Beer Defined
What is 'beer'?
Beer is a drink that's made by brewing and fermenting the extract of a cereal, most notably malted barley, and then seasoning it with hops, perhaps spices, and in some cases fruit.
What is 'real ale'?
Real ale is beer that's served the traditional way and brewed the traditional way. It's also known as "cask-conditioned ale". That means that it contains yeast, so when it goes to the cask it'll still be fermenting and maturing all the time. When it's served, it comes up fresh and complex.
What is 'keg beer'?
Keg beer is a beer that is filtered, pasteurized and artificially carbonated at the brewery and has none of fresh complexity of traditional gas conditioned ale.
What is 'mild'?
Mild is a type of beer that lives up to its name in more than one way. It's a beer that's mild in alcohol. Generally, it's around three to three and one-half percent in strength, although there are some stronger versions around. There's also mild in bitterness. It contains less hops than bitter, and therefore is a mild ale.
What is 'bitter'?
Bitter is a beer that contains a fair amount of hops so it's got a bitter flavor to it. Generally it's weakish in strength - 3.5% to 4% and is the standard sort of coughing beer of Britain.
What is 'best bitter'?
Best bitter is a step up from bitter. It's brewed in roughly the same way but it's stronger, has more malt, has a bigger body and usually has more hops as well. Best bitters tend come in at 4% to 4.5% strength.
What is 'stout'?
Stout's an ale that contains a fair amount of roasted malt, which gives it a roasted, coffeeish, maybe chocolaty sort of flavour. There are sweeter stouts available such as Mackeson and there are stronger stouts, too, which have a more Venus flavour. These are called a Russian Imperial stouts. But generally, most stouts you find are of the dry, sort of bitter, Irish variety
What is 'porter'?
Porter is generally a weaker form of stout. If you go back to the origin of the name stout, you'd find that it actually was “stout porter”, meaning “strong porter”. So porter, you generally find, has many of the same characteristics as stout, the roasted flavours in particular. But maybe porter is a little thinner in body and a touch sweeter.
What are 'barley wines'?
Barley wine is a strong ale generally ranging from about 7 percent upwards, and is traditionally brewed in Britain. The name 'barley wine' came about in the 19th century, when French wines were flooding into Britain and the brewers fought back and gave a more sophisticated name to their product; whereby they called their beers barley wines.
What are 'golden ales'?
Golden ales are very pale colored beers that are being brewed in many ways, trying to re-capture the market from Largo by traditional brewers in Britian. They're made using very pale colored malts. None of the darker malts are in there, so you get a very light colored beer, light sweeter tasting beer.The hops tend to show through rather well on top of the light malts, so you can get rather hoppy, fruity, perhaps floral flavors coming off a golden ale.
What are 'hops'?
Hops are very useful in the brewing process. They come from a plant which is a relative of the nettle, and cannabis, a very fast growing plant. It's the flowers of the plant that are used. They add bitterness to a beer. They add other flavors to a beer as well. It can be spicy, peppery, herbal, or grassy flavors. And, more surprisingly, fruity flavors too. Some of the American hops, in particular, have very pungent citrus flavors.
What is 'malt'?
Malt Is The most popular cereal used by brewers is barley, but barley's not an easy cereal to use at the brewery. Its sugars are locked inside. In order to unlock those sugars, for fermination to take place, the barley has to be Malted. This is a process whereby the barley is partially germinated in order to open up the shoots and roots of the seed, and therefore the sugars, and then kilned, baked in an oven, to stop that germination carrying any further forward. By baking the barley corns in an oven, different flavors and characteristics can be applied to the Malt. It's like roasting coffee; you leave it in there for a little bit, it's only lightly roasted, biscuitty, nutty. You leave it there for longer, you get chocolate and coffee flavors developing as the Malt browns and darkens.
