Christmas wreath of hops & mistletoe, drawn by Caroline Reeves

Hop Press

Issue 8 – December 1982

A rough scan & OCR of the original leaving out adverts & some sections such as the Crossword
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Contents

• Editorial
• Pub Quiz
• Pub News
• Mumming - Nick Mellersh
• The Wicked and Pernicious Weed - Steve Harvey
• Three Men on a Bike (Each) - Ken Hill
• CAMRA - in Texas! - Aged Swill
• Recipe - Glazing a Ham
• How the Big Brewers Dictate What We Drink - Norman Spalding
• Crossword [See pdf version]
• CAMRA Southern Hants Branch

EDITORIAL Hop Press index

Welcome to the Christmas edition of Hop Press. It's the largest edition we've ever produced, and we hope that all our readers will find plenty to interest them. One reason that we've been able to produce this larger edition is the magnificent support we've had from our advertisers. Our thanks to them.

One of the features of our last edition that seemed to find favour with readers was Pub Quiz. Several readers asked us, though, where we got the idea that the Heart-in-Hand, Winchester, is haunted. We also heard several ghost stories about other Winchester pubs. So we're going to add to your winter shivers with a special feature on haunted pubs in our next issue, due out in February.

That doesn't mean we've forgotten how to be topical at Christmas. This issue contains an article on the traditional Christmas pub activity known as mumming. It also contains an entertaining account of a pre-Christmas bicycle pub crawl - Three Men on a Bike (Each). For those of you who like to cook - well, we nearly gave you a Christmas pudding recipe - but many of you probably made your puddings months ago. Instead, we've given you a recipe for glazing a ham with barley wine, which should keep out the frost!

There's only one thing left to say to you all - the landlords who so kindly distribute Hop Press, the advertisers who support us, and all our readers –
Happy Christmas.

Pub Quiz Hop Press index

Answers on page 6

Pub News Hop Press index

Farewell New Inn, Hello Percy Hobbs by Ged Wallis

The New Inn at Morn Hill, Winchester, has been renamed the Percy Hobbs, in honour of a customer who has been a regular there since 1920.

A local, Percy has been popping in to his favourite corner in the pub for no less than sixty two years!

Today, the Percy Hobbs is a Whitbread house, serving Strong Country Bitter and Pompey Royal. Back in 1920 when Percy downed his first pint there, it was a Strong's house. Percy has fond memories of those times. "Beer was much better then," he told me. "And with a shilling you could buy five pints, half an ounce of tobacco and still have a ha'penny change"!

He also recalled that whilst best mild was tuppence a pint, you could buy "cooking beer" for a penny-ha'penny.

It was the landlord, Gregg Jarrett, who first put the idea to Whitbread. He's delighted with the change. He thinks it will give a new image to his smartly refurbished pub. And it will certainly create local interest.

Congratulations, Percy. Here's wishing you and your local every success and many more years together.

Drinks on the Lawn - SCH

Tuesday 19th October 1982. Scene: The Mash Tun, a pub in Eastgate Street, Winchester. The pub is packed with people talking, drinking, eating the free sandwiches, struggling to get to the bar. Somewhere, someone is playing the piano. At the bar, pints change hands for printed invitation cards, not money. The beer is sipped, savoured, earnestly discussed.

It's all because the beer has been brewed on the premises - the first commercially brewed beer in Winchester for over 50 years. The 'brewery' consists of two tiny rooms at the back of the pub. In one, there is a mash tun (the vessel used to steep the malted barley to extract the fermentable sugar) and a copper (nowadays made of stainless steel.) In the other room are three tall, cylindrical fermenting vessels. Fitting a commercial brewery into such a tiny space is a masterpiece of engineering ingenuity.

The beer we are drinking is Mash Tun Bitter - and it's the pub's first brew. It has a distinctive flavour, well-hopped, perhaps a trifle thin. The enthusiasts argue amongst themselves. The opportunists drink up.

The Lawn Brewery, as it has been named, is the latest in a line of small-scale breweries engineered by Peter Austin, of the Ringwood Brewery, and his partner David Welsh. Peter and David circulate amongst the crowd. Peter regales us with tales of brewing in bygone days. He promises to write down some of his anecdotes for Hop Press. The Lawn Brewery, he insists, is mainly David's work: "he's done a magnificent job." No one disputes it. As for the beer - there's only one sensible way to judge that. Go and drink some.

Thumping success

At the Great Western Beer Festival held in Bristol at the end of October, Ringwood Brewery's Old Thumper was the winner of the strong bitter class. Congratulations to Ringwood on this excellent achievement.

Beer

The Park Inn, Carlisle Road, Shirley, Southampton, is now a Wadworth's house.

The Westgate, Winchester, has dropped Eldridge Pope's Royal Oak in favour of their IPA.

The Home Tavern, Eastleigh, has Strong Country Bitter and Pompey Royal back on handpumps again.

Mortimers, the free house at Ower, is now serving Gale's BBB.

The Old Mill, Holbury, has converted to Watney's Stag and Usher's Best Bitter.

No real ale is available anymore at the Weeke Hotel, Winchester or the Compton Arms at Stoney Cross in the New Forest.

Pubs

Hiltonbury Farm, a long-standing building in the middle of the Miller's Dale estate in Chandler's Ford, is apparently to become a Watney's pub.

Landlords

Hop Press welcomes incoming landlords at the Chamberlayne Hotel, Eastleigh, the Bricklayers Arms, Swanmore, the Rising Sun, Horton Heath, and the Fountain, Waltham Chase.

Welcome, too, to Rob and Julie who took over the Frog and Frigate, Southampton, in the summer and are working hard, with David, the brewer, to recapture the success of the pub's early days.

Get well soon is our wish for Larry Walder, of the Mailman's Arms, Lyndhurst, and Bob Pink, of the Bunch of Grapes, Bishop's Waltham.

Name changes

The Fitzhugh, Milton Road, Southampton, is now called the Corner Post. It sells Strong Country Bitter.

The Brewer's Arms, East Dean, is now called The Deans. Its new owners offer Strong Country Bitter and Wadworth's 6X to complement a fine range of English and Dutch food. Peace lovers will be glad to hear that the 'music' has been banished.

The old Lion roars again

The last casks of beer had rumbled out of the Lion Brewery in Portsmouth in 1910, since when it had been almost forgotten. But thanks to the efforts of two Portsmouth CAMRA members - Barry Peers and Paul Edeson - local beer drinkers will now remember the old Lion.

Originally established in 1878, the Lion Brewery is a splendid example of a Victorian four-floor tower brewery. Barry and Paul, helped by local CAMRA colleagues, have refurbished it and are now in business as the Southsea Brewery.

Their first beer - Admiral's Ale (OG 1050) - is available in several free houses, and has already found favour with local beer enthusiasts in Whitbread-dominated Portsmouth. We wish them every success.

Take it away

Bottoms Up, the wine and beer supermarket chain established by Brian Barnett (of Augustus Barnett fame), now have branches in Lower Banister Street, Southampton, and Jewry Street, Winchester. They're selling good draught beers at highly competitive prices - for example: Ringwood Best Bitter, 49p per pint; Ringwood Old Thumper, 63p per pint, Wadworths 6X, 59p per pint. Fuller's London Pride and Marston's Pedigree may also be available by the time you read this. They'll sell you draught beer in any quantity you like, in any container you take. They can also supply 4 pint containers. Their stock of British and imported canned and bottled beers is also likely to interest enthusiasts.

Down at the old Pig and Whistle

Yet another Hampshire pub, the Pig & Whistle at Privett, near Alton, has established its own brewery. Customers of the pub, which is situated on the main A32 Alton-West Meon road, can view the brew-house through a large window in the adjoining lounge bar. The brewer, 28-year-old Gavin Millar, at present brews six barrels a week of Joshua Privett's Bitter, a sweetish, full-bodied bitter (OG 1043). The beer is also sold in two associated pubs in Southampton: the Compton Arms, St Mary's Road, and the Pub in the Park, Sports Centre, Bassett.

(The Pub in the Park is closed from 4pm on Sundays until 10 am on Tuesdays.)

ANSWERS TO PUB QUIZ

1. City Tavern, Jewry Street.
2. Mailman's Arms.
3. All three were once named the Railway.
4. New Inn, Bevois Valley (Gale's)
5. The Talbot, High Street.
6. The Green Dragon, Brook.

Mumming Hop Press index

Nick Mellersh

A hundred years ago, they must have been a common sight around Christmas time. Every village used to have at least one band of mummers who would-walk around visiting the large houses and the pubs and performing the mummers play so that they could get a little extra money for Christmas. Mummers were groups of half-a-dozen to ten men who dressed in tatterdemalion costumes made from torn rags, or more often wallpaper. Their faces would be hidden under the streamers that hung from their tall hats, some would be carrying wooden swords, and their leader would be holding a huge yew or willow branch. When groups of mummers met, they would fight, for it was important to maintain the honour of the village, and it was also important to guard their mumming territory, for the money they raised was a serious business.

The plays that the mummers performed were all basically the same, with slight local variations here and there. This is what happens in a mummers play. A man, usually Father Christmas, bursts in, and makes room for the play. Then in comes St George (sometimes King George) and boasts of his prowess. St George is challenged by a soldier, whom he slays. Then challenged again by a Turkish Knight who is likewise slayed. Then someone runs up to St George and says "Oh St George, St George, what hast thou done, cut and slain thine only son." A way must be found to revive the two men, and a doctor is found to do it. Finally, when the two men have been brought back to life, and before the audience has lost interest, a man appears to beg for beer and, more importantly, money.

What all this means is anybody's guess. Plainly there are elements of paganism in the death and revival of the men. Maybe of Christianity too, with the slaying of the only son. There's an echo of the crusades, with the Turkish Knight. But it seems unlikely that the play has been performed for more than 300 years, so it does not go back to the crusades, let alone to pre-Christian times.

Mumming is a fascinating mystery. If you live in a village, or a town that was a village a hundred years ago, you will probably be able to find traces of your own local mummers play. But before you ask the oldest inhabitant, be warned that mumming was a form of begging, and though many people will admit to knowing someone who acted in a mummers play, not many will admit to having taken part themselves.

If you are interested in mumming you can see some of the plays performed in pubs around Christmas time. Here are a few of the groups that are reviving mumming, and a list of the places where you may find them. Happy mumming.

Romsey Mummers: pubs in and around Romsey in the week before Christmas. Ring David Butterfield, Braishfield 68675, for details.

New Forest Mummers: 21st Dec, 8.30 pm, Turf Cutters, East Boldre, then East End Arms and Red Lion, Boldre. Boxing Day: Balmer Lawn Hotel, Brockenhurst, then Green Dragon, and Bell, Brook, plus pubs in Lyndhurst.

Otterbourne Mummers: in and around Otterbourne in the week before Christmas

Milford Mummers: New Year's Eve: Fleur de Lys, Pilley. Fisherman, Lymington. White Hart, Pennington. Crown, Everton. Gun, Keyhaven. Monkey House, Lymington. Chequers, Woodside.

Minstead Mummers: 23 Dec, 7.30 pm, Minstead Village Green, then Green Dragon, Brook, various Lyndhurst pubs, ending Trusty Servant, Minstead before closing time.

The Wicked and Pernicious Weed Hop Press index

Steve Harvey

Of all the ingredients that are used to make beer, the hop is the one that most readily captures the imagination. So it is the hop that, has come to be used by advertising copywriters to imply quality. You can hardly imagine an advertisement saying "You can taste the wicked and pernicious weeds in Ben Truman," yet that is just how the hop plant was once regarded.

The practice of using hops to flavour beer reached England from Flanders in the 15th century. Like most innovations, it met with considerable resistance initially. King Henry VIII is reputed to have warned his brewer not to contaminate his ale with hops or brimstone. In those days the word ale was used for the unhopped drink, beer for the hopped drink. By all accounts, ale must have been a sickly sweet concoction. But it wasn't until the 16th century that the use of hops in brewing became general practice. Prior to the use of hops, various other herbs were used to flavour ale, including bay, rosemary, juniper, bog myrtle, ground ivy, and sage.

The hop is a twining perennial plant and is in the same family as cannabis sativa, from which marijuana is derived. The part of the hop plant used in brewing is the flower, or cone, of the female plant. Each cone is anything from 1 to 4 inches in length, made up of overlapping yellowy-green scales.

In fact, the sex life of the hop may yet be the subject of a bureaucratic farce worthy of Gilbert and Sullivan. It comes about like this. In the wild, the female hop plant is fertilised by wind-borne seeds from the male plant. However, as the plant is a perennial, it can also be artificially propagated by taking cuttings, in which case the male plant is not needed. The alleged advantage, from the brewer's viewpoint, of this unnatural method of propagation is that the cones remain seedless. The seeds are of no use to the brewer, but increase the weight, and thus the cost, of the whole hop.

On the Continent, the poor male hop plant is outlawed: it is actually an offence to have a male hop growing on your land! With Britain in the EEC, there is bureaucratic pressure on us to conform by eliminating the male hop here. However, that may be more easily said than done. Hops proliferate in the wild in many parts of Britain, and even the most ruthless elimination of male hops from our cultivated hop gardens would be unlikely to prevent the female hops from being fertilised by wind-borne seeds from wild plants. If it comes to the EEC versus the Male British Hop, my money's on the M.B.H.

Hops are used in brewing because of the oils and resins they contain. The oils give flavour and aroma, while the resins impart bitterness and act as a preservative. Hops also contain tannin, which helps the clarification of the beer. Some brewers nowadays use hop extracts, but these do not give the quality that dried hop cones give.

Hops are grown in fields - called hop gardens in Kent - where they are trained to twine themselves around a system of string and wire suspended from tall poles. Every acre contains 15 miles of string! The stringing was once done by men working on tall stilts, but this picturesque method has now been superseded by a tractor with a 'crows nest.'

The hops ripen in August and September, at which time they were once picked manually. Trainloads of East End hop pickers would descend on the Kent countryside for a few weeks. The work was hard, but for many it was the only way that the family could all go away together, and it was all many of them ever saw of the English countryside. After being picked, the hops are dried in oast houses - conical brick buildings topped by white wooden cowls. These oast houses are a characteristic feature of the Kentish landscape.

The hop is also reputed to have valuable soporific qualities. Pillows stuffed with dried hops are supposed to induce sleep. The alternative, of course, is to take the hops in liquid form. No need for a prescription - just drop in to your local for a pint or two of best bitter.

Three Men on a Bike (Each) Hop Press index

by Ken Hill, with apologies to Jerome K Jerome

I think it was George who first had the idea. George, Wallis, and I were sitting in our club, the Dolphin, idly watching the frolics of the wilder spirits in the lounge, when he launched into one of his enthusiastic discourses. This time it was about the joys of the open road under crisp, Autumn skies.

An amazing series of coincidences decided the matter for us. We all had bicycles; we were all due for a day's respite from our stools and quill pens; and none of us felt like going back to work anyway. George's enthusiasm carried us along. I diffidently suggested, to make the picture complete, taking a dog. However, George held that no dog would keep up with him on his "lightweight tredaller with the double clanger." This set Wallis off, mournfully comparing the state of his machine to that of George's, but he finally scotched the dog by morosely stating that as none of us had a dog anyway, it would be jolly difficult for us to take one! I agreed with Wallis, thereby saving myself from voicing my misgivings on the implied speed that George seemed bent on achieving.

Two days later, George, full of that organisational zeal he is so good at, sent us a "letter of indenture." By signing it, we all agreed the date, the route, and the raison d'etre for the trip - fresh air, exercise, and a sampling of the ales produced by Messrs Gale of Horndean.

Three further days later, the date and the route had changed. Wallis and I, after much discussion, resignedly left the "final details" to George. Days off were booked, bicycles were tuned up (which, in Wallis's case, practically meant a rebuild - George's advice at one stage was to keep the newish back wheel and throw away the rest!) and maps were unearthed.

We all agreed to meet in Winchester at half-past nine one Thursday morning (or 0930 hrs as I insisted on calling it). I'd demurred, against the keenness of George, on an 8.30 start on the grounds that we were out to enjoy ourselves, not punish ourselves. Wallis was late. I, in my usual unassuming way, arrived first, to be followed shortly by George. He cut a dashing sight. Woolly hat, complete with pom-pom, topped a vast sweater from Rent-a-Tent and grey flannels tucked into long woollen socks. None of your effete cycle clips for George! I grudgingly conceded the point some five miles later when my damn clips came off for the tenth time.

Wallis finally arrived, muffled to his red nose in a Scott of the Antarctic anorak. He felt unwell, he declared. A short discussion followed, based on the fact that they had telephoned each other earlier and decided to carry on. Mainly, they assured me, because they couldn't phone me and I was so jolly keen that it seemed a pity to disappoint me. This saved me again. This time from admitting that I too would have phoned if only I'd been able to find twopence!

So off we set. We made good time to King's Worthy, with only two halts for me to replace those cycle clips. Across the main road, mercifully empty for ten seconds, and on through the Worthies. The sun shone. the traffic was almost non-existent, the air was crisp, and we began to congratulate George on a great idea.

Jokes were bandied about until we passed the watercress beds and arrived at the main road into Alresford. There George fell off. He'd adjusted his brakes the evening before in an effort to reach tip-top condition. When he applied them at the junction, they'd worked only too well and over the top he'd gone.

"You are an ass, George," I said, casually circling around in the main road whilst he collected himself. "You could have caused an accident. I say, what's that chap hooting for?" No damage done and off we set up the main road into Alresford. Just as we reached the main street, a nasty 'ping' came from my rear end. I thought at the time it was a loose stone, but when we'd turned into the road to Old Alresford, I discovered it was, in fact, a broken spoke.

Once again our little cavalcade came to a halt. George burrowed in his tool bag and produced a small spanner. "We'll take out the broken one and true up the wheel" he cried, the light of the true mechanic shining forth.

We eventually settled for just loosening two adjacent spokes to allow the wheel to go round. Then, as we were remounting, Wallis discovered a fault in his saddle. It had disintegrated. "Never mind, old boy," said I, "You must have had the use of it. It's at least thirty years old."

Wallis, however, was inconsolable. He'd got used to that saddle, he complained. Now he'd have to break in a newer one. Once again George came to the rescue. "We'll fix that when we get to Bighton," he said.

Along the winding country lanes towards Bighton and the Three Horseshoes we went. The sun shone from a steely-blue-sky, the air was positively intoxicating, and the number of times we said, "Aah. It beats working, doesn't it?" were legion. As we rode into the sleepy little village of Bighton, we heard the sounds of a hunting party in the neighbourhood. Wallis murmured something; but we took little notice at the time. We bumped over the stony surface of the driveway dead on the dot of eleven-o'clock. George reckoned that this put us exactly on schedule. Of course he'd allowed for the mishaps, he indignantly assured us. Into the snug we went, to be greeted by a blazing log fire.

"Three pints of Gales HSB, landlord," cried George in a breezy voice. "And what have you to eat?"

We ascertained that the menu included hot soup, warm bread, fresh butter, cheese and pickles. But the landlord asked us if we would partake of this feast immediately as he was expecting a shooting patty at twelvish. That was when Wallis repeated his earlier remark. It was good, he said, to see the local gentry out in force doing their duty - killing all sorts of little furry things (something of a preservationist, our Wallis).

This didn't endear us to the landlord. He'd already made up his mind that these weirdly stressed figures on bicycles didn't quite qualify for the description "carriage trade." So we left the Three Horseshoes before twelvish.

In an effort to salvage some dignity from the encounter, George said "Well, that gives us plenty of time to get to the next place." Pausing only long enough to 'repair' Wallis's saddle with a handy length of binder twine that was holding up a fence, we set off. The itinerary called for more country lanes. This time across country to a place called Totford. No, you won't find it on the map, unless you are George. But there nestled a Gale's House, the Woolpack.

The Woolpack had a fair sprinkling of locals in it by the time we arrived. Wallis, by now, was even looking ill. He obviously had a dose of 'flu coming on, or a very heavy cold at least. However, I still think that was no excuse for nodding off right in the middle of one of my wittier remarks.

George, meanwhile, had sampled the infamous 5X by Gales. Not really to my taste, so I declined, and poor old Wallis had no taste buds left at all, so he told us. A brief stay this time, as George's itinerary called for little more legwork to get us back to Itchen Abbas in time to try the Plough. The Plough, being a Marston's house, would, he reckoned, give us a chance to carry out a comparison test.

From Totford to Itchen Abbas showed us more of Hampshire's byways. We pedalled across heathlands, downs and farmyards. In one yard, fronting the road. George and I went through a series of fancy loops whilst waiting for Wallis. Then, bliss - one long downhill swoop into Itchen Abbas.

We had a moment's pang when we arrived outside the Plough, for it looked as though it had shut for the day. But George, by dint of pushing open a door and sticking his head in, discovered signs of life.

The landlord and his wife, a jolly couple, bade us welcome and, on discovering our mission, promptly began making suggestions as to what we ought to sample to round off the day. Closing time loomed large by this time, being about 2.15 pm., so we rapidly progressed through the Marston's Pedigree to the Owd Roger, kept in a small barrel on the bar. Wallis revived enough to partake of a small rum (purely for medicinal purposes, he murmured, as I fished for the extra change) and we left the warmth of the Snug at 2.45.

It had begun to cloud up by now as we set off on the ride home. I thought it might be anti-climactic, but I hadn't reckoned on the natural resilience of George. First his saddle bag, stolen from his daughter's bike and engineered onto his by his own method, tell oil with an alarming clatter as we left Itchen Abbas. This we thought poetic justice, for he'd told us earlier that the fixing had been "... absolutely simple, old boy, and won't move an inch, no matter how rough the going gets." After two more such disasters, he obviously felt he'd overplayed that one a bit. So, as we went through King's Worthy, he fell off again.

Now I must admit to some responsibility this time. I'd seen his absolute mastery of his steed, witnessing his "Look, no hands" along the lanes from Itchen Abbas, and thought a mere shout would not unduly disturb him.

"HI, George", I'd called, "How about coffee at your place?" "Why certainly", he'd replied, turning to wave airily, and at that moment his front wheel got mixed up with the kerb side and over he went! Again, no harm done, and we carried on into Winchester. Apart from getting us lost not half a mile from his house, George had no more entertainment in store for us. We got back to his place, had a warming coffee, then Wallis and I said our farewells. Wallis went to bed with his cold, I spent a quiet evening, and George fell asleep at 4.00 pm until the next morning. But it was a super day.

CAMRA – in Texas! Hop Press index

Aged Swill

From one of our team of roving reporters, who have been scouring the beer deserts of the USA in a search for real ale, comes this report...

Austin, the capital of Texas, is a hot, dry place. Once a cowboy town, it now sprawls untidily outwards from the old centre into several million acres of semi-desert. Hardly a place where you'd expect to find real ale. Well - you'd be surprised.

Right down near the city centre is old 6th Street. It was, until fairly recently, a seedy district, but now it is experiencing something of a revival. Old buildings have been gutted and refurbished, restaurants have sprung up, and some of the old bars have acquired a new air of respectability. There is even talk of running a tram down the street centre, Thankfully, enough of the old remains to prevent it becoming too chintzy.

Amidst a clutter of other old buildings is the unassuming frontage of Maggie Mae's, a long narrow bar. Enter and you get your first surprise. A large notice over the bar proclaims CAMRA SPOKEN HERE. Look around and note with pleasure the huge array of different bottled beers from around the world. All kinds of breweriana - trays, beer mats, posters, etc, mainly from Britain, adorn the walls and shelves. There's even a poster advertising the Second Winchester Beer Festival!

It comes as no surprise to learn that the manager, Greg Springer, has several English friends, and receives occasional visits from British CAMRA members. In fact, he was at one time a member of CAMRA himself. All this has influenced the way he runs the bar and his selection of beers. Alas, though the spirit is willing, the choice of real ale is limited by availability. Cooper's Real Ale from California, Guinness, Duvel, and one or two bottles of Gale's Prize Old Ale and CAMRA 10th Anniversary Ale were the only real ales. These were supplemented by other good quality pasteurised bottled beers, such as Sam Smiths Pale Ale, Anchor Steam beer and so on. Absent however, were two other US real ales - Albion and Boulder Perhaps that will change.

The pub itself has a young, mixed clientele no doubt attracted by the regular live folk and blues musicians who entertain there. Another great surprise: Maggie Maes has a good old-fashioned dart team, which belongs to - wait for it - the Austin Dart League! Several bars and pubs have teams which follow the traditional British pub system. In fact, a match was taking place on one of the evenings I was there.

Filled with enthusiasm by my unexpected discoveries, I returned one evening with a supply of CAMRA membership forms. Greg willingly rejoined. The barman introduced me to a couple of home brewers who also signed up. A friend of theirs was persuaded, and, not to be outdone, the barman joined as well. By the end of the evening the number of American CAMRA members had increased by seven. Convinced that others would take up the real ale cause in Austin, they are discussing forming a CAMRA branch. They'll have plenty to fight for. But even in the Great Beer Desert of the USA there are a few oases.

RECIPE – GLAZING A HAM Hop Press index

Soak and boil a ham with vegetables in the normal way (25 minutes per lb is usual). When it is not quite cooked, drain, and peel off the skin. Score the fat, cover with soft brown sugar, and stick with cloves. Place in a baking tin and pour 3 - 1 pint of Ruddle's Rutland Barley Wine or County all around. Bake in a moderate oven for 45 minutes, basting frequently with the beer.

(Reprinted with thanks from Cooking with Beer by Rosemary Ruddle, published by Ruddle & Co, the Rutland Brewers.)

How the Big Brewers Dictate What We Drink Hop Press index

Norman Spalding

As most pub customers will have observed, there is very little choice of brewer in many parts of Hampshire. Whitbread own more pubs than anyone else, and in some places it is hard to find another brewer's products on draught. These substantial local monopolies of pub ownership are aggravated because the free houses that do exist are often restricted to the products of only one or two brewers. Similar local monopolies exist in other parts of the United Kingdom, although some have been reduced in recent years by pub swaps and by sales of the smaller, less profitable pubs. Many of these local monopolies give a single brewer substantially more than 33% of the sales in a town, a pattern which, if repeated nationally, would satisfy the legal definition of a monopoly. How did this state of affairs come about?

The answer lies partly in the economics of big business. Many industries in the UK have a few large producers, mainly because of the economics of large scale production. Breakfast cereals, washing powders, High Street banks, cement - these are all the preserve of only a handful of very large firms. Brewing is no exception, and 7 firms control around 90% of all beer sales in the United Kingdom.

In the case of beer brewing and retailing, however, another force is at work which overrides the normal operation of market economics. This is the involvement of Government, in the form of licensing regulations. Its effect on the ownership of retail outlets for alcohol can be traced briefly as follows.

The Beerhouse Act of 1830 allowed any householder to obtain a licence to sell alcohol simply by paying a fee, without any need to satisfy conditions about his character or the state of his premises. In the fifty years that followed a dramatic rise in the number of pubs took place, and drunkenness reached alarming proportions. Many of the new beerhouses were of a disorderly character. Despite repeal in 1880 of the 1830 Act, a presumption persisted among magistrates that the number of licences was too great. These feelings were reinforced by the findings of the Peel Commission, published in 1899.

In 1904, the Balfour Act introduced the policy of 'fewer and better,' giving magistrates the power to refuse to renew licences at the annual brewster sessions on the grounds of being surplus to needs. (A compensation fund was set up for licensees who were made redundant in this way.) As a result of this policy, later assisted by the effects of the gathering economic depression of the 1930s, the number of full on-licences (i.e., public house licences) fell from over 102,000 in 1900 to 66,500 in 1968.

The presumption in favour of reducing the number of licences persisted on many licensing magistrates' benches, even after the compensation system was abolished in 1959. Indeed it persists in some today, which has made it very difficult to open new pubs except in areas of new population. This has conferred a huge advantage on the owners of existing pubs. Several brewers, quick to see this, had already bought large numbers of pubs by 1904.

Thus, those who were lucky enough to be established and wealthy enough to buy up pubs at the turn of the century had a head start over the rest. As the century progressed, they continued buying up pubs. As these became scarcer, they bought other breweries, in order to acquire their pubs, secure in the knowledge that no newcomer to the industry was likely to prosper unless he could afford to buy his own sales outlets. The magistrates would see to that.

Many local breweries succumbed to this process of acquisition and closure. Southampton lost its last brewery in 1956, Winchester in 1931. In all, the number of brewer-for-sale licences fell from 6,447 in 1900 to under 200 in 1979, while beer sales rose from 37 million barrels a year to 43 million.

This is necessarily a simplified account, but the salient facts are clear. The brewers have been able to exclude new competition from a market which, for at least twenty five years, was growing. This has been possible because of the extreme difficulty of acquiring new pub licences, which derives from the intervention of Government in Victorian times to quell drunkenness. The existing brewers realised their power, and in the 1960s exercised it by restricting the number and types of beers they produced. The effect on consumer choice was so severe that it gave rise to a national organisation dedicated to defending the interests of the beer consumer: CAMRA.

CAMRA campaigns in various directions to retain and promote traditional British beer and pubs. Have we achieved anything? Indeed, can we? The facts suggest that we have had some success. There has been a dramatic increase in the availability of traditional draught beer during the last five years or so. As an example, Watney's, who had entirely ceased to produce any real ale now promote it with some vigour. Almost all the big brewers have modified their marketing policies to some extent as a result of CAMRA's activities. But much still remains to be done. We need to do something about the interference with supply-and-demand forces caused by our quirky licensing system, as described briefly above. And there is an increasing public demand for more sensible and convenient licensing hours. CAMRA intends to go on fighting to give beer drinkers a fairer deal. Hop Press and the author of this article would like to hear your views on these issues.

ARTIST/ILLUSTRATOR

Hop Press needs someone to prepare illustrations and advertisements. If you have graphics arts skills, enthusiasm for real ale, and would like to help produce Hop Press, please phone or write to the Editor (see page 1). Looking forward to hearing from you!

CAMRA Southern Hants Branch Diary Hop Press index

Author

Planned for February 1983: trip to Burt's Brewery, IOW. A few places are still available.
For details of any event, contact either Mike Jones (West Wellow 22079) or Nigel Parsons Southampton 31517).

If you are not a member of CAMRA but would like to join, please complete the membership application below. As a member, you'll receive a copy of the national magazine What's Brewing every month, which keeps you in touch with the world of beer and brewing. You will also be able to join in local branch activities. And most important of all, you'll be doing your bit to help ensure that real draught beer and traditional pubs don't get 'phased out' in the name of progress.

APPLICATION FOR MEMBERSHIP

I/We wish to become a member/members of the Campaign for Real Ale.

[ ] I enclose £ 7 for full membership for a year
[ ] We enclose £ 7 for joint husband and wife membership for a year

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Please make cheque payable to Campaign for Real Ale Ltd and send completed form to Membership, CAMRA, 34 Alma Road, St Albans, Herts, ALl 3BW.

Hop Press issue number 8 – December 1982

Editor: Steve Harvey
18 Peverells Road
Chandler's Ford
Hants
SO5 2AT
Tel: Chandler's Ford 67207
hop-press@shantscamra.org.uk

©CAMRA Ltd. 1982