Microbrewed Adventures - Charles Papazian [52]
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DOGBOLTER
Originally this brew was intended to become Knee Trembler, but David got stuck on a phone call and the mash ran off a bit longer than planned, diluting the beer to 1.060 gravity. He fermented it as is and called it Dogbolter. It was a legendary success. A strong brown ale with rich caramel and a distinctive roasted malt bite provides the foundation. The UK Goldings hops is truly as English as hops can be, perhaps with the exception of Fuggles hops. This is a rich beer, full of flavor and the personality of the world’s brewpub pioneers. The recipe can be found in About the Recipes.
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At the 1982 conference, David gave a presentation entitled “The English Brewpub and the Resurgence of the Small, Local Brewery in England and America.” It was attended by homebrewers and America’s founding microbrewers. David electrified the audience with the revolutionary idea of brewing your own beer and then selling it to your customers in your own pub. Within one year’s time, America’s first brewpubs were operational in Hopland, California; Yakima, Washington; and West Vancouver, British Columbia.
David and Louise had ignited not only America, but the world. Brewpubs were opening and offering diverse styles of ales and lagers. Because the microbrewers that were making the beers had once been beer-passionate homebrewers, they enjoyed a wide variety of beer styles. For starters, brewpubs usually offered no fewer than six regular styles of ales, such as porter, stout, pale ale, India pale ale, brown ale and amber ale. These were the first pubs and bars that regularly extended the choice for American beer drinkers beyond the pale selection of brand-name light lagers. The phenomenon has now reached every corner of the beer-drinking world.
Progress has been slow, but in 2005 America can pride itself in offering beer drinkers a stunning choice of beer styles in more than 1,000 brewpubs. And it all began with David and Louise’s London Goose and Firkin.
Extraordinary Times with Ordinary Ale
Brakspear’s Brewery, Henley-on-Thames
DAVID AND LOUISE BRUCE inspired the revival of the world’s brewpub tradition. The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) is an organization that has done much to try to save other English brewing traditions, especially that of naturally fermented and traditionally served real ale. There have been a rough few years for the British brewing tradition. Some of the most classic of ales are only shells of their once proud tradition. And worse, pubs that do serve real ale are often not serving it in the best of conditions. I recently encountered two classic examples of a beer served to me in ruins, Fullers ESB and Bass Ale—both were pitifully undrinkable in a downtown London pub, sour and full of diacetyl (an intense butterscotch character). I left full pints on the bar and settled for a Guinness, which I wasn’t quite in the mood for at the time but enjoyed nonetheless as my third choice of the moment.
This example of tradition gone awry is common throughout the United Kingdom. Not only should the beer be brewed to standards of excellence, but it also must be kept in proper condition while served and the beer lines cleaned and maintained. My experiences have left me with the impression that Britain is in the midst of major apathy with regards to its real ale traditions, despite the best efforts of CAMRA.
My personal opinion is that CAMRA’s zeal for tradition has not taken into enough consideration that real ale consumption continues to decline, and without the ubiquitous consumption from which the tradition was derived, real ale in pubs simply does not get enough attention from consumers and barkeeps. When a cask of real ale does not get consumers’ attention, the product eventually