On serving temperatures - keep it cool
There are two myths about British beer that need to be laid to rest. It shouldn't be as warm as a fortnight in Tenerife, nor should it be as flat as a witch's tit. The sorry state of many a pint served in this country means the stereotypes live on today. These problems seem worse in the South, but then up North they cheat with sparklers and their rubbish climate.
I'd contend that near-lukewarm serving temperatures are one of several things that stand between cask beer and wider appeal, particularly among those who were born after 1970. Overall, the PR exercise to promote real ale has been fairly good, striking a chord with a public ever more accepting of healthier and more traditional foodstuffs. However, this will be wasted if it's served in a way that appeals only to a few old duffers.
Personally, I think 11°C is the optimum serving temperature for ale. I reached that conclusion after sampling beer from an air conditioned cellar set to slightly different temperatures on different days (a controlled experiment, if you like). In general, it's better to go slightly too low rather than turn off customers with a tepid pint. Cool beer quickly warms up, but warm beer doesn't get any cooler.
33 comments:
I agree with this 100%.
As someone who's recently moved to London (from Canada), this has been the hardest thing to get over (perhaps even more so than finding things floating in my beer). In fact, even though Greene King IPA isn't the most flavourful beer in the world, the fact that one can find it chilled often pushes me towards it.
Nonetheless, the state of ales in the UK is really something to be proud of. On the other hand, the state of lagers (in particular, "foreign" lagers brewed for the domestic market). Jesus wept.
Have to agree. As a now reformed mass swill drinker I would much prefer a pint a little too cold, rather than too warm for the reasons you state Stonch.
I agree also. Serve slightly cold if anything, as a customer I can order 2 pints, drink one cold and let the other warm up a bit.
But I have to say, I detest drinking beer that is too cold. Standard pub serving temp in NZ is around 2 degrees, which for crap bland lager is probably perfect, but they often serve better beers at that and it just isn't right.
Barry: fear not, there's no chance of real ale being served at lager temperatures in British pubs. I've heard tales about certain Wetherspoons pubs having run real ale through chilled lines, but I find that difficult to believe, frankly.
If you don't like your beer served at macro lager temperatures avoid the Tap and Spile in Darlington.
The new management had just started to get some proper real ales in after years of frankly rubbish beer. We started visiting the place again and were pretty impressed by the range on offer. Until we got an ice cold pint of real ale. I haven't been back since!
The kid behind the bar asked me why I left it and was genuinely amazed when I told him it was too cold!
John, was the pint really served that cold? I find it difficult to believe any pubs run real ales through chilling lines (other than with beers intended to be served that way such as Fullers Discovery or Greene King St Edmunds).
Seriously! The glass had condensation on the outside of it and it hurt my teeth. - Scouts Honour
Well blow me!* I must say I've never been served a really cold pint in any of the hundreds of pubs with real ale I've visited, excepting Fullers Discovery which is usually served chilled.
* Note to American readers: that expression doesn't have a rude double meaning over here.
Our garage is about 10-11 degrees at the moment and is the perfect temperature for most of our beers.
Does the fact that beer is served too warm suggest that modern cellars aren't doing their job? Are you more likely to get the right temperature beer from an old pub with an old cellar? Some more research for you!
I blame global warming meself.
Cellar cool is a hotly debated subject !
Stonch I take issue with you, what wrong with 11.5º then ?
Seriously, I agree though, if beer is flat and really warm then it is bloody awful. I suspect I'm quite happy around 11-13º. any colder and the flavour disappears
"I suspect I'm quite happy around 11-13º. any colder and the flavour disappears."
I'd challenge that contention.
I often drink bottled ales at fridge temperature. I don't find the flavour "disappears", or is necessarily impaired. It depends on the beer, I suppose.
Walking though hammersmith today, sign on the door of the weatherspoons "all beers chilled to 1-2 degrees".
Just what you need on a nice warm day like today I thought......
1-2 degrees only applies to the lagers, not the real ales!!!
I like my bottled ales colder than casked, because they tend to be bubblier. On the other hand I sometimes drink Timothy Taylor Landlord from a bottle and it's perfect at 13°C. Which goes to show.
I think it's true that the flavours and aromas in a beer become more apparent the warmer it gets -- try drinking the same beer at 5°C and 15°C -- but that's not an argument for warm beer. You don't actually want a mouthful of 'grass, marmalade, earth, burnt newspaper, etc etc,' when you go the pub, you want drinkable beer.
The JDW in Victoria - The Willow Walk - had problems last time I was in there, during their beer fest last summer. My mate had a pint that was way below serving temperature for an ale. My pint was cold but his was almost icy...
I don't think that you are really saying that sparklers affect beer temperature and that our cellars up North have poor weather are you Jeff?
Glad to see you aboard on this one.
I was in London in June a few years ago, and several pubs served me beer that was around 20 degrees. Some of them obviosly do not have temperature control in their cellars, and someone new to real ale would have the stereotypes confirmed!
A big bugbear of mine is bottled ale kept in the fridge with champagne and white wine.
The Brook Green Hotel (a Young's house, which was my local) only has Well's Bombadier, Youngs Bitter and Winter Warmer on draught (along with euro swill).
You can get other Young's beers in bottles, but they are ice cold straight from the fridge which does more than detract from a Double Choc Stout!
Tandleman - not quite: I'm linking sparklers to "flat" pints, and freezing Northern climes to colder beer. That's where the cheating comes in! ;-)
If pubs are not running some form of line temperature control for the real ales (most would be, one of my engines even has a cooling jacket so the beer engine can be temp controlled) then the only control over serving temp is the cellar temp. Unfortunitly this has significant implications on the conditioning of the beer. 13c is usually stated as the optimum temp to keep a cask in the correct condition.
Of course this is probibly becoming less of an issue as brewers become less interested in priming thier casks and the trade becomes less skilled at conditioning them.
Stonch I disagree, if you want to accurately taste a beer it needs to be warmer than fridge temp. I take the comment from Witwould that you dont necasarily want to taste everything thats in your pint when you are having a session, I probibly do if its decent.
Personally I like it warmer,but I come from the land of ice cold everything. The number of times I have asked bar staff to heat my glass from the coffee machine prior to pouring in the beer ...
Kieran - what a great idea! Wish I'd thought of that when I was in Spain (also ice-cold everything, even when it's minus 5 outside)
Boak / Kieran: there are of course other ways to heat a pint - remember the handheld immersion heaters I encountered in Franconia? Click here to see one in action.
Yes, i thought of that, wistfully, while I was out there. Didn't think they'd be sitting behind the average Spanish bar. Perhaps the serious beer geek should buy one to take to foreign climes.
Just buy an infrared temperature sender. Point and shoot. If pint is too warm(usually the case) smash pint glass over responsible party's head.
Hiya Stonch,
Sorry to argue with you about tasting but it's a proven fact, and my personal experience too, that when you serve things too cold you lose a lot of the flavour characteristics - which is why mass-produced lager is served so cold so things like Carling don't taste like a pint of blended sweetcorn! (seriously, buy a half, let it warm up, you'll see what I mean!).
I do however agree that slightly more chilled ales are a good thing and have said so before, between 11 and 12 is my preferred temperature.
To my mind the problem with serving it straight away at 'optimum temperature' is that it does warm up - unless you're going to scull it and then you're a filthy nasty binge drinker and the scourge of modern society! : )
"it's a proven fact, and my personal experience too, that when you serve things too cold you lose a lot of the flavour characteristics"
In so far as something as subjective as taste can be proven, you're right.
To some extent however, it depends on both the beer and the person. If we wanted to be technical and precise, the approach would have to be more complicated than saying lagers should be one temperature and ales another, which seems to be the orthodox view in the UK (witness the gnashing of teeth when GK announced their new ale will be served at 6-7 degrees).
"To my mind the problem with serving it straight away at 'optimum temperature' is that it does warm up - unless you're going to scull it..."
This is true. Yet the first sip is by far the best -- didn't someone even write a book about this? -- and in my opinion the beer should be aimed at that sublime moment. If this means hurrying through the rest of it, so be it.
"...and then you're a filthy nasty binge drinker and the scourge of modern society!"
Also true. That's me.
theculinarybrewer said...
A big bugbear of mine is bottled ale kept in the fridge with champagne and white wine.
The Brook Green Hotel (a Young's house, which was my local) only has Well's Bombadier, Youngs Bitter and Winter Warmer on draught (along with euro swill).
You can get other Young's beers in bottles, but they are ice cold straight from the fridge which does more than detract from a Double Choc Stout!
This is the problem I have with the Rake at London Bridge and why I find it so annoying that it won the Standard Bar Of The Year - most of the porters and stout they proudly serve up are a waste of money at polar temperatures - and I thought the lot running this place were in the know....
Eddie, what The Rake should do is have one fridge set at about 10 degrees and another at about 6. That's what they do in Belgium.
Personally I don't drink in the The Rake very often as I don't really see the point in drinking bottled beer in a small bar, when a lively boozer with a dozen cask ales is just a stone's throw away.
Stonch,
Great discussion!
There is another theory we had remember?
Older people/inactive/'larger' people like warmer beer, younger/more energetic people like their beer colder!
Simple solution as you said, serve slightly cooler and for those that want it warmer, put your hands round the beer! The beer warmer is also the great Franconia solution (Germans eh, think of everything).
In some places in Belgium they actually ask if you want some beers 'cold' or 'warm', another great solution!
Have a good one old son.
That would be a start Stonch but I don't hold out much hope - they should just keep some downstairs in the cellar.
I like to visit the Rake occasionally to see if it improves but it's only bearable when it's quiet. I find I want to throttle all the wankers who go there and drink beer straight out of the bottle rather than a glass (e.g. Duvel and others of that ilk). I'm sure I get this from my Mother but to me, drinking beer out of bottles is just plain common and it soon has mean chuntering into my beer.
I'm not a huge fan of the Market Porter - it can be OK but I've found their a miserable set behind the bar. Or maybe it's just me.
In the mid 80s when it was 2pm (3pm?) closing on a Sunday, we got caught up in a lock-in at the Market Porter and I was drinking GK Abbot for the whole session. This was followed by some partially warmed-up pork pies and you can guess what happened next. I've never drunk Abbot since.
An old curmudgeon like me prefers the quieter atmosphere in the Wheatsheaf, just wish it had more beers on.
I am in San Francisco USA and just had a cask beer last night - WAY too warm - worse then most I have - the guy next to me who tasted with me just for a try was like why would i ever drink that. Before getting into all the good stuff about cask ale i was like - yeah that is pretty bad. So yeah - let's cool this stuff.
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