s College (now Central St Martins) in the early 2000s. Temperamentally similar and with a shared passion for music, they cooked up a vague plan to open a dive bar/gig venue—and when a site, formerly The Camden Tup, came on the market in 2009 they opened the first Grace Land venue, The Black Heart. It wasn’t an immediate success. “The Black Heart was a dismal failure for many years,” he says. “But it’s about working with the concept, sticking with it. People get it now.” That philosophy has served them well in the years since, during which they’ve slowly accrued a small family of high-quality pubs…

Note: The English are coming back down to pre-Covid levels of alcohol consumption. Is inflation healthy? Hmm… and while we are at it… next time someone suggests that terrior in wine isn’t real, mention this study as reported in The New York Times:

“It’s one of those terms that the wine industry likes to keep a bit mysterious, part of the magic of wine,” said Alex Pouget, a computational neuroscientist at the University of Geneva. Dr. Pouget is trying to apply chemical precision to this je ne sais quoi. In a study published Tuesday in the journal Communications Chemistry, he and his colleagues described a computer model that could pinpoint which Bordeaux estate produced a wine based only on its chemical makeup. The model also predicted the year in which the wine was made, known as its vintage, with about 50 percent accuracy.

That’s some science right there, that is. Continuing with questions of authenticity, again we go with The Times out of London which had an interesting article on tea and chai this week with some very interesting assertions about appropriation and the nature of foodways:

You can culturally appropriate badly, or you can culturally appropriate well, but almost all culture involves appropriation. While Indians have been adding spices to milky beverages for centuries, the spiced tea that is fashionable in American and British coffee shops, and is sometimes marketed as an exotic drink, is no more purely Indian than, say, chillis (which originally came from Central/South America). Indeed, chai is the result of the British imperial push to get Indians to consume tea.

Note: Lars wrote about complexes of closely located language families. Nicely done. Also nicely done, Geoff wrote about Ethiopian borde over on Mastodon, a very complex form of beer making.

I think I first had Jack’s Abbey lager with Ron and Craig in Albany New York back in March 2016. I recall hitting a store on the way back from Delmar. Ah, Delmar! Anyway, Jeff has done an admirable job remembering what he wrote down during his recent visit… before he lost his notes from that visit… including, to begin, its location:

The city proper is small and compact, but the metro area, or Greater Boston, includes around a hundred small towns clustered in the fan stretching out from Boston Harbor. Two radial freeways, I-95 and I-495, mark important distance metrics. Anything inside I-95 is pretty Boston-y, while anything within the larger I-495 ring is Greater Boston. Framingham, home to Jack’s Abby, is 20 miles due west of downtown Boston and about halfway between 95 and 495.

Note: Zak Rotello of the Olympic Tavern of Rockford, Illinois alerted us to this situation: 1, 2, 3, 4. Govern yourselves accordingly.

Nice piece in Cider Review this week on the state of the tiny German perry trade and its advocate in chief, Barry Masterson:

As anyone who follows Barry will know, there are a good number of pear trees in his home region around Schefflenz. He’s previously reported its former significance in Bavaria and until relatively recently it was a central cultural tenet of rural life in the Western Palatinate, a little way west of Barry, near the Rhine and around much of German wine country. But today there’s vanishingly little to be had commercially, and if I didn’t have a direct line to Barry, Lord alone knows how I’d have found anything out about it for the book.

And finally in one of the weirdest craft fibby claims yet, the fact checkers and desk editors of Forbes seems to have taken coffee break when this one crossed by their inboxes:

Recently the Cicerone Certification Program announced that six people had achieved the rank of Master Cicerone. There are now a total of 28 Master Cicerones worldwide. A Master Cicerone is similar to a Master Sommelier in the wine world but the focus is less on service/hospitality and more on general beer knowledge. The exam is frequently billed as one of the hardest tests not just in beer, but in the world.

FFS. Is there any bloatification that craft can’t claim? Safe to say that gaining the certificate does not require passing one of the hardest tests in the world. There are, after all, brain surgeons not to mention standard shift drivers licenses. Not being a peer reviewed academic course, however, allows for this sort of thing to float around.

Fin. We are done. I know I’m done. Remember, ye who read this far down to see if I have edited these closing credits and endnotes (as I always do), you can check out the many ways to find good reading about beer and similar stuff via any number of social media and other forms of comms connections. This week’s update on my emotional rankings? Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (94) rising up to maybe pass Mastodon (907) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,426) hovering somewhere above or around my largely ignored Instagram (162), with unexpectly crap Threads (43) and not at all unexpectedly bad Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear – and that deservedly dormant Patreon presence of mine just sitting there. All in all I still am rooting for the voices on the elephantine Mastodon (even if BlueSky is catching up in the race to replace.) And even though it is #Gardening Mastodon that still wins over there, here are a few of the folk there discussing or perhaps only waiting to discuss beer:

Anyone else? Anywhere else? Yes, you also gotta check the blogs, podcasts (really? barely!) and even newsletters to stay on top of things including the proud and public and certainly more weekly recommendations from Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan at his spot on those Mondays when he is not SLACKING OFF! Look at me – I forgot to link to Lew’s podcast. Fixed. Get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by this year’s model citizen David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s now much less occassional but always wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is back with all the sweary Mary he can think of! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass. Any more? Yes! Check to see the highly recommended Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the long standing Beervana podcast . There is the Boys Are From Märzen podcast too and Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has introduced a podcast… but also seems to be losing steam. And there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube and remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water… if you have $10 a month for this sort of thing… I don’t. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that. There was also the Beer O’clock Show but that was gone after a ten year run but returned renewed and here is the link!

*Or not… as a web-publication called Just Drinks has asserted that Diageo does not plan to offload beer assets – apparently based on this peak of investigative reporting: a “company spokesperson said: ‘We do not comment on market speculation.’“

The Thursday Beery News Notes For May Two-Four 2022!

May two-four. Back again. I explained it back in 2014 when I included the photo to your right (my left) of Bob and Doug McKenzie who were Canada’s #1 export forty years ago and whose 1983 movie, Strange Brew, is the last cultural statement about beer before microbrewing struck in earnest. Even though the movie isn’t set on the Victoria Day holiday in the second half of May, you can see many aspects of our drunken mildly retro-pro-monarchist celebrations replayed in Canadian homes as well as at campsites and cottages throughout the land this weekend as people feign gardening and practice inebriation. And it’s a big year for our top dog, our numero uno, our favourite anti-Nazi. Speaking of which… you know what broke? That cap thing on my whippersnipper that keeps the weedwhacker’s string coil in place. How the hell does that break? Spool went flying and the lawn’s all half haggy still. Didn’t so much break as ‘sploded. Now I have to hunt down a replacement lawn trimmer line cap or I have to buy a whole new thing-a-ma-jig. Pray for me.

Now… to the beer news. First up, a set of photos posted by the Glasladies Beer Society of a recent Glasgow beer fest set up in what looks like a somewhat permanent outdoor space. Being who I am, a child of children of the Clyde, the event looks like a mass gathering of aunties and uncles and masses of cousins. The use of steel container boxes is interesting as a relatively cheap but cheery but secure set up. Looks like it was held at the Glasgow Beer Works in the Queenslie Industrial Estate. This may be a common site for some of you but sometimes that’s still remarkable.

Next, Ron wrote a piece he titled “The Future of Mild” which serves as an interesting counterpoint to the fan friendly writings on the style mentioned two weeks ago. Ron provides an interesting set of thoughts about Mild itself and how styles may or may not make a comeback:

I’d love to go to Cross Green and drink 10 pints of Tetley’s Mild again. But it isn’t going to happen. The world has moved on. Beer styles come and go. And almost never return. I’ll just cherish the memories of a time that’s gone forever. Like a Porter drinker in the 1940s. The same fate, incidentally, awaits Pilsner and IPA. All styles have their day.

The fate of Mild has been formed he suggest as “it’s harder to throw all sorts of random shit into a Dark Mild.” That would seem to be where we are at. The post also lead to an interesting considered discussion on the nature of revivals. Jeff wrote:

…I wonder if a style that was once quite popular ever came back as a major style, perhaps not as popular as it was during its heyday, but with significant production. It’s probably happened, but I suspect it’s very, very rare. Once fashions change, styles sunset.

TBN reminded us of the classic example of style revival – Hoegaarden. I expect this is as much framed by the word “style” and its imposition limiting structure but the entire micro (1980-2003)) and craft eras (2003-2016) were based on revival of lost beers. Hoppy malt rich ales were descendants of earlier strong ales like Ballantine IPA and Dominion White Label as much as they were clones of imports. So… revivals common enough in the days when brewing was not so wound up with novelty and amnesia. We always have to remember how quickly we forget. As recent at 2011, SNPA’s place in the pantheon was still somewhat speculative. Now, of course, it was always the source of all things including those that came before it – thanks to the nation’s PR professionals!

Speaking of perhaps one revival or perhaps homage that has not lasted, one bit of news that I was a bit surprised to learn about this week was how St. Joseph’s Abbey of Spencer, Massachusetts is no longer brewing its beer. This was all the news in 2015 and I reviewed their first beer as you can read here. The monks announced:

After more than a year of consultation and reflection, the monks of St. Joseph’s Abbey have come to the sad conclusion that brewing is not a viable industry for us and that it is time to close the Spencer Brewery. We want to thank all our customers for their support and encouragement over the years. Our beer will be available in our regular retail outlets, while supplies last. Please keep us in your prayers.

Jordan thought it a particularly worrying development based on their low labour expenses. Greg reported that the equipment was already listed for sale before the announcement. I gratuitously added the 2015ish image up there from the celler’s stash for Stan. Pretty sure the bottle has move about six inches in seven years.

Des generated a wonderful cascade of comments related to cellered casks with this big barrelled beery buttery – including these cautionary ones:

Not being funny, but going on that photo, “immaculate” is a strong word. Serviceable, cleaner than many, maybe. And as I’m sure has been pointed out, a 36 (massing the best part of 200kg) is a H&S nightmare. You romantic.

Note: please don’t send out bleggy emails saying “ I don’t have limitless cash on hand to subsidize this project, but it’s reality nonetheless. I need at least [XXX number of] paid subscribers…” Listen to the wind… the marketplace of ideas is speaking… write for joy or get a job to support your hobby interest in booze.

Boak and Bailey elaborated something at their Patreon widget-a-thing that was evident in their (lovely and highly recommended) account of Ray’s out for hike and stopping at rural pubs with pals:

…at least part of the joy we took in drinking it on this occasion must be down to having “earned it”. The same goes for that first beer of the weekend, after a tough week at work. Or, as many people have observed, almost any mediocre lager you drink on holiday. How do you compensate for this effect? Well, you don’t, unless you’re a Top International Beer Judge. Instead, you report the context when you give notes on a specific instance of drinking a specific beer. And you make judgements about the overall quality of a beer based on mutliple encounters in multiple contexts. A beer that tastes good every time you bump into it is probably a good beer, full stop.

I wonder if we have become so enthralled with these beer judging events for hobbyists that we miss the obvious – that those beers actually do taste good in those contexts. And that judging contexts make beer taste bad. Because they are geared to ensure failure. Because that is what institutionalizing human experience does, makes you distrust and then outsource your own experience of life. Stop feeling bad because someone who has a certificate for passing the equivalent of a grade 11 history class says so.* Not to suggest TBN is not correct when he explains “Beer is weird. You’re lucky to have me here, putting things straight.” It is. We are.

Handy example: print off and cut into separate burger and beer images. Throw all in air and match the beer with the nearest burger. Equally valid. Every. Time.

Rolling Stone put out a story about beer prices this week under their “Culture Council” tab, not something I have notice from them in all my years at the coal face. The author, Kevin Weeks of Anderson Valley Brewing (who actually follows me on Twitter so I feel extra bad for not noticing before), argues interestingly that any increased costs faced by brewers are likely not going to justify the level of price increases that consumers are going to see on the shelf from the big brewers so…

For the smaller craft breweries facing this dynamic, this is an excellent opportunity to differentiate their brands by both managing pricing and clearly conveying priorities to the consumer. The most obvious tactic is to hold price (or implement only slight increases) to create an opportunity to increase market share through a comparable pricing advantage over the larger brewers that are grasping for margin.

And this passed by my eye this week, “It always rains on Monday” by Ian Garstka. More of his work can be found on IG. Prints available from the artist.

Perhaps relatedly at least atmospherically, Gary posted about “Birmingham Beer Detectives, 1937” who in plain clothes were sent out to protect the interests of the beer-drinking public and augment lab testing quality controls:

It seems therefore, at least for a time, a two-track beer-tasting inspection system existed, city and industry, to control beer quality in pubs. Perhaps the whole thing, at city level, collapsed with the Second World War – bigger fish to fry, if you will, but this remains to be known. Certainly at industry level, tasting onsite continued into the postwar era. A number of press reports, one pertaining to Ansells in 1949, attest only too graphically, a conviction of an inspector for drunk driving.

There’s a BBC historical drama script right there for the taking. I can smell the damp tweed and ashtrays now.

Note: “Finnish brewery release new beer celebrating Finland joining NATO“!

Note also: “TikTok star says Wetherspoons ‘scammed’ him out of £2,000 of food and drink.” Star!

Finally and falling under Stan’s reminder “no one cares what you think, Alan” I upset Maureen a bit a tiny bit (which I never like to do) when I commented about this article on Hogarth’s Gin Lane and Beer Street as I mentioned it amounted to was a bit of a sneeky apology for mass drunken frenzy. My observation was quite specific so I should explain so that all you all can correct me. The first half of the article is fairly straight forward GBH-style with loads of quotes from other sources framing the well understood topic. But then it goes in an odd direction mid-essay with the statement that those “in positions of power in England sought to create an all-around negative image of gin.” According to the article’s own previous paragraphs rightly describing the generally understood hellscape unleashed by gin at the time, I was left wondering if it could also be said that people in power now are perhaps creating an all-around negative image of the Covid-19 virus. My wonderment didn’t last. I found this key angle within the article odd. Odder still the suggestion that the works of Hogarth were for an elite:

Because of the timing, “Gin Lane” and “Beer Street” are often viewed as a work of moral propaganda, and some have speculated they were commissioned by the government to help reach gin’s working-class imbibers. Tonkovich points out this is not the case, however, because that working-class target couldn’t have easily accessed these prints. “These prints would not have been affordable for the working class,” she says. “They might have seen them in a tavern or through a window, but they couldn’t buy prints, so who is the audience for these? People of the press and the merchant class.”

The thing is… I just don’t think that is correct. Because I don’t think that is how mass communications and specifically those on virtue and vice worked at the time. If you look about at English political pamphleteering in the 1600s and 1700s, you see a wide-spread, robust and even salacious debate within a highly literate population. Vibrant grassrootism. You also see in the first bits of the 1700s, the development of the First Great Awakening and proto-Methodists sermonizing to many millions.** Consider, too, 1751’s Essay on the Characteristicks and the “frenzy” of gin. Ideas related to a proper and healthy society were flying about. These and other Hogarth pieces fit into that scene. And, as the Royal Academy explains, fit into it in a very specific and intentional way given Hogarth’s process:

Hogarth aimed the prints at the popular, rather than fine art market, stating in his prospectus for the prints that: ‘As the Subjects of those Prints are calculated to reform some reigning Vices peculiar to the lower Class of People in hopes to render them of more extensive Use, the Author has published them in the cheapest Manner possible’. As a result the line in these prints is thicker and less sophisticated than in other prints engraved by Hogarth, both to enable the printing of more impressions without significant loss of quality, and to approach the characteristic style of popular prints.***

We are assured, via the hive, that the two prints were in wide circulation and that Hogarth’s works were even used for moral instruction by schoolmasters. So if they are not luxury items but rather something of a targeted public service announcement to those at risk, the paragraphs that follow seem strained, racing through the Victorians and US Prohibition then on to us today with a suggestion of the elites guiding government overstep. And, on the rebound, inappropriately sewing doubts as to Hogarth’s good faith intentions under the guise of some sort of shadowy social engineering as opposed to improving public health. Had gin been slandered? Seems all a bit goal oriented.****

There. More fodder for a good general public debate. Away you go! And for more, check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday but no longer from Stan every Monday as he’s on another extended leave of absence. Plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, and at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. (Ed.: that seems to be dead now.) There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s irregular newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword (Ed.: …notice of revival of which has been given…) And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*If you are unaware of this phenomenon, I recommend the works of Ivan Illych to you, starting with 1973’s Tools for Conviviality.
**and they themselves mocked in return.
***See also “The marketing techniques of William Hogarth (1697-1764), artist and engraver” by Mark McNally at page 170 “The conscious decision to set the price of prints according to the theme and the intended audience was further demonstrated with the distinctively didactic Gin Lane, Beer Street and the Four Stages of Cruelty which were advertised twice in the widely read London Evening Post on 19 and 26 February 1751 priced at one shilling each being ‘done in the cheapest manner possible in hopes to render them of more extensive use’ with an alternative set priced at 1/6d being done ‘in a better manner for the curious’. Despite the relative lack of sustained advertising for these key prints, which formed the basis of Hogarth’s campaign with his friend and magistrate Henry Fielding to draw attention to the moral decline of the lower classes, they became as popular as many of his more heavily publicised prints. This was perhaps due to the fact that they were primarily meant as social commentary and evidence of the need for reform rather than for commercial interest…” and also especially at footnote 123: “Hogarth noted with satisfaction in how ‘some masters gave their apprentices sets of the prints as Christmas gifts’ and that ‘he had even heard of a sermon preached on the prints’.”
****PS: a word about disagreement. If we are going to take beer writing seriously at all, we need to get used to the idea that a reader may either (i) disagree with aspects of what they read (as I have above with backing supporting research) or (ii) call out poor writing (which I have not done above.) One of the saddest things in good beer culture is the “hooray for everything!” mantra and, its cousin, the abusive response for those who who don’t buy in to the hooray. Let’s be honest – rooting for booze is weird. I blame too much booze and good folk struggling for not enough money as the commissioning organs do just fine. In this case, my comment to Maureen attracted the less than attractive, the dropped turd. Let’s be honest. I get negative comments and labels all the time and have for a couple of decades from publications high and low,***** sometimes from people I can’t imaging deserving one’s full respect. One scribbler who has my respect once even told me “hear that – that’s all the beer writers in Toronto mocking you” to which I responded “who gives a fuck about beer writers in Toronto?” We don’t worry about such things, especially now that the beer writers in Toronto either either have moved on now and are mowing the lawn somewhere in the suburbs, arguing with themselves. None of which relates to the article above that, in small part, I disagreed with. It is a well enough written if skimmy summary with a mild expression of the standard beer writer political slant on public health (“…nanny state! …neo-prohibitionists!! …folk putting my income at risk but mentioning health!!!“) but, no Maureen, it is not an example of something that did not exist before. The wheel that was invented long ago still turns round and round. Which is good. Because it gets thoughts going and leaves conversations enriched. Which is why I do this every week – to think about what is being written. If you aren’t doing that, why do you bother?
*****Funny ha-ha joke…no really… just kidding… footnote to a footnote, too! Very light and amusing, right?

Addendum: Cream Beer Was Once Cream Beer

Over five years ago now I wrote the last of a few posts on the question of cream beer. It co-existed with cream ale and Imperial Cream Ales and all the other creamy drinks. I traced it from Ohio in the 1840s back to NYC and Pennsylvania in the 1820s. It has been referenced as a predecessor to Kentucky Common. It was a thing until it wasn’t:

‘The scent of roses clings round it still.’ Cream beer, which was brewed by our best brewers, is, like the ale-sangaree, is a thing of the past. The rich cool beverage has gone out of use…*

Note: cream ale as not “a thing of the past” when that was written. One of the puzzles was whether it was something from Germany. One of the records I came across referenced “…cream beer, or Lauderschaum…” My problem was I thought there were two waves of German immigration to the USA which did not line up with this timing: the Pennsylvania Dutch from before the American Revolution in the mid-1700s and then the Germans of the 1840s escaping the backlash against other revolutions like George Gillig, bringer of lager.

So much pleased was I to come across that notice up at the top from the Pittsburgh Weekly Gazette of 19 Nov 1816. A notice for the sale of indentured servants, or German Redemptioners. To the right is another notice for Redemptioners from New York City in 1785. No brewers were mentioned in this group unlike the notice from thirty one years later. According to Wikipedia, redemptioners were continental European immigrants in the 18th or early 19th century who sailed most often to Pennsylvania by selling themselves into indentured servitude to pay back the shipping company for the cost of the ticket. Including brewers.

Which means there was a third sort of immigration, one with a supply of brewers with contemporary brewing skills within the right time frame who would be able to make “…cream beer, or Lauderschaum…” just like Gillig was able to bring his lager brewing skills a few decades later.

Update: I should also link to this 2018 post about schenk and Bavarian beer.

*What the hell is ale-sangaree?

Your Thursday Beery News Notes For The End Of Q3 2021

Do you ever find yourself on a Wednesday evening and realizing you didn’t note a lot beery news in a week? No? Me neither. No way. What’s been going on? I can tell you for sure. Because I have been attentive. Saw stuff like this: Curtis walked into a 2005/2010 central New York beer store cosplay event this week. That was something. And I cracked a new databased to dig through for new 1700s New York brewery information as part of the work on Empire Beer. Just typing “Lispenard” gave me, like you, a rush as well as a renewed sense of purpose. I found a reference that pushed the brewing career of Mr. Leadbetter back one whole year. And Craig found Albany beer for sale in Boston in the 1730s. Inter-colonial beer shipments almost 300 years ago. Neato. Oh – and I didn’t drink beer in a graveyard. So there.

First up, I had no idea about France… keeping in mind the first thing that comes to mind with much beer industry writing is the question “is that really true?”:

It may be famous for its wine, but France is also the country with the largest number of breweries in Europe. This is how French beer changed its image from a “man’s drink” to a refined beverage worthy of an apéro… The number of microbreweries here has exploded over the past decade. The country went from having 442 active breweries in 2011, to 2,300 today, meaning no country in Europe has more breweries than France, according to the trade union Brasseurs de France.

Next, an update on the Umqombothi situation. You will recall that in June a man took the prize for making the best Umqombothi, right? Well, now the traditional South African beer faces regulation:

With the newly-amended Liquor Products Act that came into effect last Friday, there are now strict production requirements that traditional beer merchants will have to abide by in order to stay on the right side of the law. Thembisile Ndlovu has made a name for herself as the queen of brewing umqombothi the natural way it was done by grandmothers back in the villages. The 36-year-old from Zondi in Soweto, who is owner of All Rounder Theme events that organises themed parties and provides catering, said the new law regulating the making of umqombothi would not affect her business.

Odd seeing Pellicle win second place in a “best blog” award this week. From Beer 52 which fulls wells knows what Pellicle is. It’s not that it got an award or came second. It’s that it recognized that the drinks website was a blog. There is an interesting comment hidden in the explanation of the award:

…Pellicle has stuck to a founding principle that I recall finding quite radical at the time: kindness. Next to the toxic dumping ground of rivalry and acrimony that is Beer Twitter, Pellicle has been unremittingly positive in choosing what to cover and how to cover it.

I don’t disagree but I also find it weird that the fairly barren wasteland for any beer discussion on Twitter is set up as the comparator. Having made a hobby of reading this stuff every week, beer Twitter died off a long time ago. May still be general jerk Twitter, sure. And both GHB Sightlines and Dave Infante’s Fingers have recently seen the need to put up a paywall to make ends meet. Is “beer blog” the last phrase standing? Maybe so – if that is what Pellicle is. Speaking of which, they published an excellent piece by Will Hawkes on hops growing in England:

Crucially, the hop gardens sit on rich, fertile Brickearth soil, windblown loam and silt, deposited during the Ice Age. The Thames Estuary is just three miles away, and the hops, which grow on a gentle east-facing slope, are frequently buffeted by wind. This proximity to the sea is part of what makes East Kent Goldings what they are, although John regards it as a mixed blessing. “They can end up a bit bashed and brown,” he says. “The German hops are always pristine! They must get no wind there.”

Speaking of which, Stan’s Hop Queries blog by email showed up this week including observations on the Colorado hop market:

MillerCoors (now MolsonCoors) subsidized Colorado’s mini-hop boom in the teens, paying much more for Colorado grown hops than the brewery would have for the same varieties from the Northwest. They were, and are, used in the Colorado Native line of beers. That includes seven year-round brands and four seasonals that are brewed with 100% Colorado-grown ingredients. However, a few years ago MolsonCoors cut back its hop contracts to “right-size” inventory. Many farmers weren’t ready to compete.

Stan also noted that the Ales Through the Ages beer history conference has gone Zoomy and yet, even after scrapping the junket side, has also ditched all of the original speakers. Did ticket sales bomb for what many thought, as I observed last April, could have been called “Males on Ales Through the Ages”?

And Andy Crouch guided me to an article in Wine Enthusiast on the tepid performative solidarity craft beer is displaying in response to bigotries in the craft beer trade:

“… I keep getting messages and emails and calls, and people just stopping by the brewery, every day, just being like either this person apologized to me, or this person was fired, or the company just did this for everybody, and just letting me know all these really positive changes that people are actually sticking to and doing what they say. “It is heartwarming to know that it actually is helping people and creating lasting change.” To bring these issues to light in the customer sphere, in July, Allan announced a collaboration beer called Brave Noise. Its aim is to promote a safe and discrimination-free beer industry. At press time, fewer than 100 breweries had committed to the project.

Craft fibs category ticked. Back in England but still about forms of ticking, Mudgie guided me to the post at Real Ale, Real Music about an excellent pub crawl in Preston:

I retraced my route, passing dozens of takeways, a few restaurants, vape shops, beauty salons, and the odd pub as Saturday evening came to life. I had decided I would visit one more place before getting the train home. It was back across town, back to Fishergate, where down the side street by Barclays Bank was the Winckley Street Ale House, another recommendation from earlier in the day. There were tables outside, as there were at other spots on a pleasant side street, and as I walked in I joined a queue to the bar. It moved slowly, but finally it was my turn.

Reality. I believe what I read in that story more than I believe that France has more breweries than any other country in Europe. Or that much of craft cares. Facts! That’s what we need.

That’s it. For more check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and from Stan now apparently a regular again every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast (this week… VIKINGS!!!), at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness! And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

Your Mid-May Beery News Notes For The UK Pubs And Other Floodgates Opening

What a week. We hit 50% first vaccine coverage locally and folk over 18 are able to try to book appointments. Our two eldest must head to two town over in three weeks for their. But as for me, the provincial government has gotten very cold feet over the AZ jab just as I await word on my where and what and when my second jab will be. Oooo… sole mio. Oh, to be the happy man that Tim Holt found reference to in an unnamed book: “[h]is hobby was chaffinches… on a Sunday he would lie nearly through the day sucking up the treacle beer through the tube… thinking of nothing at all…” Magic.

Of course I am not that man and, like all you all, must face the realities. This includes the biggest news in US craft beer circles is the news which isn’t really news at all. Sexism is wide ranging within the culture and this week, led last weekend by Notch Brewing’s Brienne Allan, names were named. Beth Demmons provided the best summary of the situation as of Monday afternoon through another well documented article at VinePair, setting out the background:

Allan, production manager at Notch Brewing in Salem, Mass. and a former leader of the Pink Boots Society’s Boston chapter, was on-site at Notch’s forthcoming Boston area brewery to help assemble the new brewhouse. After being in Covid-19 quarantine for a year, she says, she’d gotten used to not having to deal with sexism, but it didn’t take long for it to rear its head once — then twice — more.

In response, Allen went on line. She received over 800 response to her exasperated question “what sexist comments have you experienced?” The responses range from the crude to the horrific as Demmons writes. There have been initial consequences including a staff uprising at Tired Hands Brewing of Ardmore, Pennsylvania by Tuesday afternoon as reported upon by the Philadelphia Inquirer. And firings and resignations at this and other breweries and organizations followed and may continue to follow. Libby Crider of St. Louis’s 2nd Shift also shared experiences of what she has to put up with from pigs but also welcomed the wave of support. David Sun Lee shared the statement above from my local and beloved Matron Fine Beer. Also read Jessica Infante’s piece on the story from Tuesday as well. In addition to these grim allegations, one of the more interesting bits of information was this:

Let’s say hypothetically I run a for profit marketing business, that doubles as a publication, and am on record/screen shotted, warning clients to pull certain SM accounts before a hypothetical article dropped… am I contributing to the toxic male presence in beer while posting articles of the toxic male presence in beer? Asking for a “friend”.

Hardly independent publishing if that is the case. Interestingly, GBH ran a story that consisted on interview notes with Brienne Allan along with commentary from two lawyers on the challenges whistleblowers may face in the form of defamation lawsuits. It was odd as it seemed to give both slightly false hope as well as a warning to whistleblowers. As a lawyer, I also found it a particularly odd approach what with the legal conclusions drawn like:

…users and providers of internet services are generally protected from defamation claims when they post or share content that was created by a third party…

Not to mention the categorization of brewery owners and employees as “public figures” which would require acceptance of the phony rock star narrative which is also part of the problem with depictions of craft beer culture. As always – as with pro/am beer writers offering medical advice – get actual professional advice if you are in any way involved with a situation like this.

My own two cents in all of this was to remind people – again – that the whole shift from “micro” to “craft” brewing was an intentional rebranding specifically in response to a sex scandal that led to criminal charges. You can read about the 2002 “Sex for Sam” promotion fiasco here and, if you doubt the primary sources I cited, you can read about it also in Barrel-Aged Stout and Selling Out: Goose Island, Anheuser-Busch, and How Craft Beer Became Big Business by Josh Noel as reviewed here.

Katie questions the political economics behind the low ethical standards in what was supposed to be craft’s brave new world – what she calls “social justice paint jobs”:

I have worked in marketing for over a decade, and in that time I’ve developed a talent for sniffing out social justice paint jobs. This in turn has allowed cynicism to grow where it’s not welcome — I desperately want to see beer businesses working to bring good into the industry, and to banish what’s rotten, and to believe that this is being done for the benefit of everyone who interacts with the industry. It’s difficult to see how anything that operates within a capitalist society could survive without adopting capitalist goals…

Me, I am not one to think that “it’s the same everywhere” as I think craft has built for itself its own particular variant of the problem:

If you were wanting to create a cover story for anti-social behaviour why not create an alcohol laced drinkers’ loyalty culture controlled top down by the clique of brewery owners, cleverly labelled as a community driven by passion?

It’s that dream of a consequence-free experience under which it provides a particular cover for some pretty bad behaviour, the thing that still allows someone known to be a creep at work to claim it’s his personal matter.* Sorry. Nope.

Somewhat related, while these matters may raise many points of view, I am not sure this is exactly how one should put this, inclusion-wise. Seems itself to be pretty whitely-dudely:

…I want to balance my interview list a bit, so if you make or sell these beers and you’re not a white dude then I’d love to talk to you…

So… if this is all true, then are we facing a reality that unless you are a tiny family operation or a big brewery with all the controls a proper independent and empowered HR department that there is a risk the pigs are in charge? Maybe. Maybe not. As Jeff recommends, we can at least start by remembering that all humans deserve respect, kindness, and equity.

Speaking of tiny family operations, Joe Stange has written a profile of Virginia’s Wheatland Spring Farm and Brewery run by Bonnie and John Branding. It is published in what is either Craft Beer & Brewing or Beer & Brewing depending on which web page upper left logo you are looking at. Warning: there may be pigs but they are the proper sort so it’s OK. The Brandings make land beer:

That experience in Germany also inspired the brewing of what the Brandings call “land beer.” To them, all Wheatland Spring beer is land beer. The Germans use the word landbier—it simply means “country beer,” and breweries use it to evoke images of local, traditional lagers. To the Brandings, it reflects the farm and its surroundings…. Land beer “has to do with culture and a mindset,” John says. “It’s this connection to agriculture and to artisans, and to this more tightly knit community of craft maltsters, small hop growers, and small family breweries.” In Germany, he says, those small village breweries aren’t trying to compete with the bigger ones. “They’re happy and content with their market, just as it is….

History lesson time. The T-feed presence known as “Intoxicating Spaces” posted this message and accompanying image to the right (my left):

A charming C18th view of St Pancras Wells, a spa and pleasure garden on the site of the present-day station. As well as healing waters, it offered ‘the best of tea, coffee, neat wines, curious punch, beers, other fine ales, and cyder’.

I have writing a bit about pleasure gardens, such as Vauxhall Gardens in the last third of the 1660s at Lambeth, England as well as, note bene, Vauxhall Gardens in NYC in around the 1760s. I would absolutely love access to a pleasure garden. Why have you not provided that to me, world?

Courtesy of TBN, I saw that Ron wrote about British military brewing in WWII including in the jungles of Burma:

In Burma they took the concept of mobile brewing one step further than a brewing ship. They stuck breweries on the back of lorries. Quite a clever way of getting beer production as close as possible to the front line. Given the conditions under which it was brewed, I doubt it tasted that great. The soldiers must have been glad to get any beer at all, out in the jungle.

Look! A “curate” sighting care of the Mudge. So 2018. I thought we were done with that once it came to mean “stuff I own” but there you go.

Marverine Cole directed my eyes to this piece in The Guardian about troubles facing the only Belgian brewery that really really matters, Rochefort:

The monks have doggedly claimed that plans by Lhoist, an international company run by one of Belgium’s richest families, to deepen its chalk quarry and redirect the Tridaine spring risked altering the unique taste of their celebrated drink. Now, thanks to a deed dating back to 1833, it appears that makers and drinkers alike need no longer worry. A court of appeal in Liège has confirmed that while the quarry owner also owns the spring, it does not have the right to “remove or divert all or part of the water which supply the abbey”.

Holy subsurface riparian rights ruling, Batman! Excellent outcome.

Boak and Bailey educated us all on the history of pale’n’hoppy ale. As did Ed. They wrote in response to a post from Jeff on Thornbridge Jaipur. The point of pointing this out is not the appearance of corrections and disagreement. No, it was the appearance of a collective exploration that helped everyone and build understanding. Certainly helped me. Excellent. Good stuff indeed!

Finally, the pubs have opened in the UK for indoors pints and, just like that, the arseholes are back:

To the group of lads who ran up a £200+ drinks bill outside a #bristol pub yesterday, were abusive staff & fabricated complaints, only to then do a runner. You are the very worst of the worst sort of people, and we sincerely hope the police can track you down #unbelievable

In happier pub opening news, Jeff only had to move the sofa and TV to get the place fit for human company.

That’s a lot. Take the time to take it in. And please don’t forget to check out the weekly updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness. And remember BeerEdge, too. Plus a newcomer located by B+B: The Moon Under Water.

*Just had to note what a sad exercise this sort of statement is: “While this was all my PERSONAL life, I am so very sorry that these poor choices are now reflecting on the excellent people and products at Grains of Wrath. I emplore those who have any questions or concerns to ask me personally. I’m happy to talk to you and answer any questions you may have because open and honest dialogue is the only way to move forward.” No, bringing bad behaviours out into public with real consequences is how to move forward.

Your Middle Of January 2021 Beery News Notes For A Thursday

And what a Thursday! The last of Donald Trump’s pre-incarceration period!!! Days to go… unless he drops the big one and we all fry. That would be typical, wouldn’t it. As soon as you think you are getting rid of a fifth-rate loser like Donnie T, he drops the big one and we all fry. I shall miss things. As in all things, sure, but in particular the sort of unsmarmy positive stuff that slips through all the smarmy positive stuff about good beer, like that image above from The Wicking Man as well as his accompanying message:

I’m sure many have had difficult times in lockdown and like me have been lifted by good people on Twitter. Many thanks to my #pubtwitter friends. Your tweets and blogs have made me smile and I look forward to the days when we can share our pub trips again.

The Tand wrote a bummer of a post about the perils Welsh icon Brains Brewery faces in these uncertain times:

So what has happened? In short, Covid-19 has happened. Wales has been particularly hard hit by restrictions during the coronavirus pandemic causing “significant financial pressure” to Brains. The company had already concentrated business on a core number of around 160 pubs with the remaining 40 or so being closed or sold off in March 2020. Clearly this wasn’t enough to stave off problems, as this was followed by an announcement before Christmas that rival pub chain Marston’s was to take over on 25-year lease, 156 Brains pubs in a bid to save 1,300 jobs. The deal includes a supply agreement to continue the availability of Brains brands in the pubs, which will be leased to Marston’s at an annual rent of £5.5 million. Brain’s managed houses will also be run by Marston’s.

And similarly Jeff wrote about the death of Portland Brewing Company, an early participant in that area’s scene, offering us basically an obituary written by an old friend:

On the Friday afternoon of January 8th, Portland Brewing put out a short note announcing that, after a 35-year run, they were winding down all operations. It was a strangely subdued note given the brewery’s historical significance. One of the founding quartet of Portland breweries that started putting out beer between late 1984 and 1986, it played a substantial role in laying the foundation that would place beer at the center of the city’s identity by the early 1990s.

Going back further, Jeremy Irons as Wooster advertising a sherry of a sort in the 1970s. Fabulous.

Canadian author Anne Theriault spotted an important moment in 18th century English brewing culture the other day:

Because I am twelve years old, I wish to read more about the 18th century Farting Club in Cripplegate, where members “meet once a Week to poyson the Neighbourhood, and with their Noisy Crepitations attempt to outfart one another.” Truly the past is a foreign etc…

Careful readers will recall that Cripplegate was one of the great brewing areas of London for hundreds of years. Theriault linked to her source, Geri Walton, who had shared further detail including this:

To determine a winner, stewards acted as judges and new stewards were chosen quarterly. The stewards also resolved any disputes that arose “between the Buttocks of the odoriferous Assembly.”[7] Furthermore, to ensure the competitors did not cheat, in a nearby room a bespectacled Alms-woman sat. This elderly woman’s job was to check the underwear of participants: If “any member was suspected of Brewers Miscarriage, he was presently sent in to be examined by the Matron, who after searching his Breeches, and narrowly inspecting the hind Lappet of his Shirt … made her Report accordingly.”[8]

The fact that there were 21 footnotes below the story is in itself wonderful.

Along the same lines and following up on their 2011 false claim of inventing the beer photo contest, US brewery Founders found time to commit a form of hari kari this past week. Perhaps it was the photoshopped image of their flag as the Battle of Congress last week but their lost their social media marbles by banning everyone on the planet who mentioned them – well, who mentioned their lack of interest in living in the 21st (and perhaps even the 2oth) century. It got so fun that folk like me baited them just to get blocked on Twitter but then all that happened was this:

Funny thing. That blocking strategy rolled out by Founders this weekend? Search for their Twitter handle as any prospective new customer might and you find this long list of folk very unhappy with you. Meaning @foundersbrewing decided to trash their brand

It’s true. This is how that works. Someone woke up and stopped all the blocking by Tuesday. Dumbasses.

Continuing from last week, Mark Solomon has posted again on his new blog, this time about his project Indigenous Brew Day:

I do worry about my alcohol consumption, I would be lying if I told you I don’t think often about addiction regularly. I do believe I have a healthy relationship with alcohol but I am aware that can change quickly. Although there are many Indigenous peoples who are struggling with addiction, there are many that have a healthy relationship with alcohol. I want to tell that story, and turn around the misconceptions about Indigenous people and alcohol. Indigenous Brew Day is a great start in changing misconceptions.

ATJ wrote about missing pubs behind a paywall so I never got to read it.

The Beer Nut shared thoughts on one of his nation’s character flaws when it comes to good beer:

This beer deserves to sell in quantity but I fear that the mainstream stout drinkers are too set in their ways to switch, while the craft-curious have too much choice of other beers in more fashionable styles with arty labels to bother with this oulfellas’ stout which isn’t even in a can. The difficulty in getting Irish people to drink stouts is our beer scene’s principal national tragedy. And if you agree with me to any extent about that, make sure you get yourself some of this.

Further odd division was fomented by those who would control who should speak and what should be spoken when it comes to Dry January… oddly called Dry Feb here in Canada. “Keep it to yourself” v “if you’re doing Dry Jan and you’re sharing your experience keep it up” and see also this yet this but also this. I expect you can figure out where I sit on the question.

Kate Bernot has noted that the SCOTUS has declined to hear the case in Lebamoff v. Whitmer, a court case about widening interstate alcohol shipping laws. “Certiorari Denied!” is all they said. So no actual ruling with interesting chat to read unlike the similarly framed case before Canada’s top court in 2018. SCOTUSblog has framed the issues in the case this way:

Whether a state liquor law that allows in-state retailers to ship wine directly to consumers, but prohibits out-of-state retailers from doing so, is invalid under the nondiscrimination principle of the commerce clause or is a valid exercise of the state’s 21st amendment authority to regulate the sale of alcoholic beverages within its borders.

And finally, in other semi-regulatory news, it appears the US Brewers Association may be facing challenging times, too, as they have announced a temporary free membership offer:

Not a member but want to join? To ensure no breweries are missing updates due to financial barriers, we’re offering nonmember breweries a temporary membership free of charge. Reach out to our membership team if you’re interested.

Jings. Well, that is that for now. Enjoy the reassertion of US democracy over the next week. As you do, for more good reading check out the weekly updates from Boak and Bailey, back now mostly every Saturday, plus more at the OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. We have a new entry from the DaftAboutCraft podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. Plus the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword. And remember BeerEdge, too.

The First Thursday Beery News Notes For A Brand Spanking New 2021

Well, here we go. One year gone and another year starts full of hope and promise… oh, and an insurrection in the US Capital. Nice. This is the year of the 18th anniversary of my beer blogging, too. That’s 31.56% of my life. What an utter waste. Not at all like the art of Joel Goodman, photographer of the image above as well as the partner photo of the same spot in Manchester one year before taken early on New Year’s Day 2020, a portion of which shows up here as a random header image. Lovely stuff and a great expression of where we are today.

Speaking of reality today… do you know about storm chips and the associated beer weather severity standard? Note I wrote “beer” and not “beers” as in much of Canada the plural of beer is beer. “Beers” means a selection of brands of beer. Twelve Molson Golden are twelve beer. I have my doubts about the particular application as there is no way Kings Co., PEI is in the 24 beer zone but Truro, NS is only at 12 beer. I have a pal from the little islands to the lower left who talked of 1970-80s storm stayed parties held in houses with bordered up windows lasting two or three days until the blizzard had gone past. As posted on the FB page for Storm Level Brewing.

First… err… second, I failed you all before Christmas by not mentioning Martyn’s post on the roots of Jamaica’s love of strong sweet porter:

Draught porter was sold from draught porter shops, in existence in Kingston, Jamaica from at least the Edwardian era; from casks in refreshment parlors that also sold fried fish and bread; and also by travelling salesmen, who would call out “draaf porter!” as they travelled on foot around rural villages in the Jamaican interior, carrying a large tin container with a spout, and cans in quart, pint, half-pint and gill (quarter-pint, pronounced “jill”) sizes, for serving. Jamaica also had itinerant ice-cream salesmen, who would sell a blend of “frisco”—ice-cream and “snow ball”, shaved ice flavored with fruit syrup, mixed together—and “a measure of draught porter for the older folks.”

I wonder if Sam Adams authorized either this guy’s keg delivery technique or his filming rights? The opportunities for injury are a bit boggling. Speaking of which, this non-beer entrepreneurial advice thread had one nugget I quite likes, somewhat related to the Great White Male Hero problem with the good beer narrative:

The biographies of tech unicorn founders won’t help you. Survivorship bias is terrible. For every one that succeeded thousands more failed.

After asking on Twitter if he should, Mark Solomon joined the beer blogging world with his new site Headed Up North on which he is going to share an Indigenous perspective:

There is a tradition in many Indigenous communities, and I have since learned in many other cultures, on winter solstice. Many communities light a fire at sunset and keep the light going all night. While winter solstice is known as the shortest day of the year, the one with the least amount of daylight, there is a refrain that it only gets brighter from here. Those fires are not to strike back at the darkness but to honour it and sit within it. In the Anishinaabe creation story there are songs and teachings about the nothingness at the beginning then came darkness. Darkness is not nothing. We learn a lot about ourselves and others in the darkness.

In our regular pandemic trade news corner this week, cellar sellers are most note worthy. Makes sense. We’ve seen it from place to place including now at Falling Rock Tap House in Denver:

“We weren’t going to make it if we just kept on doing what we were doing,” Black said. Luckily, for the past 23 years, Black and his team have been slowly amassing a nest egg. “We have just probably a couple thousand bottles of beer that are vintage,” Black said. The collection contains very rare, highly sought-after beers from big-name breweries around Denver and the US. The most prized item is a 750ml bottle of a collaboration blended sour beer made in 2008 by The Lost Abbey Brewing Company called “Isabelle Proximus.” When the Cellar Sale list was posted, the lone bottle sold in one second for $400.

Retired Martin has started to chronical the take away pubs from his new location in Sheffield:

…we’ve had some wonderful beer, alternating porters and bitters and crafty keg with impunity. The only problem is, cask must by law be enjoyed within 3 hours, which means drinking 4 pints between us in an evening out of Bass glasses (NBSS 3.5/4). That’s not a habit you can keep up forever.

Here’s a big of a helpful hint for the history buffs. If you look at this image from the Twitter feed of a sailing cargo firm you will see in the lower right an explanation of the various grades of tea. These grades appear in many 1700s and 1800s newspaper notices and may assist in determining if accompanying cargo such as beer are considered fancy goods – or nor.

Best historical slag of the week: “your bum is so heavy you can’t get up“! In another history fan news, Dr. Christina Wade at her site Braciatrix wrote about a Viking burial in Ireland in the first part of the release of her Phd thesis. I am hoping for more beer content so this as yet is a placeholder – but a useful one as she canvasses questions on the quality of evidence. I note this especially in the context of the Vikings in Canada and the archaeological evidence they left behind as described in this handy post from Ottawa Rewind, especially this bit:

Wow! Barrel piece…was this for wine? Again, where did they get the oak for this?

Careful readers will recall my 2011 post on the early European settlements in Newfoundland, including Vikings. I have not had any luck finding Viking brewing in my research but it is clear that beer and malt could well have been here before 1577, the earliest date I have so far. Were the Vikings masterless men happily brewing beer hundreds of years before the masterless men? Was there malt in that oak barrel?

Jonny the Ham* wrote in Pellicle about how Pellicle came to be. I like how it is illustrated by images from a particular journey:

The first and most important reason is that Pellicle, the concept, was originally meant to be a short photography zine taken on this trip which I would self publish—something of a passion project I had dreamt of for years, based on my love of travel and film photography. Secondly, I’m incredibly self-conscious about folk reading my innermost thoughts, so at the very least you can enjoy some nice photos.

His partner in crime – or at least publishing – Matt has written a bit in Beer 52 about his upcoming book “hopefully be called Modern British Beer” and the concept of a returning greater regionality in beer. I prefer this muchly to nationalism as a defining characteristic, if only given the reality that beer predates many borders and can reflect the more important factor of trade routes rather than anything like state regulation or even national culture. I had just one truly tiny quibble about this bit:

Historically in the UK, regionality was a strong differentiator in beer styles and helped develop so much in terms of how we know and enjoy beers today. Take Burtonisation—for example—a process developed by brewers to mimic the mineral content of the Burton-upon-Trent water supply. The hard water of Burton contains higher levels of gypsum, which when used as a brewing process aid in the form of brewers salts will lower your worts pH. This is preferred by some brewers when producing pale, hoppy beer styles, as it aids hop absorption rates, and thus how they are showcased in the resulting beer. It’s no coincidence the story of IPA began here, in the Midlands.

Quibble? The brewing with and drinking of the sulfurous waters of Burton predated the inclusion of masses of hops. Hops were first added by one clever brewer in the late 1600s at the Brimstone Alehouse to deal with those who had to deal with the, err, vomitous qualities of his local product ripe with regional… umm… vernacular. Which actually makes Matt’s point even a bit better.

Elsewhere, Dave Infante is “joining”** VinePair‬⁩ to cover the beer industry. Send him tips if you think it is a good idea to send other beer writers your tips. And speaking of speaking about beer, I liked this back and forth between Monsieur Noix du Biere and Matt. Are local voices too likely to be embedded or are the embedded ones the best perspective? Note also the second alt use of the word “indigenous” in today’s roundup. I prefer “vernacular “for this particular meaning but I don’t think anyone’s toes are aching.

Finally, two good posts this week from Boak and Bailey on, first, a surprising forerunner of an improved pub from the 1880s and, second, a helpful piece on the rare duck these days that is ESB. Looks like they spent their recent break from beer blogging over the holidays writing beer blog posts. Alistair is taking another sort of break this January but found time to post about a day dream he is having about another venerable beer, Trukker ur-Pils.

There. That’s a good start to the year. And for more good reading check out the weekly updates from Boak and Bailey, back now mostly every Saturday, plus more at the OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. We have a new entry from the DaftAboutCraft podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. Plus the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword. And remember BeerEdge, too.

*The Hammer? The Hamster?
**…which could mean anything from being a freelancer to CEO.

A Thursday Beer News Update For An Even Sadder Week

Another week in lock down. What is there to say? Things are moving along a bit of a path, maybe showing a bit of the light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe. I hope the world hasn’t turned too upside down where you are. Things are looking a bit better in Rye, England where as we see above James Jeffrey has created the “Beer Delivery by Stonch!“* service. I’m not sure of the legalities of it all but how lovely to get a couple of pints of fresh drawn ale delivered from the pub. We’ve had new laxer laws pub in place here so no doubt there are more novel opportunities out there to be discussed.

The new home delivery here in Ontario has been so successful that some breweries are now being drained:

Thirsty Ottawans in lockdown are drinking beer faster than local breweries can produce it, causing some to run dry of their most popular varieties. The demand for canned beer is keeping some breweries afloat during the economic slowdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. “We’re definitely moving beer faster now,” said Laura Behzadi, co-founder of Bicycle Craft Brewery. “Our beers will sell out in a day or two, sometimes three.” Like many craft beer breweries and brew pubs across the province, Bicycle has shifted solely to taking orders online since public health officials in Ontario commanded restaurants to close in mid-March.

Not every brewery has been able to adapt as Britain’s Left Handed Giant shared in detail:

Aim no 1 has been to try to find new revenue streams after the loss of both our bars, and around 85% of trade custom. All bars are shut and as such all trade we used to sell to wholesalers and bars direct has dried up. Worryingly very little of the beer we sold on credit through the early part of the year has now been paid for. Most bars and shops that have been shut have closed their books and are unable to pay. So not only have we lost current trade, we are staring at the possibility of losing the revenue generated from sales before the crisis even began. We are still paying our bills so we have hugely negative cash flow. All the money we owed going out, but very little of what’s owed coming in.

I do find the folk writing about today’s new situation the most interesting. By the way, here is great writing advice from Al Purdy, who wrote this. And this was my favorite tweet this week about the change:

Living next to a pub, I’m used to late-night revellers shouting but what really annoyed me was the chap who would imitate an owl hoot around 2.30am every night. Now pubs are shut I realise the hooting still goes on and it’s not a drunk. It is actually an owl.

Looking for something to do? Now you can volunteer to transcribe records on line with the Archives of the Province of Nova Scotia! Might be something about beer in them there archives. I wrote a paper in law school in that there building on the Court of Vice-Admiralty cases 1750 to 1760 on liquor violations. See, the local pre-Cajun Acadians liked their brandy but the conquering British wanted them to buy rum. It all ended up badly.

And while I want to hear about today, the odd post about what is missed is good, this one about a beer garden once visited in Germany:

I find myself thinking back to Bamberg. It was the height of summer and the middle of a Europe-wide heat wave with the sorts of temperatures that I, as a woman from the North of England, rarely come across; high 30s, each step an effort and bringing with it waves of exhaustion. We climb up a hill on the outskirts of town. It feels steeper than it is, the progress takes longer than it should and I grumble that it better be worth it.

Did I mention I wrote an actual post last weekend about actual brewing history? Dorchester Ale!!! Or beer… Dorchester Ale and Beer!!!!

Matthew L has continued his revivalist blogging (when he is not working to stock grocery shelves) with his admission that, along with Paisley patterned shirts, he has a thing for that thing Buckfast:

For me, the past two weeks have been like this – get up, go to work, stay there till Midnight (for maximum social distancing), go home, eat, have a few beers and go back to bed. The thing about this routine, is you have very little to look forward too at the end of the week. Basically, it’s the same as a work day, only without the work. And as such, you try to find the smallest thing about your old life to hang onto. With me, it will be Buckfast Sunday. Let me explain – every Sunday at 3pm, myself and few other regulars at a local micropub have a glass of the infamous Buckfast Tonic wine. Like all the best traditions, nobody really knows how it started (or even how a craft beer focused bar ended up stocking notorious Ned juice).

ATJ created a very interesting participatory project when he tweeted this and received many answers to his hypothesis:

Doing some research on regional beer styles, it’s my belief that the idea of regional differences in beer preferences has all but died out in the UK but am willing to be proved wrong if anyone has any examples. Be good to read all views based on personal experiences.

Robsterowski’s reply was practically haiku… or maybe half a sonnet: “Golden, flinty bitter in West Yorkshire. Sweet yet hoppy golden bitter in the West Midlands. Heavy in Scotland. Lightly flavoured quaffing bitter in Cumbria.” There are more than fifty other responses. Worth the read.

A timely joke…

Finally, as if things could not be worse, they did. As I mentioned last weekend on the bits of social media I use, I have been particularly struck by the horrible news from Nova Scotia because the crimes occurred where I used to live. The roads around Portapique were where I worked in high school and undergrad summer jobs, doing maintenance jobs in senior citizen housing or working up dirt roads piling pulp wood. Where we had summer beach parties, one of which included a pal’s car floating in the sea after being caught parked too near the world’s highest tides. School friends lived there along the northern shore of the Minas Basin. Some now back retired forty years later. Terrible. I mark this here to remember how it happened in a week like any other week, when we were already dealing with rotten news.

Having said that, we do know that things will be better and another day and week is coming. Keep writing and keep reading. Check in with Boak and Bailey most Saturdays, plus more at the OCBG Podcast on Tuesdays and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, too. Plus the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And have a look at Brewsround‘s take on the beer writing of the week. Thanks for stopping by.

Wouldn’t We All Prefer A Nice Quart of Dorchester Ale… Or Beer?

Have my mentioned my last two and a half years have been a bit of a blur at work? The history blogging has suffered. But it’s always the things we hold most dear that fall away, aren’t they. Well, as I expect is the case with you, it’s a bit quieter in the evenings around here so I thought I would pull out some of the delayed research and have a look at Dorchester Ale and Beer starting with a summary of the known information to date. First, if you look at this notice in The Literary Gazette of 1819, you will see something that is apparent from the research: there is both Dorchester Ale and Dorchester Beer. For purposes of this bit of writing, I am not going to get into the distinction but it is important to note that they likely were not synonyms.

Dorchester is the county town of Dorset, which sits on the middle of the bottom of England on the Channel. Daniel Defoe praised it in his book A tour thro’ the whole island of Great Britain (1724–26):

“The town is populous, tho’ not large, the streets broad, but the buildings old, and low; however, there is good company and a good deal of it; and a man that coveted a retreat in this world might as agreeably spend his time, and as well in Dorchester, as in any town I know in England…”

Dorchester was a key departure port for Puritans emigrating to New England in the 1600s. Dorchester beer was popular before and after the American Revolution from at least the 1760s in New York City to the early 1800s. It is not mentioned by Locke in 1674. There was a song about it published in 1784 praising its power to even sooth political disunion. Coppinger described its ingredients in this way in the 1815 edition of his fabulously named book The American Practical Brewer and Tanner:

- - 54 Bushels of the best Pale Malt.
  - 50 lb. of the best Hops.
  - 1 lb. of Ginger.
  - ¼ of a lb. of Cinnamon, pounded.

So, a spiced pale ale says he. You can figure out the 54 bushel to 14 barrel ratio but his version of it does not look like super strong stuff. That would seem to go against the cross-Atlantic shipping market for it so we can think about that a bit more. Or we can turn to North American’s best beer writer who doesn’t write book nor blog, Gerry Lorentz, who added a great whack of information in a comment left at this here blog posted in October 2018 which I add here in full simply because I can:

I’m sure that Dorchester beer probably didn’t stay constant over the centuries. Coppinger’s recipes contain a long list of additives, so that fact that he says Dorchester beer contained ginger and cinnamon probably doesn’t amount to much. Friederich Accum indicated that “Dorchester Beer is usually nothing else than Bottled Porter,” this coming after a discussion of Old Hock, or white porter. In Observations on the Diseases in Long Voyages to Hot Climates (1775), John Clark also indicated that Dorchester beer was similar to porter. He discussed “country beer,” noting it as one of “the usual diluters” of meals for the fashionable sort in India: “Country beer is made by mixing one part Dorchester beer, or porter, with two or more parts of water.” Others writers viewed Dorchester beer as similar to brown stout. One early twentieth-century researcher looking to get more information on Dorchester Beer put out a question in Notes and Queries in 1905 asking about a footnote in William Gawler’s 1743 poem, Dorchester, that indicated that “an eminent Dealer in Dorchester Beer, now living in London, reckons amongst his Customers the late Czar, the Kings of Prussia and Denmark, as well as his late and present Majesty of Great Britain,” which points to a Baltic trade similar to porter.

Both William Ellis in the London and Country Brewer (1837) and John Farley in The London Art of Cookery, 7th edition (1792) point out the “chalky water” used in making Dorchester beer. Farley writes that “The Dorchester beer, which is so much admired, is, for the most part brewed of chalky water, which is almost every where in that county ; and as the soil is generally chalk.” So, perhaps it had some Burtonesque qualities to it.

Thomas Hardy probably has the best, and least helpful, description of Dorchester Beer in his book The Trumpet Major, in which he states: “It was of the most beautiful colour that the eye of an artist in beer could desire; full in body, yet brisk as a volcano; piquant, yet with a twang; luminous as an autumn sunset; free from streakiness of taste, but finally, rather heady. The masses worshipped it, and the minor gentry loved it better than wine, and by the most illustrious country families it was not despised.”

Excellent. Clearly a strongish ale. And Gerry is always right. I would but quibble the slightest bit about the qualities “Burtonesque” but I have my own theory about the vomit inducing levels of sulfur that spawned that region’s Satanically hopped styles a generation or two earlier that Dorchester rose into popularity.

In the 1922 book Thomas Hardy’s Dorset, by R.T. Hopkins, we read

Dorchester has now lost its fame for brewing beer. But about 1725 the ale of this town acquired a very great name. In Byron’s manuscript journal (since printed by the Chetham Society) the following entry appears:

“May 18, 1725. I found the effect of last night drinking that foolish Dorset, which was pleasant enough, but did not at all agree with me, for it made me stupid all day.”

A mighty local reputation had “Dorchester Ale,” and it still commands a local influence, for this summer I was advised by the waiter of the Phoenix Hotel to try a bottle of “Grove’s Stingo” made in the town. It is a potent beverage–and needs to be treated with respect, to be drunk slowly and in judicious moderation.

Hopkins continues with the same passage from Thomas Hardy that Gerry L. noted in his comment, above, as well as others from Hardy as well as a mid-1700s song “The Brown Jug” that references a Dorchester Butt as a measure of at least one lad’s girth.

Acknowledging the love-hate relationship we have with records, the earliest i have found Dorchester Ale is recorded as being delivered to North America relates to a shipment to Virginia mentioned in a letter dated, oddly, June 28th and July 25th 1727 from one Robert Carter to Edward Tucker, the latter of whom died in 1739, merchant of Weymouth, Dorset who served as mayor in 1705, 1716, 1721, 1725, and 1735, and also as a member of Parliament:

…Your Portland is gon to York to fill up I have Six hhds of my Crop Tobbo: on board her which Sent you a bill of Lading had Russell bin at liberty to have Sent a Sloop for this Tobbo: he might have got redy for this Fleet I must desire you to Send me in the next year in one of your Ships a hogshead of your fine Dorchester Ale well and Carefully bottled of and under very good Package Your Master Britt will tell you how I was abused in the last. The Southam Cyder the Portland brought me I doubt will never be fine it is not yet Bottled If you can Send me a hogshead of it in bottles that is right good Such as I had two Years ago, it would [be] Acceptable but in Cask I will have no more I am with a great deal of Sincerity…

Hmm… it is fine and worth being shipped. In 1752, Frances Monday was before the judge in London’s Old Bailey indicted for that she assaulted John Hall and stole from him one half guinea in gold. The evidence of Hall begins thusly:

Last Thursday se’nnight I had been in the Borough, staid late, and was in liquor. I could not get into my lodgings in Grey’s-Inn-lane. I was going from thence to Westminster to an acquaintance there, and passing by the new church in the Strand this woman came cross the way to me and asked me to go with her and drink some Dorchester ale. I went to a place which she said was the Black Swan between the new church and Exeter Change. I drank but one glass of beer. She then asked me to give her some shrub. which I did, and a bottle to take home with her.

Ms. Monday was acquitted based on her alternate version of events, backed by witnesses: “The gentleman made me a present of it. After he had what he desired of me, he said he would have it again, or he’d swear a robbery against me.” So… perhaps a sort of beer that was name dropped perhaps to show a bit of unwarranted class?

In his MA thesis for the Université de Sherbrooke submitted April 2014, Mathieu Perron stated that Dorchester ale (or beer) was mentioned among numerous other beers in the notices published in La Gazette de Québec during the early years after the fall of New France:

De 1764 à 1774, sur 28 mentions relatives à la bière dans les petites annonces de La Gazette de Québec, 15 occurrences appartiennent à la catégorie « Porter », le restant étant réparti entre différents Malt Liquor. Ces bières (Dorchester Ale/Beer, Yorchester Ale, Taunton Ale, Welch Ale) aux degrés d’alcool élevés, génèreusement houblonnées, raditionnellement consommées par les classes moyennes anglaises, attestent du transfert des habitudes de consommation chez les classes marchandes de la province…

Fabulous references to the variety available to the military elite in that garrison town. And I need to see the ad for “Yorchester” ale now.

Further south, in his diary of 1775-76, the Reverend Dr. Samuel Cooper, pastor of the Brattle Street Church in Boston, Massachusetts – a bit of a coffee fiend – records being treated to “a Glass of Dorchester Ale” on one occasion as he made his way around his fellow revolutionaries in Boston during its bombardment by the British.

After the war, as part of reparations claims which were made with various degrees of success, Henry Howell Williams a 1775 tenant on Noddles Island in Boston Harbour claimed for goods “Destroyed by a Detatchment of the American Army or Carried off by said Detatchment, for the Use of the United States” claimed just in terms of the liquor in his cellar:

3	Barrls. Cyder 36/2 Q. Casks Wine 220 1 Dozn. Ditto Bottled	1412.–
1	Hamper Dorchester Ale. 6 Dozn. Excellent Cyder	3.16.–
3	Dozn. Carrl. Wine 1 keg Methegalin Sweet Oyle &c.	6:4:–
2	Hogsheads Old Jamaica Spirit 231 Gallns @ 5/-	57.15.–
3	Hogsheads New Rum Just got home from the W. Indies Quanty. 234 Gallons a 3/4-	39:0:0

Which seems like a lot – and also places Dorchester Ale in fine company.* And on both sides of the Revolution in Puritan Boston, a century and a half after being founded by Dorset folk.

At about the same time back in England but on the same end of the cannon demographically speaking as Mr. Williams of Noddles Island, we read about a pleasure garden named Jenny’s Whim in the Pimlico area of London, “a very favorite place of amusement for the middle classes”:

This feature of the garden is specially mentioned in a short and slight sketch of the place to be found in the Connoisseur of March 15th, 1775:—”The lower part of the people have their Ranelaghs and Vauxhalls as well as ‘the quality.’ Perrott’s inimitable grotto may be seen for only calling for a pint of beer; and the royal diversion of duck-hunting may be had into the bargain, together with a decanter of Dorchester [ale] for your sixpence at ‘Jenny’s Whim.'”

Then things get all scientific. In the 1797 essay “Experiments and Observations on Fermentation and Distillation of Ardent Spirit” by Joseph Collier the pre- and post-fermentation densities of four type of beer are described: Porter, Ringwood Ale, Dorchester Ale and Table Beer. It is interesting. Of course it is. If it was not interesting why would I have mentioned. it? The author uses a “saccharometer” like this. Without knowing the details of the calibration or the scale, the relative ratio is enough to tell us that Dorchester is sweet and a bit strong, a bit more than double that of Table beer. Dorchester drops 39 degrees of the “whatever scale” where Table beer drops 18. Ringwood drops 44 degrees but has a final gravity that is two-thirds of Dorchester. Notice too that these are “the most celebrated malt liquors” – which is interesting.

In an 1816 German text entitled Jenaische allgemeine literatur-zeitung, Volume 3, it is listed in another list of English ales. I include the whole passage because it’s pretty interesting as a snapshot of the times. Ron or someone cleverer that I will be able to translate but quite neato to see the references to Queen’s ale and Wittshire ale .

More science. In 1829, Dorcehster Ale is listed in the book Description and Use of the Brewer’s Sacchatometer as having a “proportion of alcohol” of 5.56 which placed it below Burton and Edinburgh Ale and above London Porter.

Does it start to become faded? After his fall from grace and the financial support of the Regent, Beau Brummell exiled in Calais in the 1820s was said to drink it according to this 1860s account and an 1855 article in Harpers:

Not even for Lord Westmoreland, his creditor for frequent loans, would the Man of Fashion consent to “feed” at an earlier hour. Being a pauper, Dorchester ale, with a petit verre, and a bottle of the best claret were his usual beverage when alone; but he counted largely on invitations to dinner from passing Englishmen. As he grew older, gluttony grew upon him; ho had not the heart to refuse an invitation, no matter what the hour of ” feeding.”

In Slaters Directory 1852/3 it was written:

The spinning of worsted yarn and the manufacture of woollen goods , formerly ranked as the staple here; but these branches have greatly declined, if they are not entirely lost – blanketing and fiuscy being the only articles now manufactured. Dorchester ale has long been famed, and it still maintains a superior character; the mutton of this district is liekwise held in great and general estimation.

The same source for that text has a helpful page on one Robert Galpin of Fordington in the County of Dorset, Brewer, which give a helpful sense of scale of brewing operations then or at least his operation at the time.

What to make of it all? Dorchester Ale / Beer appear to be a Georgian thing that arcs in parallel to Burton and Nottingham, coming after 1600s and early 1700s strong English ales like Lambeth, Derby, Hull and Northdown/Margate. Like Taunton, it is exported to North America and perhaps elsewhere in the colonies. It is not as strong as others and seems to have chalky water with a pronounced residual sweetness. Premium while not necessarily being a headbanger.

Interesting also to note how these strong pale ales named after the city or region in which they were brewed generally (but not exclusively) fit between (i) the Medieval and Tudor pattern of naming beers according to their heft: half-penny, two penny, double double and (ii) the brewer branded beer, scientifically made proto-styles we start seeing beginning in the 1800s. Like the climactic observations on the reason French bread in great in the recent excellent article in the New Yorker “Baking Bread in Lyon“, they would have been remarkable for some local characteristic that set them apart.

I will have to organize these posts on English Stuart and Georgian era regional strong pale ales into some better categorizations. They need an umbrella term. They are not styles in the same sense as their predecessors or their descendants. But they were clearly recognizable and sought out for their prestige.

*And I trust that table rendered well at your end of the internets.

Your Thursday Beer News Notes For The Week Which Was The Best Of Times And The Worst Of Times

What a week! And it’s not done yet. I’m working in isolation as many of you are while many others are not able to work. Here in Canada, a huge collective response is underway at the many levels of government and public compliance with sheltering in place is high. Neighbours are sharing with neighbours. It seems to be working well and I hope the same is true where you are. Well, working well for the most part:

P.E.I. farmer keeps social distance by hurling pork products to hungry customers.

People are finding out how to make do in the beer world. I get by with a bit of the old bunting when the sun shines. The Polk is out on the porch, too a sure sign of a Canadian spring. The BA is looking into supply chains. Some aren’t. Some places it is about bounced paycheques. Andy wrote about the scene as of Monday and it ain’t pretty in the world of NuKraft:

With tap rooms closed, thousands of breweries around the country no longer have a source of income. Most don’t have their own canning or bottling equipment. They don’t have relationships with distributors or bars, restaurants, or off-premise stores. They never saw the need to diversify their operations because nothing could ever shut off their money maker, the customer at their own bar.

My favourite so far is (err… perhaps poorly) illustrated to the right, the Albany Pump Station driving around with a growler fill tap truck as Craig described:

Does your brewer show up at your house, with a trailer full of beer and fill growlers for you at 9pm? Mine does. C.H. Evans Brewing Albany Pump Station a buzz tomorrow and ask if Sam will Santa Claus over to your house tomorrow! $10 crowlers (or 3 for $20)!

In Ireland, an extra-legal approach to keeping the taps flowing has lead to a stern warning:

Publicans who have opened despite the Government’s direction that they close for two weeks due to the coronavirus pandemic have not only put the wider public at serious risk, they have also put their licences and livelihoods on the line, one of the State’s leading barristers has warned. Senior Counsel Constance Cassidy who specialises in liquor licence applications, told The Irish Times that although the closure guidelines issued last week “are merely directory in nature until specific regulatory legislation is introduced”, publicans have been ignoring them at their peril.

In my own town, newly opened Daft Brewing has, a bit by luck, joined the ranks of those making hand sans-a-hizer:

The company’s new-found ability to make the increasingly scarce hand sanitizer hinged on a decision to buy a 200-litre still from China. “At the time we were thinking we couldn’t get this cheaper and with free shipping, so we just bought it for future use,” Rondeau said. “We had no plans to use it. We’re not a distillery. We just had it sitting in storage.” Skip ahead to three days ago, after hearing about how distillers were switching production to hand sanitizer, and the company’s employees dragged the still out of storage.

The UK’s mass watering hole chain Wetherspoons appears to be rushing to the bottom according to Rog the Protz:

Just in case any of you were thinking the #TimMartin #Wetherspoons fiasco couldn’t get any worse (keep my businesses open no risk in pubs, laying off staff without pay “go & get a job in Tesco”) he’s now written to out of pocket suppliers they must wait at his pleasure to be paid

And just like that, the pure power of Protz proves its potency as the hairy dimwit running the place does a 180. Good news for the staff.

Next, a bit of history was made this week as Martyn wrote the tale of a very early and not much good porter brewery in the US state of Virginia – which might be the first but is certainly the earliest example so far of porter brewing on this side of the Atlantic*:

In 1766 the brewery made 550 bushels of malt, but the quality of much of the beer and ale produced was poor. Mercer wrote to his eldest son George that “Wales complains of my Overseer & says that he is obliged to wait for barley, coals & other things that are wanted which, if timely supplied with he could with six men & a boy manufacture 250 bushels a week which would clear £200 … My Overseer is a very good one & I believe as a planter equal to any in Virginia but you are sensible few planters are good farmers and barley is a farmer’s article.”

And Boak and Bailey have posted about one of my favourite forms of Victorian writing, the recollection of how things were in youth, that leads them on a chase for the meaning of Kennett Ale:

The novelist and historian Walter Besant’s 1888 book Fifty Years Ago is an attempt to record the details of life in England in the 1830s, including pubs and beer. Of course this doesn’t count as a primary source, even if 1888 is closer to 1838 than 2020. Besant was himself born in 1836 and the book seems laced with rosy nostalgia – a counterpoint, at least, to contemporary sources whose detail is distorted by temperance mania…

These sorts of writings were very handy as part of the patching together of the 1800s tales of Albany Ale and Cream Beer. I trust them as recollections in the way one trust evidence in a court proceeding. Something to build upon.

In the category of upside effect of pandemic, ATJ had dusted off Called to the Bar and is getting back in the blogging game as part of his isolation skills development program. His first new post was about his experience of “PSS” – pub separation syndrome:

Where shall I wander when I’m told if I’m old and need to be at home? At what shall I wonder if I cannot stroll alone? The cities and towns in which I clowned but also frowned and then classed glasses of brown, gold and amber beers with varying degrees of hwyl are closed to me for now.

And Jeffery John himself has fired up the coal-fed servers and has Stonch’s Beer Blog running again:

Day one of being a pub landlord on Coronavirus lockdown: mothball the cellar; thoroughly clean lines; switch off all non-essential equipment.

Day two: turn the remote cooler back on again; connect a keg up to *just one* line for personal consumption.

Day three: get the ice machine going for 5pm G&Ts; decide it’s reasonable to have one IPA line and one lager line in operation for me and my cabin-mate.

JC’s Beer Blog is also revived. Any others? We need to recall that blogging was one way that we got through the immediate aftermath of 9/11. It’s good to write.

In the world of not-beer, another positive out of the lock down of the planet appears to be the delay in releasing the next vintage of Bordeaux so that it will be first reviewing from the bottle not the cask:

Normally, tastings for the new vintage would take place at the end of this month and early April. Scores and reports would emerge at the end of April and into early May and the first wines, bar the odd wild outlier, would start to trickle out in late May with trading properly happening in June and all wrapped up by July. All in all you have five months of Bordeaux-focused discussion and selling, something entirely unique in the world of fine wine. It’s no wonder it causes such jealousy. In a normal world the Bordelais would not want to release the 2019 wines until the trade has tasted them and formulated an opinion but when can this happen? France is currently in lockdown and the UK is rapidly following suit. When exactly both countries – and indeed other western countries that constitute en primeur’s primary markets – will be fully released from this limbo is unclear at present.

Remember – even in these troubled times, there is more beer news every week with Boak and Bailey most Saturdays, plus more at the OCBG Podcast on Tuesdays and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, too. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast now as well! Plus the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. Check them out. Hunker down. You got this.

*Must check on this. A rogue porter brewery in Newfoundland would not surprise me if it were not for their happy habit from the 1500s on of importing all the good stuff they need.