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Getting to Know Britain's Real Ale

© Paul Ruschmann

For many North Americans, Real Ale is a recent discovery. It first appeared in the 1980's, and is still found in relatively few establishments in the U.S. and Canada. In Britain, however, Real Ale has been around for centuries. It's survived wars, revolutions, and, more recently, bean-counters inside the brewing industry.

Real Ale, in a Nutshell

Real Ale is ale made in the traditional British fashion: the process of fermentation--converting sugar and yeast to carbon dioxide and alcohol--continues inside a secondary container. For ale served on draft, that container is a cask, often a pot-bellied wooden vessel called a firkin--which explains why you see that word in more and more pubs' names.

Before it leaves the brewery, cask-conditioned ale is racked into vessels where fermentation, or conditioning, is allowed to continue. (Some brewers add a small amount of hops and brewing sugar to help the process along.) The casks are delivered to pubs, where they're stored in the cellar until the ale is ready to serve--usually in a week or two. Proper storage and handling of cask-conditioned ale is vital, requiring the skill of a trained cellarmaster.

When it's ready to serve, the ale is drawn from the cask through unpressurized lines, typically by using a hand pump called a beer engine. It's served at cellar temperature, about 55 degrees. Contrary to widespread belief, British beer is not served warm, and it isn't supposed to be flat. At cellar temperature, you can better appreciate an ale's fresh hop aroma, malty flavor, and natural carbonation. (As I write this article, I'm enjoying some cask-conditioned Extra Special Bitter fresh from a local brewpub...all in the name of research, of course.)

Saving a British Tradition

While Real Ale is good news for the drinker, it can be bad for the brewer's bottom line, largely because it stays fresh for only a few days. To make their product easier to handle, most brewers stop the fermentation at the end of the brewing process; they filter the ale or pasteurize it, which causes the yeast to be killed. As a result, mass-produced ale loses much of its natural flavor--something the average drinker doesn't notice because it's served cold. And because this ale has no natural effervescence, it has to be injected with gas before being served.

Although cask-conditioned beer is a British tradition, it once faced extinction as one brewer after another decided to stop making it. But in 1971, a group of diehard fans banded together and organized the Campaign for Real Ale. They started calling the cask-conditioned product "Real Ale," and lobbied against takeovers of small, independent breweries by brewing giants who foisted their mass-produced beers on the pubs they owned. (Unlike the U.S. and Canada, British law allows brewers to own retail establishments. They're called "tied houses.")

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