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2. Another wine from Hungary is probably more widely known today than Tokay, namely Egri Bikavér. What sort of wine is it, and what is it called in the UK?

3. What is Schluck?

4. Cyprus has been rapidly improving its wines of late. Its best-so-far dry red has a name most inappropriate to an export to the UK. What is that name?

5. The wines of the USA are expanding their overseas markets by leaps and bounds, but they are not yet well enough known in this country for a detailed question on them to be fair. So just name a few states of the Union at present making wine of some quality.

6. Which South American country produces the most wine, more than all the others put together?

7. Distinguish between English and British wine.

8. Australian wines have had a great and deserved success over here in recent years, but are individually known only to a small circle as yet. So have a go at the date of the first wine-harvest there. As a special concession you may look up the date of the first settlement, or alternatively allow yourself ten years’ leeway.

9. The South Africans have also been doing well in the UK, but the same applies. If you want to find out more, whom do you ask? (Not much of a quiz question, perhaps, but you might like to know the answer.)

10. Name the odd man out:

Japan China Afghanistan India Canada.

BEER IN GENERAL

Until about ten years ago nobody in this country seemed to know anything about beer. The drinks it was proper to know about came down pretty much to wine, fortified wine and brandy. Now all that is changed, and beer has become a field not just of knowledge but of aggressive knowledgeability too. I suppose this has its good side, and certainly a decent glass of draught beer is not the rarity it was in many places. The trouble is that there are so few pubs where one can endure to stay long enough to drink it.

1. In most contexts, “ale” and “beer” are names for the same thing, but the terms were far from interchangeable in previous ages. Can you say what the difference was?

2. What is or was porter as applied to beer?

3. What was the original meaning of the term “stout” as applied to beer? What gives it its distinctive dark colour?

4. The brewing process begins with the malting of barley. Explain this and say what it does.

5. A later stage in the brewing process involves wort. What do you understand by this term?

6. Hops were probably first used in brewing as a preservative, and they clarify the beer too. But they also have an important effect on the flavour. Describe it.

7. We all know, assuming that we can take in what we read, that yeast is used in the making of beer (and wine), but what exactly is yeast and what is its function?

8. What does sediment in a bottle of beer normally indicate?

9. We sometimes see on a pub beer-pull an announcement that the stuff is “cask-conditioned draught beer.” Give the shorter and more usual expression.

10. What are the advantages of pasteurizing beer?

BEER IN PARTICULAR

This is likely to be a difficult quiz for uncommitted beer drinkers. What is still our national drink draws less attention and interest than wine, a foreign importation. A man who will be able to tell you unhesitatingly that Margaux is in the Médoc is more than likely to look quite blank if asked where Ruddles Bitter comes from. [Rutland, in fact Oakham, once the county town, now said to be part of Leicestershire.] But general knowledge should be of some service here.

1. About 30 per cent of the beer sold in GB nowadays is lager. Everybody knows this blanket term for vaguely continental-style lively beer, but what is the significance of the name?

2. Pilsener beer or Pilsener lager is a popular type of beer in many countries. Where does the name come from?

3. Diät Pils from the Holsten brewery in Hamburg has been very successful in GB. Although plenty of British drinkers believe it to be a weight-watcher’s beer, it is actually rather more fattening than the average brew. True or false?

4. Where can you:

(a) legally get a Fix

(b) find Time for a Tiger?

5. Which