Friday 3 May 2013

Barclay Perkins Table Beer 1804 - 1869

I've never written much about Table Beer, have I? Just realised that. Not sure why, just haven't. Guess it's time to put that right.

I suppose I should get things rolling with an explanation of exactly what Table Beer was. First though, I'll explain what it wasn't. It wasn't a specific style. As the example from Barclay Perkins wonderfully illustrates.

What Table Beer was, at least initially was a tax class. In the 18th century there were three tax classes. Which class a beer fell into was decide by its wholesale price per barrel. Here's the information in a handy table:


Excise duty on beer
strong table small explanation
1761 8s 2s 1s 4d
1782 8s 3s 1s 4d Beer above 11s a barrel strong,  below 6s small beer, inbetween table beer
1802 10s 2s Beer above 16s a barrel strong, below 16s table beer
Source:
The Brewing Industry in England 1700-1830 Peter Mathias, p.369

The classification Small Beer was abolished in 1802. The whole system disappeared in 1830, when the Beer Act moved all the tax onto malt and hops and beer itself was untaxed.

Its disappearance as a tax category didn't lead to the immediate disappearance of Table Beer. It continued to be brewers, no doubt because there was a demand for a cheap, low-alcohol beer. In the early 19th century, beer was a much safer drink than water, which could often be infected with all sorts of nastiness, including cholera bacteria. Table Beer probably was, as the name suggests, drunk to accompany meals.

Improvements in water supply are probably one of the reasons Table Beer faded away, That and the rise of tea-drinking, couple with the rise of modern, bottled low-alcohol beers such as Dinner Ale.

There's one very important point which is invisible in the table below. After 1860 the character of Barclay Perkins' Table Beer changed completely. Before that date it was a low-gravity Porter, after a low-gravity Pale Mild Ale. That could be a good indicator of when Porter fell from ascendancy in London, replaced by the new favourite Mild Ale.

Wondering why some examples appear to contain no hops? That's because none are recorded on the log. I assume that spent hops from another brew were used.

Barclay Perkins' Table Beer had about 55-60% of the gravity of TT, their full-strength Porter. As this table shows:


Barclay Perkins Table and Standard Porter
year TT T T's % of TT's gravity
1804 1054.8 1029.6 54.01%
1810 1053.5 1031.3 58.50%
1820 1061.5 1025.5 41.46%
1836 1061.8 1033 53.40%
1845 1064.5 1036 55.81%
1849 1060.6 1035.5 58.58%
1857 1059 1037.1 62.88%
1858 1061.2 1036.6 59.80%
Source:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/525, ACC/2305/1/526, ACC/2305/1/547, ACC/2305/1/550, ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553

Here's the same comparing the Mild-like Table Beer with X Ale:


Barclay Perkins Table and X Ale
year X Ale T T's % of X's gravity
1863 1061.5 1049.3 80.16%
1867 1060.9 1041 67.32%
1869 1060.4 1056.8 94.04%
Source:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553, ACC/2305/1/546, ACC/2305/1/572, ACC/2305/1/579/1, ACC/2305/1/573

You can see that there was a much smaller difference in gravity between these two. Another point worth making is that while the Porter Table Beer was always single-gyle, the Mild-like version was often parti-gyled with X Ale. The later versions were pretty heavily hopped, in contrast to the Porter-like one.

Note also the very high fermentation temperature of the 1863 and 1866 versions. I've no idea why those particular beers were fermented so hot.

In the next instalment, we'll be looking at the grists.

Barclay Perkins Table Beer 1804 - 1869
Date Year OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl boil time (hours) boil time (hours) boil time (hours) Pitch temp max. fermen-tation temp length of fermen-tation (days)
28th Jul 1804 1029.6 1009.0 2.73 69.63% 3.49 0.48 67º
25th Aug 1804 1024.9 4.06 0.56 70º
2nd July 1805 1024.1 1012.0 1.60 50.21% 4.15 0.64 68º
14th May 1810 1031.3 1011.0 2.69 64.86% 2.00 0.28 66º
26th Jun 1820 1024.7 1005.0 2.60 79.72% 0.00 0.00 71º
12th Jul 1820 1025.5 1005.0 2.71 80.38% 0.00 0.00 67º
20th Apr 1836 1033.0 1008.0 3.30 75.73% 0.00 0.00 63º º
20th Apr 1836 1033.0 1008.0 3.30 75.73% 0.00 0.00 63º 72.5º 3 + ?
16th May 1845 1036.0 1009.0 3.57 75.01% 0.00 0.00 64º
16th May 1845 1036.0 1009.0 3.57 75.01% 0.00 0.00 64º 76.5º 3 + ?
21st May 1849 1035.5 1010.0 3.37 71.80% 0.00 0.00 66º
21st May 1849 1035.5 1010.0 3.37 71.80% 0.00 0.00 66.5º 75º 3 + ?
15th Apr 1850 1038.7 1009.0 3.93 76.76% 0.00 0.00 66º
15th Apr 1850 1038.7 1009.0 3.93 76.76% 0.00 0.00 65º 73º 3 + ?
13th Jul 1857 1037.1 1009.0 3.72 75.75% 0.00 0.00 67º 78.25º 3 + ?
9th Jul 1858 1036.6 1009.0 3.65 75.39% 0.00 0.00 66º 77º 3 + ?
2nd Jul 1863 1049.3 1000.5 6.46 98.99% 0.00 0.00 72º 90º 5 + ?
12th Apr 1864 1036.3 1007.0 3.87 80.71% 0.00 0.00 66º 76º 3 + ?
10th May 1866 1044.0 1006.5 4.97 85.24% 0.00 0.00 71º 85º 3 + ?
12th Apr 1866 1036.3 1007.0 3.87 80.71% 0.00 0.00 66º 76º 3 + ?
30th Apr 1867 1041.0 1026.9 1.87 34.46% 0.00 1.5 1.5 3 º º 4 + 2
3rd May 1867 1058.4 1016.6 5.53 71.56% 15.50 3.97 1.25 1.5 2.5 65º 74.5º 3 + 2
10th May 1867 1055.7 1018.8 4.87 66.17% 15.08 3.98 1.25 1.5 2.5 º º
30th Aug 1869 1056.8 1016.1 5.39 71.71% 20.00 5.00 1.5 1.75 3 61º 75º 3 + 2
23nd Sep 1869 1056.2 1015.0 5.46 73.40% 20.00 4.98 1.5 1.75 3 61º 75.5º 3 + 3
16th Dec 1869 1056.8 1016.1 5.39 71.71% 15.80 3.99 1.25 1.5 3 61º 74.5º 3 + ?
Sources:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/525, ACC/2305/1/526, ACC/2305/1/547, ACC/2305/1/550, ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553, ACC/2305/1/546, ACC/2305/1/572, ACC/2305/1/579/1, ACC/2305/1/573

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