Being originally from England, I grew up watching my Dad make homebrews of great British beer, got to drink it down at the local pub when I was 12 years old (they don’t worry too much about legal age in the UK) and, by the time I was in college definitely knew my beers. Anyone not British will tell you British beer is served warm. Well, sometimes it is and sometimes it isn’t. But a warmer beer does hold its flavor a lot better than a freezing cold beer, and that’s probably why most Brits still choose British beer over the American version. As my Dad has often said about American lager, “It’s like gnat’s piss” (translation, weak tasting and light colored).
British beers come in four different varieties – Ale, Lager, Bitter and Cider.
Ale – British Ale has light ales, pale ales, dark ales and stout. These four varieties of ale taste completely different.
The pale ales and light ales have fewer hops and usually come in bottles. Dark ale is very popular in northern England, where I’m from, and it’s also bottled, a little heavier and sweeter than the pale and light ales. Real ale is brewed traditionally and is always stored in casks (wooden beer barrels). The real ale brewers in England are a bit like the microbreweries in the United States in that they are usually independent brewers and quite small operations. Stout is a heavy, thicker beer – the most famous in the world, of course, being Guinness.
The best ales, in my opinion, are these:
Pale Ales and Light Ales – Bass Ale or Timothy Taylor
Dark Ales – Black Cat Mild or Newcastle Brown, (which is what my Dad drinks)
Real Ale – Theakston’s Old Peculier, or Bank’s Original
Stout – Guinness (I’m borrowing this – I’m sure the Irish don’t want to be classified as ‘British’ but you can’t name the best stout without saying ‘Guinness’.)
Lager – this is now the most popular beer drunk in England. Lager is basically what American beers like Budweiser, Coors etc. are. Light beers, smooth taste, a little sweet and a higher carbonation than ales. Lager can be bought either in bottles or on draught.
The best lagers are these:
Carling Black Label, Tennants Lager, or Samuel Smith
Bitters – Bitter can be either light or medium bodied but, like its name suggests, it’s strong with a bitter taste to it. It’s an acquired taste for many. I lived in England for over 20 years and probably drank it only three or four times. Didn’t like it any of the times I did, but many of my friends love it.
The best bitters are often said to be:
Ridgeway Bitter, John Smith’s, or Tetley’s
Cider – A quintessential European drink, cider was my drink when I lived in the US. British cider though is not like the namby-pamby American stuff. British cider can literally knock you on your ass. It started as a West Country drink in Britain, but is now drunk everywhere. It’s also, for some reason, the drink a lot of parents start their kids on drinking when still small. Cider is made from fermented apples and nothing else. In Britain though, make sure you get the real stuff made by an independent British brewer and not the dross that has been imported from overseas for the last twenty years.
The best ciders are:
Special Reserve Cider, Woodpecker (just because I grew up on it), or Strongbow
As you can see, there are thousands of different beers brewed in Britain, some of them even being brewed for several hundred years. The British really know their beer so, the next time you’re in England, stop into any of the local pubs and strike up a conversation with someone at the bar. They’ll be able to tell you in 30 seconds flat which are the best British beers and why. Then try a few yourself. Make sure you try the beer on tap as well as the bottled beer, as tap beer is some of the best in Britain. You’ll even get used to the warmer temperature of it, I promise.
