Categories
Beer history

1918 anti-brewing tract

I can’t find out much about Adolph Keitel, but in 1918, he wrote “Government by the Brewers?”. It was published in Chicago, and is an anti-brewery/anti-beer tract. It’s available from Project Gutenberg, the free etext archive.

His argument is a bit odd – he’s not anti-prohibition, but he’s annoyed that brewers were trying to convince people beer was less harmful than whisky. He says that beer is a habit forming drug (“It’s not a drug – it’s a drink” – Chris Morris) and not fit to be in the home. Brewers, he argues, are a sinister force for evil.

This point re: the quality of American beer is particularly amusing:

WHAT IS BEER?

In the well known European beer drinking countries nothing but hops and malt are permitted in brewing.

Here beer is a concoction of corn, rice, hops, malt, glucose,preservatives and other drugs–and, in most cases, it has nothing in common with real beer other than its artificial foam and color.

A leader of public opinion made the statement in the United States Senate that “Beer that is brewed in this country is slop. They say it is ‘good for the health.’ I never saw a man who drank it who was not a candidate for Bright’s disease or paralysis.”

Categories
design

Who makes those lovely German beer glasses?

On the recent Boak & Bailey tour of Bavaria, we were, as always, dazzled by the cosmetic beauty of every beer we were served. It helps that the beer always has a creamy, frothy head, several inches in height, but most of the impact really comes from the glasses and stoneware it’s served in.

SAHM’s tradition goblet

Continue reading “Who makes those lovely German beer glasses?”
Categories
beer and food News

Curry and beer

The British Guild of Beer Writers reports on a recent “tasting event” at the Bombay Brasserie in London. Eminent beer experts got together for a curry and tried to work out which beers went best with spicy foods. Their recommendations are here.

Rupert Ponsonby, co-founder of the Beer Academy comments:
What this tasting hopefully shows is the potential for Britain’s 8,500 curry restaurants to look seriously at developing beer lists to inspire their customers and to match with their cuisine. This is a fantastic commercial and marketing opportunity for them. Top Michelin-starred restaurants such as Le Gavroche, Le Manoir aux Quatre Saisons and Aubergine have already taken the lead in creating inspired beer lists, and it will be wonderful to see top Indian restaurants doing the same.

On a visit to the Cinnamon Club last year, I was appalled to find that the only beer they had available was Cobra lager. Cobra’s OK – nicer than you’d expect, is what I mean, for a mass-produced lager made in Bedford – but surely not anywhere near as posh as the food, the wine or the waiters? Ms. Boak visited one of Gary Rhodes’ restaurants in the City of London last year, too, and was similarly disappointed by the lack of any beer, never mind a beer list.

Of course, my local curryhouse, which is very cheap and cheerful, is run by Sri Lankans, and they sell wonderful Lion Stout. It’s not a perfect beer to drink with a curry, but it’s a great one to have as a dessert. So, posher isn’t always better for beer lovers.

Categories
london News

A brewpub in London

Stonch, of the internet’s Stonch’s Beer Blog, brings news of a new brewpub in London. For a city this big, it’s surprising there aren’t more (Stonch counts five). But then again, how much would it cost to buy or lease central a London property big enough to accomodate brewing and a pub?

Categories
Germany News

Keeping a head on your pint – here comes the science

Scientists have carried out research into how a pint keeps (or loses) its head (BBC News Online). One of the scientists involves speculates that the long-lasting creamy head on Guinness might be the result of “a little surfactant“. Eugh.

Ochsenfurter Kauzen

The article also asserts that “the foam on a pint of lager quickly disappears”. Well, perhaps on a pint of Fosters in a dirty glass, but the head on a glass of lager in Germany sticks around for quite some time. And they’re not using “surfactant” – the sinister and secretive arbiters of the German Beer Purity Law wouldn’t stand for it.