More hypocrisy from the Government.

After I wrote the previous article I did a little searching around on the internet and found the House of Common's report by which the new Government guidelines are based which can be found here. I just thought I'd post a selection of snippets from the evidence section to highlight my earlier point.

"There is a lack of consensus amongst experts over the health benefits of alcohol, but it is not clear from the current evidence base how the benefits of drinking alcohol at low quantities compare to those of lifelong abstention."

In other words, there is no evidence either way.

"We have heard sufficient concerns from experts to suggest that a thorough review of the evidence on alcohol and health risks is due."

So essentially since they have no evidence they are calling for a review.

One of the most interesting things I could find was this little graph which I think they have gotten from the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research, a part of the University of Boston's School of Medicine, and Alcohol in moderation who state on their website (found here)

"The Forum consists of an international group of invited physicians and scientists who are specialists in their fields and committed to balanced and well researched analysis regarding alcohol and health. The Forum includes epidemiologists, statisticians, and basic scientists; cardiologists, hepatologists, neurologists, oncologists, and other medical practitioners; psychologists and social scientists; and specialists in social matters, psychology, and public health."

Sound like a fairly credible organisation to me. Much more credible than a Government funded lobby group like alcohol concern.

Now, to the graph itself. It doesn't really need a huge amount of explanation; the graph quite clearly shows that from their data the relative risk of mortality is minimum for both men and women when around 0.5 drinks a day is the average consumption. It is also necessary to point out that the relative risk only meets that of abstention, even taking the lowest confidence interval, for men around 3.75 drinks a day and for women at around 2 drinks per day. Now if we say the average drink has around 2 units in that would mean that if a man was to drink 7.5, or a woman 4, units a day their relative risk of mortality would still only equal that of the case of abstention. So where oh where have the Government plucked these 2-3 for women and 3-4 for men from? It truely does baffle me that this is clearly stated in the same Government report they use to campaign for reducing the guidelines.

Would "dry days" make a difference? A comment on Government policy and bad science journalism in general.

Mark Dredge recently wrote an interesting article about the new government recommendation for drinkers to have a least a couple of "dry days" within a week which can be found here. He makes the good point that we occasionally feel like we can "reward" ourselves after these dry days. As a younger drinker, with a reasonably hectic university life, I know all too well the feeling of "saving up" a weeks worth of drinking to have a few too many at the weekend. To me this notion of a dry day from the government just goes further to highlight the lack of understanding of the affect of alcohol. As far as I could tell from the original article here this new advice has come on the back of very little scientific studies or evidence; the article claims that "recent studies have cast doubt on the health benefits of regular drinking". However, as with all good science articles the names of, the sources of funding for and any information about these studies is nowhere to be seen. As a science student I am intrinsically unsure of any article which fails to disclose where the information has come from. It wouldn't surprise me if the funding for this study came from one of the well known impartial bodies like Alcohol Concern. While I do agree that there is a problem in this country of alcohol abuse, especially amongst people my own age, I think to attack the sensible drinkers with policies like this is not only pointless but also downright irresponsible. I am almost certain a large amount of young drinkers read these headlines and thought "Great if I have 4 dry days during the week it means I can drink as much as I want at the weekend because the government said it was ok!"

The article also raises the older issue of the actual safe amount of alcohol the body can deal with in a set amount of time. According to current Government legislation my mum having a glass of wine with her evening meal would render her a binge drinker. A good comparison to the current non-guidelines is that of speed limits; in my opinion they are both too low and importantly everyone knows it. Most drivers would have no real qualms about hitting 75mph on a motorway and similarly most drinkers have no problems drinking more than 21 units a week. Many people will have drank over 21 units a week and seen no ill affects from it so clearly the current guidelines are simply too low to be believed. The other big problem with the current guidelines is the fact that they are very confusing to the average person on the street. The notion of units need to be scrapped ASAP if the Government ever want people to understand  the guidelines. Call me Dave seems to have realised this with calls for the simplification of the system and for more education for young people about the amount of alcohol in certain drinks. If the Government want their guidelines to be taken seriously, they need to present the public with the actual evidence and set guidelines which are both understandable to the average person and also don't appear patronising.

Low alcohol beers; it's not all about getting pissed you know!

Having recently raved about a couple of excellent low alcohol beers I'd had recently, and with everyone's favourite government announcing more drinking advice, I took the time to find a selection of the new low alcohol delights that should be available this year.

 

The first of these is Wadworth's small beer which is described as "using six different malts along with three hops added at various phases of the brew". They also say that the duty saving WILL be passed onto the consumer meaning the price should only be around £2.50 a pint. So far so good I think.

The second is Fuller Mighty Atom which is supposedly a "2.8% beer that doesn't compromise on flavour." Fullers also say that the tax saving will be passed onto the customer.

Finally it's the turn of one of my least favourite breweries. In the past I have often accused Greene King of churning out some truly mediocre beers. However, at last they have tried something new. As with the other 2 they say the beer should retail for well under £3 a pint.

Low strength beers are a great idea and something which I think could revitalise one of the major areas of concern for pubs; the decline in lunchtime drinking. I wholeheartedly urge any brewers out there to give the style a bash.

Beer, class and snobbery

A lot of people have been blogging recently about whether enjoying exotic and rare beers is a form of snobbery. One that really struck my eye was the article from Curmudgeon here. In it he quotes a definition of artisanal from the dictionary:

"Artisanal. Adjective suggestive of handmade goods and old-fashioned craftsmanship. In the food world, a romantic epithet bestowed upon the cheesemaker, breadbaker, bacon-curer, etc., who labors in his or her integrity-steeped native locale, independent of the pressures and toxicities of Big Food, to produce exquisite high-end, SMALL-BATCH edibles available by mail-order."

In my opinion anyone who described anything as artisanal is both a snob and a fool! This notion that things are somehow better than others because they are made by small companies in sheds is absurd. The reason mass produced food and drink is generally of lower quality is because it is designed to be cheap and henceforth the quality of, and amount of care taken over, the ingredients is significatnly lower. It has nothing to do with the fact it is made in a high-tech factory with the latest production methods. I had an argument recently about artisanal bread and how if it were to be made in an industrial factory using exactly the same ingredients that it would clearly be better than if it was made in a shed in Hampshire.

My main problem with the drinking of rare and exotic beers though is that companies seem to be able to add a huge margin on their products simply because they are "hand crafted" and "artisanal" beer. Yes I know you use more and better quality ingredients but I often sometimes recoil at the price of beer in certain "craft beer bars". BrewDog's tagline is that they aim to revolutionise the beer world with new and interesting beers. Well I can tell you that most definitely won't happen by selling £4 pints of punk in an edgy and alternative bar in Camden.

A trip to BrewDog!

After months of anticipation I was overjoyed to see that the new BrewDog bar in Camden was officially open last week. Although not a huge fan of their marketing techniques I am an avid fan of their beers and so I clearly felt that a trip was warranted. The offer to meet an old flatmate, who shares my love of their beer, for drinks prompted the perfect chance for a trip. 

Upon arrival I was pleased to see that at least 8 of their own beers and a good number of foreign beers were available on draught and complimented by a staggering bottle list of again both their own and some rare foreign brews. We decided to start the evening with a half of the low strength, 2.8%, Blitz. As I ordered the barman asked if I'd tried it before and I told him I had not. He then decided to offer us a taster after telling us it had quite a strong flavour. Obviously people had tried it and complained after being misguided by it's strength. I have to say I was quite taken aback by this as I'd always thought I looked like someone who knew their beer. Maybe the lack of piercings and a tattoo, which appeared to categorise a large part of the clientèle, made him think that I hadn't tried BrewDog beers before. Anyway, I found the beer to be a delightfully light and extremely hoppy beer and one which will definitely lay down a challenge to other brewers to create excellent beers in the low strength tax bracket. On this note, on the same night I also had the chance to try Weltons' PridenJoy which although I didn't know it at the time is listed in Roger Protz's 300 Beer to Try Before You Die. This again was a lovely light beer; lacking the big hop profile of the Blitz but still an excellent brew.

Having tried 2 beers which now sit in the low strength tax bracket and found them to both be exquisite I implore other brewers to also try and create masterpieces that can be drunk all night without the fear of the dreaded morning tenderness.

It's Christmas! Bring on the naff sounding crap beers!

So it's less than 2 weeks until the big day and we're well an truly into what I like to call the season of excess. For most of us that means long nights in cuddled up on the sofa  with a hot beverage. For others it's the chance to try the pointless yearly ritual of ordering pint after pint of novelty Christmas beers "because it's nearly Christmas" and finding them to be generally disappointing at best and simply shoddy in the worst scenario. I always feel at this time of year that brewers get lazy and brew a relatively boring and uninspiring beer, whack a novelty name on it like Rudolph's Big Red Nose and expect it to sell.

In the worst case some of the names are simply crass and sometimes very distasteful. This year I've seen the Beachy Head Christmas Jumper which has caused quite a lot of controversy and also had the delight of tasting a pint of Santa's Bulging Red Sack whose pump clip was suitably distasteful as the name would suggest. Needless to say the I've had no Christmas beers this year I could classify as good or even reasonable.

What I can't really understand is why this idea seems to be limited to Christmas it's not like we regularly see beers called Halloween Honkers or Easter Bunny's Cum Filled Cheeks. If you've had any good Christmas beers  then let me know and I'll be sure to look them out for a tasting.

On a slightly contradictory note I think this is without a doubt one of the best beer names I've ever seen:

Boring Brown Ale

Let me start by apologising for the lack of writings recently. I’d love to tell you that it’s because of some huge interesting events happening in my life but that would be a flagrant lie. The truth of the matter is that there has been nothing that has really inspired me to write a piece for this blog. There’s been a relative abundance of real ale related things going on over the summer months but I just haven’t really sat down and spent the time to write about them.

So what have I been up to? Firstly, an update on my homebrewing situation.  This summer I decided to make the step up from making kits to creating my own beer from malt extract and hops. The first attempt, which I joyfully named Lord Nelson IPA, was a single hop brew using quite large amounts of Nelson Sauvin hops. I decided to do a smaller batch than usual just in case it went horribly wrong. After bottling and leaving to condition for a few weeks, the results were surprisingly impressive. The feedback from friends who have tried the beer were generally good and I feel it was the first brew I’d done that didn’t have the distinctive homebrew twang. I’m hoping to repeat the brew this week with the addition of some more malt to balance out the quite pronounced hop bitterness. Depending on how this next brew turns out I may or may not enter it into the national homebrew championships. I’ve also decided that I’m going to have a go at brewing some traditional style ginger beer and alcoholic lemonade. I found the recipes online and I have no idea how they’re going to turn out.

After a recent trip to Scotland to visit some family members I returned with an abundance of Scottish bottled ales which I was excited to try. The overwhelmingly malty character of these Scottish beers would make a nice change from the usual assortment of hop bombs and imperial stouts that seem to be taking the blogging world by storm. Other members of our little community sometimes deride a brewer for making a good, tasty, no nonsense session beer and to me this stance holds no real weight. Most of the beer I drink is what I guess some bloggers would call “boring brown ale” but I like “boring brown ale”. It may not rock in at 8%+ and a million IBUs but some of it a tasty beer nonetheless. While I often deride pubs in my local area for serving only a few of, mainly the same, standard ales I also think that some pubs occasionally go a bit far and end up putting many people from drinking real ale. This is a point which stood out especially to me from the 2011-2012 Cask Report. While I think specialist beer bars have their place, mainly involving a clientele of wealthy, young fashionable people, there is still room in the market for solid traditional bitters. It baffles me that many of the new bourgeois craft brewers, mainly based around London and Sheffield (2 of the real power houses in the craft beer revival), can claim to be the victim of CAMRA keg bashing but then also deride the hundreds of slightly more reserved brewers who brew mainly to the market. I’d like to see James and Martin from BrewDog try and convinvce a small country pub that keg Hardcore IPA would sell as well as the cask Boddingtons they’ve stocked for 50 years.

The real point I’m trying to make here is that deriding someone for the beer they drink is both pathetic and useless. The market will inevitably be the deciding factor in which beer styles survive and at the moment it would seem that both American Quadruple IPA’s and 3.8% nutty bitters are here to stay; long may that continue in my opinion.