Britannia's Christmas Booze

Begone despondency and depression in the economy and let us celebrate instead the brilliant selection of alcoholic drinks that make Britain great. Let’s go local during this festive season and stock up on Britannia’s booze. Whether it is cider brandy or perry, sparkling wine or cassis, regional producers are harnessing their passion to create world beating drinks.

Britain is one of the Top 3 brewing nations (along with Germany and Belgium) with a plethora of styles of beer that are copied particularly by American, New Zealand, and Australian brewers.  Pale Ale, India Pale Ale, Porter, Stout, Barley Wine are just five styles that rule the world. And that’s just the English ones.  Have you ever tried traditional Scottish ale made from heather, gooseberries, spruce, or seaweed?  Heather ale is the oldest style of beer in the world still being brewed – dating back to circa 2,000 BC.

Farmhouse Ciders and Perries par excellence especially from Somerset and Herefordshire producers are exciting people’s palates and revitalising ancient traditions of cider making in the countryside.  After a prolonged tussle with Brussels, the Somerset Cider Brandy Company has won the right to use the word ‘brandy’ to describe their distilled cider – even though written records describing a drink called cider brandy date back to 1678.

Ten years ago most people laughed at the phrase ‘English Wine’.  No longer!  Have you tried an English sparkling wine?  If not, why?  For a start, sparkling wine was invented in England not France – albeit by adding a sparkle to imported French wine (the proof lies in the archives of the Royal Society in London).  Thanks to the temperate influence of the Gulf Stream on Britain’s climate, grapes grow here, despite the country being so far north.  The chalk underlay of southern England is a continuation of the land under the Champagne region and the gentle contours and well drained soils of the region are perfect for planting vines.  In blind tasting competitions English fizz has beaten French sparklers.  Crisp dry acidic wines are the English still wine producers’ forté using grapes such as Bacchus and Madeleine Angevine. That’s the grape wines, but don’t ignore country wines and liqueurs made from a cornucopia of fruit, flowers, sap, and spice.

Mead (fermented honey and water) was probably the first alcoholic beverage made by humans, and after being largely overlooked in Britain in the past few decades, it’s making a return to the drinks cabinet. Served over ice or gently warmed up it makes a tasty dessert.

And how could anyone forget Scotland’s singular export – malt whisky?  No need to watch your back Jock, but there are some surprising new rivals – the English Whisky Company and the Welsh Whisky Company distilling the water of life in Norfolk and the Brecon Beacons respectively.

Are you inspired yet? Get ready for Christmas dinner with the two drinks menus below. I am a passionate beer drinker, worship at the altar of Ninkasi, and consider beer to be the best match for food, so for fellow beerophiles there is a menu of malt and hops, and for the liquorish all-sorts there is a menu to excite those palates.  Or if you’re like me, you’ll try both drinks menus.  Plenty of time - it is the Twelve Days of Christmas after all!

Beer Menu (serve the beer in wine glasses)

• Aperitif (served in a Champagne flute):  Fuller’s Organic Honeydew.  A light, gently carbonated beer with a distinct honey aroma, biscuit flavours, and a mild hop bitterness to give a refreshing bite.  It gets the party started.
• Main dishes:  Brewsters Pale Ale.  A fresh, crisp beer with citrus aromas, grassy, biscuit character on the palate, and a dry finish.  The refreshing character of the beer makes it cut through the heavy body of the food without overwhelming some of the more subtle flavours of the meal. Stock up – you’ll want more than one bottle.
• Christmas Pudding: Durham Brewery Redemption Barley Wine – a full-on beer with enormous dried fruit flavours.
• After dinner Stilton:  Dark Star Imperial Stout – an incredibly complex beer with roasted chocolate and coffee flavours.  Grown up beers need grown up cheese where the robust flavours of both do not dominate the other.

What a choice. Roll on December 25th I say!  Anyone want to join me on the roof to shout out why Britannia rules the booze?

Book Review: The Oxford Companion to Beer: edited by Garrett Oliver

If I did not already have this book it would be top of my Christmas wishlist.

The temptation to ignore my ‘To Do list at work in favour of hours devouring the hundreds of entries is almost irresistible. It is crammed with everything you need to know about beer, and plenty of things you didn’t even know you needed to know.

One of my favourite aspects of the encyclopaedia is the range of subjects – from fascinating anecdotes about Catherine the Great and her love of London Stout, to solid science – polymerase chain reactions.

Whether you want to dip in and out, or spend a month with your head buried in it make sure you have some beer handy.  It’s thirsty work!

A Brewster in Witch's Clothing?

Picture the popular image of a witch – black cat, broomstick, pointed hat, bubbling cauldron. These also the motifs associated with England’s female brewers and ale-wives in the medieval era. 

Is it a coincidence that the image of medieval brewsters so closely resembles the popular image of a witch, or was foul play perpetrated by persons who wanted to malign female brewers in an era when witch hunting was rife? 

FACTS

• During the medieval period the majority of brewers in England were women.  Brewing was low status, low paid work largely performed by women in the home as part of their household duties.

• Ale was a staple of the diet providing valuable nutrition, a safe source of drinking water, and fun! Surplus ale was sold by middle-women called ale-wives, hucksters, or tipplers.

So how are the witch motifs connected with female brewers?

• Cats. Malted cereal is an essential ingredient in brewing.  Cats keep hungry vermin at bay and prevent mice and rats from eating the malts.

• Broom . An everyday household implement that also resembles an ale-stake.   An ale-stake was a pole to which twigs or greenery were attached at one end. By law, purveyors of ale had to display an ale-stake above their door as a sign to customers, and the authorities that ale was sold at those premises.

• Pointed hat.  No-one left home without wearing a titfer.  And a high crowned hat would permit ale-wives to be easily identified in the street.

• Bubbling Cauldron.  Ale is made by boiling water and malt together.  Before electricity was used for heat, cooking was done over a fire in a metal container.  When the malt and water cooled, the yeast went to work creating a bubbling froth as it fermented sugars in the brew. In the medieval period people did not understand what yeast was.  To them something supernatural happened as water and cereal was transformed into alcohol.  In other words, it was magic.

Why Were Women Edged Out of Brewing in England?

• In medieval England there was a revolution in brewing when hops were introduced from Europe.  Hops give aroma, flavour, bitterness, and are a natural preservative.

• In the medieval period ale contained no hops, but beer did. Ale went sour very quickly but the hops in beer gave it a longer shelf life which meant brewing became a lucrative trade as beer could be transported to new markets without losing its quality as quickly as ale did.

• Society needed a regular source of ale and beer and so the authorities restricted its production to a small group of reliable brewers who were members of the brewing guild.  Women were not permitted to join guilds and were edged out of brewing.

• People did not understand how yeast worked to ferment the sugars in the brew and convert it to alcohol.  To them magic was involved in turning water and cereal into a bubbling froth (the yeast) that created beer.

• Rumours were often spread about the local brewster – questioning the quality of her ale; suggesting that she cheated customers; that she was dirty; or that she kept a disorderly ale-house.

• Witch hunting in Medieval England was rife so it was simple to ostracise a woman from society by accusing her of witchcraft.  Does this explain the connection between the brewer’s tools of trade and the popular image of a witch?

Brewing Competition for Women

Did you know that women were the original brewers of beer?  For the majority of beer’s thousands years of history, women were the primary beer brewers because beer was food and women were in charge of food production. All the deities of beer are female, including the Sumerian goddess Ninkasi.

Nowadays there is still a dearth of female brewers so Jane Peyton, Principal of the School of Booze is on a mission to inspire more women to brew and drink beer.  Beer is full of nutrition, and in moderation, has proven health benefits.  And the connection with beer and bellies is a myth!

If you’re a women and fancy having a go at brewing beer then why not enter a competition to invent your very own beer. Whoever wins will brew their beer alongside founder and head brewer Sara Barton at Brewster’s Brewery.  And it may even go on sale through Brewster’s outlets!

To make this competition even tastier, entrants will take inspiration from Britain’s leading producer of Fairtrade chocolate, Divine and devise a beer recipe inspired by one of their brands. If the brand is Divine Dark Chocolate with Orange and Ginger then the beer recipe might be an IPA containing citrus and spicy hops.

So why not become a 21st century goddess of beer and enter the competition to brew Ninkasi’s Nectar.  Competition ends on December 31st 2011.

For more details see: http://www.school-of-booze.com/ninkasis-nectar-brewing-competition

Jane Peyton, Principal of the School of Booze

The International Language of Beer

When Ludwig Zamenhof invented Esperanto in 1887 his goal was for humans to communicate in a common language so peace and international understanding could be fostered regardless of regional or national tongues. Perhaps he was not aware that a lingua franca already existed and it is called beer.

Oh beer – what a priceless gift to humanity.  Not only is it packed with nutrition, has myriad health benefits, is a safe source of drinking water, but it begets happiness, sociability, and companionship. No wonder it is the world’s favourite alcoholic beverage.

Walk past a pub, inn, saloon, tavern, shebeen, bar, café, brasserie, bodega, lodge, boozer, and look at the people who are having the most fun. What are they drinking?  Beer, bier, cerveja, biera, ビール, birra, bière, пиво, μπύρα, cerveza, 啤酒 of course!

Beer is the essential social beverage. There is nothing wrong with drinking it alone at home but how much better does it taste when consumed in company. Beer is not the drink to turn to when in shock, to self medicate with, or for drowning one’s sorrows in.  Beer is playful. How many times does a quick beer after work end up hours later with people singing, arms round each other, as they  profess unending friendship to a person they met for the first time earlier that evening.   It is beer goggles that make the world beautiful. Not brandy goggles.

Picture the scene.  A group of strangers are in a pub.  One drinks a whisky, another person a glass of wine, someone orders vodka. Chances are they will remain strangers.  Now take that same group and fill their glasses with beer. Within minutes they will be friends.

Beer drinking encourages bonhomie.  I have the satisfaction of observing this close-up because I sometimes work as a tour guide in a British brewery. The brewery has visitors from all over the world.  Some speak little or no English.  Tour groups vary in their make-up - individuals, couples, sets of work colleagues.  People are often shy and don’t interact with the others during the walk through the brewery.  But as soon as we go to the bar afterwards and they start drinking the beer something magical happens.  Noise levels increase, laughter punctuates the air, the atmosphere becomes very jolly as beer breaks down the barriers and everyone starts talking to each other – regardless of mother tongue. Then afterwards as the visitors leave the bar, faces lit up with smiles, they invariably head to the nearest pub for more beer together with their new friends.

Those visitors from overseas are envious of British pubs and cask conditioned ale. The latter is a way of serving beer that is all but unique to Britain.  It is how beer should be drunk – live, full of flavour, and natural – passionately cared for by the pub’s cellar men and cellar women so customers get a perfect pint. And yes other countries have public spaces for the consumption of alcohol but British pubs are unique in their heritage, interior design, atmosphere, the central role they play in our communities, and the platform they provide for people of different generations, ethnic origins, and social backgrounds to chat and debate. Where else but a pub would such a diverse mix of people be so comfortable interacting socially. And without beer (ale) British pubs would not have developed the way they did. They started off in medieval England as public houses – rooms in someone’s private dwelling that were licensed to sell ale for consumption on the premises. A community without a pub has no heart.  French writer Hilaire Belloc recognised that which is why he wrote ‘When you have lost your inns, drown your empty selves, for you will have lost the last of England’.

But that’s not going to happen is it because beer will save the world! Or at least save our pubs.  And here’s a reason why.  Session beers tend to be around 3.5 - 4% alcohol by volume which means people can drink several pints and not fall over, thereby keeping the party going, and the pub’s tills ringing.  ‘Oh go on. I’ll have one more’.  So at last orders when the publican shouts out ‘Haven’t you got homes to go to’ he or she might secretly be pleased to have a room full of enthusiastic drinkers who are doing their bit for the Big Beer Society.

So get yourself down the pub and buy a round.  British people are much more likely than other nationalities to buy drinks for friends and strangers and not expect anything in return.  That generosity of spirit displayed by beer drinkers is summed up in my favourite limerick.

Try this experiment on your friends. Ask them what Spanish phrases they know.  I bet you a fiver they will include – ‘por favour; gracias; and dos cervezas signor’.  I don’t know about you, but whenever I go overseas I learn the basic phrases in the local language to be polite, and be able to order beer.  

On a recent visit to Zambia, where there are 72 tribal languages, I studied enough of the four main dialects to make myself understood when I ended up in the bar each night to drink Mosi, the local brew.  In Zambia I realised that in addition to beer there is another international language – football.  Luckily I am fluent in both so now I have new mates in Mongu, Lusaka, and Mufulira. It may have been Wayne Rooney who introduced us but it was beer that sealed our friendship.

Chin Chin Pink Gin

Despite being the daughter of a sailor, I did not inherit my Dad’s sea legs.  But that’s not a problem because if I become sea sick I have the perfect cure.  It’s called Pink Gin and could not be simpler to concoct.  Just pour a measure of gin (ideally the sweeter Plymouth as opposed to dry London), and shake in a few drops of Angostura Bitters.  The gentian and spices in the bitters deliciously complement the botanicals in the gin.

Bitters were developed as a treatment for sea sickness in 1824 by a German doctor called Johann Gottlieb Benjamin - Surgeon-General of the Military Hospital in the Venezuelan town of Angostura. When the British Royal Navy started prescribing the bitters to its sailors, they were made more palatable by adding gin.  Shiver me timbers – Pink Gin was born on a boat and became one of England’s most popular cocktails.

If you want to join me on my campaign to restore Pink Gin to the drinks cabinet then arm yourself with a bottle of Angostura bitters and make your choice of Madame Geneva.  Decide whether you want the bitters in or out – that means swirling the Angostura around a Martini glass and either leaving it in, or pouring it away to leave a residue. Add two shots of gin, garnish with a lemon rind and bottoms up!  Pink Gin and tonic served in a large tumbler over ice is a sparkling alternative.

If you had sipped Pink Gin & tonic in the 19th century you would have prevented sea sickness and malaria thanks to the quinine in the tonic.   What a fine idea.  Who wants to go into business with me inventing medicinal cocktails for the 21st century?