Friday 31 December 2021

Beer is Bust beers

To go with yesterday's post of an advert listing various beers on sale here are analyses of most of them.

The ones described as "all" beers selling for 3 shillings or so a quart are those with gravities in the low 1030ºs. They're things like Brown ale, Light Ale and low-gravity Stouts. A beer selling for 3 shillings a quart would be around 10d or 11d when packaged as a half pint.

1/4 (16d) seems like pretty good value for a beer as strong as Bass or Worthington. I'm sure the advert got it wrong when it spoke of red and green labelled Bass. Their Pale Ale came with either a red label (bottle conditioned) or a blue label (brewery conditioned). It was Worthington which had Green Shield, the brewery-conditioned version of White Shield.

In the strong Pale Ale segment, Double Diamond, Tavern and Ben Truman were less value for money, being only 0.5d per half pint cheaper, despite being considerably weaker than Bass or Worthington.

Beer is Bust beers
Year Brewer Beer Style Price size OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation colour
1955 Bass Pale Ale (Blue Triangle) Pale Ale     1063.5 1003.1 7.96 95.12% 19
1955 Bass Pale Ale (Red Triangle) Pale Ale     1063.2 1009.6 7.02 84.81% 19
1953 Bass Barley Wine Barley Wine 20d nip 1104.6 1036.3 8.90 65.30% 80
1956 Ind Coope Double Diamond Pale Ale 17d half pint 1048.3 1012.7 4.62 73.71% 20
1956 Simonds Bitter Ale Pale Ale 12d half pint 1030.1 1010 2.60 66.78% 25
1956 Simonds Berry Brown Ale Brown Ale 16d half pint 1031.9 1011.9 2.58 62.70% 85
1957 Simonds Luncheon Stout Stout 11d half pint 1033.6 1014.9 2.41 55.65% 275
1959 Simonds Tavern Export Ale Pale Ale 17d half pint 1045.8 1013 4.25 71.62% 18
1959 Simonds SB Light Ale Pale Ale 10d half pint 1034.2 1010.3 3.09 69.88% 19
1956 Truman Trubrown Brown Ale 10.5d half pint 1034.9 1016.5 2.37 52.72% 95
1956 Truman Light Ale Pale Ale 10d half pint 1031.7 1011.4 2.62 64.04% 19
1956 Truman Eagle Stout Stout 11d half pint 1034.8 1016.1 2.41 53.74% 225
1959 Truman Ben Truman Pale Ale Pale Ale 16d half pint 1049.9 1010 5.20 79.96% 17
1953 Watney Yorkshire Stingo Barley Wine 17d nip 1089.6 1031.7 7.52 64.62% 110
1956 Watney Brown Ale Brown Ale 10d half pint 1032.2 1011.1 2.73 65.53% 120
1957 Watney Special Stout Stout 13d half pint 1042.3 1009.4 4.28 77.78% 200
1959 Watney Pale Ale Pale Ale 10d half pint 1033.2 1010.1 2.99 69.58% 23
1955 Worthington India Pale Ale (Green Shield) IPA     1063.3 1009.4 7.06 85.15% 18
1955 Worthington India Pale Ale (White Shield) IPA     1063.7 1002.9 8.02 95.45% 18
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/002.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Unrelated, happy New Year at you Pattinson!

I can't say I relish numbers quite like you do, but I appreciate the enthusiasm, as well as all the travelogues.

Stay strong and productive in 2022.

Mike in NSW said...

Was the later Courage Tavern keg beer a continuation of Simonds' Tavern or did they just use the name?

When I lived in Cardiff in the 1970s there were very few Courage pubs, the only one I remember was the Six Bells out of town at Peterstone Wentlooge and we used to cycle out and drink the Tavern.. very acceptable on a hot day.

Sadly I find it closed down in 2018 and is going to be pulled down for housing.