AK mistakes revealed

I'm back from a brief holiday in Newark. Making this an approriate time to reveal the mistakes in that description of Snake River's AK Session.

To remind you, here's the quote:

"AK Session is traditional English mild ale. Mild refers to its low hopping rate. Mild is an ale intended to be consumed in quantity, thus the name “session”. AK is thought to stand for “Ale Kyte”, Flemish for “small ale”. This is a tawny colored brew that was a favorite among the farmers and laborers of the West Midlands. The alcohol content is 3.9% abv. This beer is a collaboration between Chris Erickson and Cory Buenning."

The first is pretty obvious: AK is a type of Pale Ale, not Mild. Bloody McMullens, by badging their AK as a Mild for a while they've led many to believe AK = Light Mild. An error repeated in David Sutula's Mild Ale book. It's another example of people not understanding what "mild" meant in the 19th century. As you can see from the table below, in no case is AK described as Mild Ale. The closest is "mild bitter Ale", where mild is clearly referring to the fact that it's unaged. "Bitter" or "Pale Ale" appear in the vast majority of the descriptions.

AK's
Brewery	Place	year	beer	price per barrel (shillings)	price per gallon (pence)
Ind Coope	Romford	1871	AK	36	12
Daniell & Co., Donyland Brewery	Colchester	1884	AK	36	12
Bedford Brewery	Bedford	1870	AK (a mild bitter Ale, very celebrated)	36	12
Hodson & Baverstock, Sun Brewery	Godalming	18??	AK (Pale for Families)	36	12
John Bird	Westerfield, Suff.	1883	AK Ale	36	12
Shakespeare Brewery	Cambridge	1889	AK Ale
Langton & Sons	Thorpe End, Leics		AK Ale
George Stibbs, Steam Brwry	Cheltenham	1871	AK Bitter	42	14
John Murton	Croydon	1867	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Battersea Park Brewery (S.G. Mason & Co.)	London	1869	AK Bitter Ale	38	12.67
Hodges and Ritchie, College Brewery	Brighton	1884	AK Bitter Ale	42	14
Walcot Brewery	Bath	1884	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Goodwin Bros.	Newark	1885	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Charrington Nicholl & Co	Colchester	1885	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Roger's	Bristol	1889	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Rogers' Ales	Bristol	1890	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Arnol, Perret & Co	Wickwar, Gloucs	1895	AK Bitter Ale	36	12
Henry Collett	Chippenham	1870/90	AK Bitter Ale
Adey and White	St. Albans	1884	AK Bitter Beer	36	12
Eltham Brewery	Eltham	1874	AK Bitter Dinner Ale	36	12
Thomas Gundry	Redhill, Surrey	1878	AK Family Ale	42	14
Flower & Sons	Stratford-on-Avon	1890	AK Family Ale	30	10d
Northampton Brewery	Northampton	1880	AK Family Pale Ale, a sparkling and agreeable Tonic	36	12
Major Lucas & Co	Northampton	1893	AK Light Amber Ale	36	12
Major Lucas	Northampton	1893	AK Light Amber Ale	36	12
Waltham Bros.	London	1898	AK Light Biitter Ale	36	12
Reffell's Brewery	Bexley, Kent	1888	AK Light Bitter	36	12
Ind Coope	Romford	1890	AK Light Bitter	42	14
Epping Brewery	Epping	1898	AK Light Bitter	36	12
A.E. Druce & Sons, Hans Town Brewery	Chelsea	1855	AK Light Bitter Ale	34	11.33
E. Greene & Son	Bury St Edmonds	1887	AK Light Bitter Ale
Fuller, Smith & Turner	Chiswick	1893	AK Light Bitter Ale	36	12
Humby & Baillie	Stafford	1896	AK Light Dinner Ale	36	12
Godsell & Sons	Stroud, Gloucs	1902	AK Light Dinner Ale	36	12
Byles & Co	Henley	1876	AK Light Pale Ale	36	12
James Hole & co.	Newark	1890	AK Luncheon Ale
Leney	Wateringbury	1884	AK Pale Ale	42	14
Daniell & Son	Colchester	1894	AK Pale Ale	36	12
Wordsley Brewery	Stourbridge	1897	AK similar to above but lighter	36	12
Waltham Abbey Brewery	Waltham Abbey	1882	AK Stock Bitter Ale	36	12
Sources:
19th-century price lists

I've already explained what's wrong about the second sentence: Mild doesn't mean lightly hopped. It means unaged.

There are no real errors in sentence three. But session is a very modern was of describing low-gravity beers. And I've most often seen it associated with Bitter, i.e. Session Bitter.

"AK is thought to stand for “Ale Kyte”, Flemish for “small ale”." Good bit of garbling there. I think they mean "ankel koyt" (though there are many different spellings of koyt: keyte, keut, kuyte). This is Martyn Cornell's theory of the derivation of AK. It doesn't mean small ale, but single Koyt. The standard form of Koyt as opposed to double Koyt. Personally, I don't believe this theory for a minute. There's a couple of hundred years gap between Flemish brewers settling in England an the name AK appearing. But that's another argument

"a tawny colored brew". I'm not sure what colour they mean with that description. But it sounds darker than the pale colour of AK.

"a favorite among the farmers and laborers of the West Midlands" Er, no. AK was mostly brewed in the South. As the map below shows. I can only see three that could possible be describes as West Midlands: Stafford, Stourbridges and Stratford. I think they're getting confused with Dark Mild, which still retains some popularity around Birmingham.

View AK distribution in a larger map

Note that Newark is the most northerly outpost of AK.

I'll make no comment about the ABV. It seems about right for a Light Bitter.

Give yourself a pat on the back if you spotted them all.