A Brief History Of Beer In The Uk

The exact timeline for the introduction of beer into the UK is unclear, but it is believed that a brew of fermented yeast, water, and barley was first drank by the ancient Egyptians and Mesopatamians. The simple brewing technique meant that the drink quickly evolved and spread throughout the world. It is this brew that was most likely to have been drunk by the Celtic druids before the Romans ever arrived on our shores.

Enter The Romans

The Romans attempted to introduce wine, to replace the drink they referred to as ale, but the growing of grapes in the British climate meant that this attempt was largely unsuccessful. The Middle Ages saw ale become even more popular with many households even enjoying it with breakfast and in the 15th century hops were introduced from Holland and the drink we now know as beer was introduced.

Beer And Ale

The main distinction between beer and ale is that beer is ale but with the addition of hops to the mix. Individual houses brewed their own beer for their own consumption and soon, monasteries began to brew on a larger scale to quench the thirst of pilgrims. By the mid 16th century, beer was becoming more commonplace and hops were widely accepted as being an essential component of good beer.

Lager

Lager is a more recent addition to the beer family in the UK and it is only really since the mid 20th century that it has become so popular, now accounting for the majority of beer sales in the country. The extended brew time of the beer leads to further carbonation which makes lager fizzy. Mass produced lager, produced by a very small number of major breweries, now accounts for the majority of beer sales in the UK.

Real Ale

Real ale is widely considered to be the national drink in the UK but recent surveys have shown that as many as 65% of the country's drinkers have never consumed a single pint; sticking instead to the German style of lager. CAMRA, the Campaign for Real Ale, routinely arranges promotions in a bid to redress this balance and recent years has seen a greater resurgence in the drinking of more traditional brews but we are still primarily a lager drinking nation.

British Drinkers

The UK has the 5th highest beer drinking level per capita consuming an average of 99 litres of beer per head per year. In contrast, we consume only 22 litres of wine per head per year. Despite the existence of foreign named lagers, we brew 98% of the beer we drink in the UK and nationally we export approximately 1.2 million pints every single day. There are believed to be more than 400 breweries in the UK selling a total of 2,000 different varieties of beer.

The Great British Pub

The pub isn't just a place where we go to drink beer and has become a social meeting place and a community gathering spot for centuries. With around 60,000 pubs spread throughout the country, some represent the oldest and most widely used buildings in communities large and small. Some dispute surrounds the oldest pub in the country, with Ye Olde Fighting Cocks in St Albans listed as the oldest pub in the Guinness Book of Records

By: Matthew Jackson

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