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Tuesday, 11 May 2010

Simonds beers 1938 - 1965

I bet you can't guess what this post is about. Really. You think it's going to be another one of those boring table posts, don't you? One with just loads of numbers about beers from a brewery that closed before you were born. Well it isn't.

This post is more a celebration of getting through the Whitbread Gravity Book volume II. It's in alphabetical order, the Whitbread Gravity Book. But, for reasons I won't annoy you with, I finished with Simonds. The former Reading brewer. That was gobbled up, chewed and then spat out again by Courage. There are two factoids I can remember about Simonds:

  1. they took part in one of the first copyright lawsuits, being sued by Bass for having a hop-leaf logo that was too similar to their own red triangle
  2. the Simonds name lives on, as does their flagship Hopleaf Pale Ale (and logo), in Malta

That's all the interesting stuff. ("Interesting" is a relative term in this context..) I know - what about a nice table of Simonds beers? You know it makes sense.


Simonds beers 1938 - 1965
Year Beer Style Price size package Acidity FG OG Colour ABV attenuation
1938 Stout Stout 10d pint bottled 1053.2
1946 SB Pale Ale Pale Ale 13d pint bottled 0.05 1005.1 1029.4 25 Brown 3.16 82.65%
1947 SB Ale Pale Ale 13d pint bottled 0.05 1007.2 1028.6 24.5 2.77 74.83%
1947 SB Ale Pale Ale 13d pint bottled 0.06 1008.2 1029.1 23.5 2.71 71.82%
1947 Special Stout Stout 12d pint bottled 0.06 1022.6 1043.9 1 + 14 2.73 48.52%
1948 Pale Ale Pale Ale can 0.06 1007.8 1028.8 22.5 2.72 72.92%
1948 Brown Ale Brown Ale 18d pint bottled 0.05 1006.3 1025.6 40 + 16 2.50 75.39%
1948 Brown Ale Brown Ale 18d pint bottled 0.05 1006.4 1025.7 40 + 16 2.50 75.10%
1948 Brown Ale Brown Ale 15d pint bottled 0.05 1006.7 1026.3 40 + 8.5 2.54 74.52%
1949 E. IPA IPA 1/6d pint draught 0.05 1007 1039.7 23 B 4.26 82.37%
1949 Brown Ale Brown Ale 15d pint bottled 0.05 1008 1026.1 23 + 40 2.34 69.35%
1949 Special Stout MS brand Stout 12d half pint bottled 0.05 1018.9 1045.4 1 + 13 3.42 58.37%
1949 Bulldog Pale Ale (imported into Belgium by John Martin, bought in Brussels) Pale Ale bottled 0.08 1011.9 1069.8 25 7.59 82.95%
1950 Ale Mild 12 pint draught 1030.4 56
1950 Pale Ale Pale Ale 14d pint draught 1031.5 26
1950 Berry Brown Ale Brown Ale 15d pint bottled 0.07 1007.3 1029.5 10 + 40 2.88 75.25%
1950 SB Pale Ale Pale Ale 9d half pint bottled 0.05 1008.5 1032.5 26 3.11 73.85%
1951 Luncheon Stout Stout 9d half pint bottled 0.07 1013.1 1034.1 1 + 14 2.71 61.58%
1951 Brown Ale Brown Ale 9d half pint bottled 0.06 1009.6 1029.2 19 + 40 2.53 67.12%
1951 Mild Ale Mild 1/2d pint draught 0.05 1005.5 1032 80 3.44 82.81%
1951 Mild Dark Sweet Mild 1/2d pint draught 0.06 1005.7 1031.5 80 3.35 81.90%
1952 Berry Brown Ale Brown Ale 9.5d half pint bottled 0.06 1005.5 1032 5 + 40 3.44 82.81%
1952 Brown Ale Brown Ale 9d half pint bottled 0.05 1009.7 1029.9 17 + 40 2.61 67.56%
1953 Velvet Stout Stout 26d pint bottled 0.05 1022.5 1046.2 1 + 13 3.05 51.30%
1953 Old Berkshire Strong Ale Strong Ale 14.5d nip bottled 0.06 1033.2 1076.7 16 + 40 5.61 56.71%
1953 Tavern Pale Ale Pale Ale 10d nip bottled 0.05 1012.3 1044.9 21 4.23 72.61%
1953 Archangel Stout Stout 16.5d nip bottled 0.05 1041.2 1084.6 1 + 10 5.57 51.30%
1954 Velvet Stout Stout 14.5d half pint bottled 0.04 1023.8 1047.5 350 3.04 49.89%
1955 SB Pale Ale Pale Ale 9d half pint bottled 0.04 1009 1033 21 3.11 72.73%
1955 Bulldog Pale Ale  Pale Ale bottled 0.05 1018 1067 20 6.38 73.13%
1956 Bitter Ale Pale Ale 1/- half pint bottled 0.04 1010 1030.1 25 2.60 66.78%
1956 Berry Brown Ale Brown Ale 16d half pint bottled 0.04 1011.9 1031.9 85 2.58 62.70%
1956 SB Pale Ale Pale Ale 10d half pint bottled 0.04 1010.3 1033.4 21 2.99 69.16%
1957 Velvet Stout Stout 14.5d half pint bottled 0.04 1022.2 1047.9 250 3.31 53.65%
1957 Luncheon Stout Stout 11d half pint bottled 0.04 1014.9 1033.6 275 2.41 55.65%
1959 Keg Bitter Pale Ale 22d pint draught 0.04 1007.3 1037.4 19 3.76 80.48%
1959 Velvet Stout Stout 16d pint bottled 1022 1047.9 275 3.33 54.07%
1959 SB Light Ale Pale Ale 10d half pint bottled 0.02 1010.3 1034.2 19 3.09 69.88%
1959 Light Ale Pale Ale 11d half pint bottled 0.02 1012.1 1034.4 19 2.88 64.83%
1959 Tavern Export Ale Pale Ale 17d halfpint bottled 0.04 1013 1045.8 18 4.25 71.62%
1960 Best Bitter Pale Ale 19d pint draught 0.05 1007.5 1042.3 17 4.35 82.27%
1960 IPA IPA 14d pint draught 0.04 1010.2 1035.4 18 3.15 71.19%
1960 Velvet Stout Stout 16d half pint bottled 0.04 1020.3 1042.3 300 2.83 52.01%
1960 Luncheon Stout Stout 10d half pint bottled 0.04 1010.4 1034.4 3.11 69.77%
1964 Milk Stout (lactose present) Stout pint bottled 0.05 1021.6 1066.3 250 5.80 67.42%
1965 Martins PA (sold in Belgium) Pale Ale bottled 0.05 1019.7 1068 17 6.04 71.03%
Sources:
Truman Gravity Book
Whitbread Gravity Book

There are a couple of beers I was really pleased to find in there: Archangel Stout, Martins PA, Bulldog Pale Ale, Tavern and Berry Brown Ale (just because of the name. And of course an authentic, traditional IPA. None of that new-fangled, high-gravity bollocks.

Oh shit. This did end up just a table post. The brewery shut in 1980. That's in case you want to check if it closed before you were born.



You can find a history of Simonds in pdf format here.

8 comments:

  1. Matt11 May 2010 at 00:43

    I was a bit surprised to see a canned Pale Ale in the list. I was under the impression that only our American cousins had started canning beer by the 1940's but clearly not.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ike11 May 2010 at 15:21

    The strength of these beers is so depressing. I've looked at the labels for years, wondering what the were like. I was at Reading Uni. in the 70's when Simonds had not long disappeared. Funny how something you cannot get seems more exciting.
    How could Old Berkshire be so weak, and look at Archangel stout, Simonds answer to Imperial Russian, but weak as piss. Any idea why the attenuation was so low on these?
    Still, Bulldog was the same. I drank an awful lot of that. Often with a bottle of John Courage as a J.C.B. in Courage pubs with no Directors.
    Matt - Felinfoel were bottling in the middle 30's. Simonds were fairly quick in taking up canning, maybe because they were big suppliers to the NAFFI.
    The tins had a screw top like the ones Brasso still comes in.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rob Wosley1 August 2017 at 13:46

      Oh my goodness JCB! I used to do that! I also used to put a bottle in the top of a pint of Directors and call it a Dizzy Dog. I miss Bulldog very much.

      Delete
  3. John Clarke11 May 2010 at 23:47

    Matt - the first UK brewery to can its beer was Felinfoel in the 1930s.

    Ron - I'm guessing the Tavern mutated into the Courage Tavern keg I consumed in the Queens Head in Newark back in 1972 - 73.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ron Pattinson12 May 2010 at 01:11

    Ike, there are actually some beers of respectable strength in there.

    In the 1950's sweet Stouts were very fashionable. The attenuation was often very low - under 50% isn't uncommon. They were deliberately leaving lots of unfermented sugar in the beer.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ron Pattinson12 May 2010 at 01:12

    John, I guess that's where Tavern came from. Or maybe from Alton. It won't have been the original Courage brewery by Tower Bridge, as that brewed no Bitter in the 1950's.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Ike16 May 2010 at 13:59

    I just can’t understand how Archangel could be just 5.57% and the Strong Ale 5.6%

    Campbell described Archangel as a ‘similar type’ of Russian stout to Barclay’s Russian Imperial Stout. He said it was ‘very powerful’, ‘dry and strong to the taste’.

    The Old Strong Ale he described as ‘only a little below Archangel but sweeter and more mellow’.

    I understand that attenuation was low on sweet stouts but neither of these beers was of that type. They were low sale, prestige products.

    By the way Tavern was Simonds answer to the high gravity national beers like Bass. Courage made it their premium keg beer to compete with Worthington E, DD and Red Barrel. It was in every Courage house and most John Smith houses. They also kept on Velvet Stout and Bulldog from the Simonds range.

    I still think their beers were weak, except for the export brands.

    ReplyDelete
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    ReplyDelete