It is time to settle an issue that can often lead to acrimony around a pub table. No, not Brexit (thank fuck), that’s so 2019.
Let’s attempt to address a marginally-less thorny issue: the differences between craft beer and real ale.
When I first started drinking craft beer, my dad, primarily a cider drinker, would often jocularly pose the question ‘what’s the difference between craft beer and real ale?’ I’d usually roll my eyes. But it is a good question, so let’s dive in.
First up, some definitions:
Craft Beer: produced by small, independently-owned breweries. Helpfully, The Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) currently provides a definition for what a craft brewery is in the UK.
- Produces less than 20 million litres annually (0.12 million UK barrels or 0.4% of beer sales)
- Is a truly independent brewer and not a subsidiary of a larger firm with other attendant or subsidiary brewing interests
- Meets and abides by SIBA’s Food Safety and Quality standards.
Real Ale or Cask Beer: CAMRA states that ‘real ale is a ‘living’ product, which is typically produced and stored in a cask container. In comparison to other types of beer that kill off the yeast and artificially inject the beer with CO2 prior to serving, real ale contains live yeast which continues to condition and ferments the beer until it is served.’
At this point, it seems important to point out there is no universally accepted definition of craft beer in so far as Birmingham Beer Blog understands the term. Craft beer is made in small batches by independently-owned breweries.
Both real ale and genuine craft beer are artisan products that have a lot in common, however there are a few key points of difference:
Temperature
Ale served from a cask should ideally be served at between 11 – 13°C, whereas craft beer, such as IPAs, should be dispensed between 5 – 8°C. To the uninitiated, particularly our cousins from down under and across the pond, serving beer at an ambient temperate is a repulsive notion – but a cask beer will lose a lot of flavour if it is stored and served too cold.
Dispensing
Real ale is served using a hand-operated hydraulic pump, the beer is then drawn up from the cellar into the glass. Craft beer is typically served from a key keg and through a tap. Traditionalists who can remember pubs in the 1970s will often recoil at anything that comes out of a keg – but really we are a long way past ‘party 7s’.
Aesthetics
Thankfully, in recent years there has been a move away from old-dated stereotypes linked to cask beer particularly those that may have excluded women. For instance in 2018, Robinsons Brewery announced that they would be redesigning the pump clip for their flagship brew, Dizzy Blonde. Many real ale breweries are keen to emphasise their heritage and their branding will often reflect this. Whereas you tend to find that craft breweries will have funkier artwork – particularly when it comes to cans!
Taste
Rightly or wrongly (very rightly in our opinion), craft beer has developed a reputation for innovative and bold brews, whereas cask beer is sometimes considered to be stuffy and old-fashioned. This isn’t necessarily always true, but certainly craft breweries tend to be the ones who are pushing the boundaries.
Real Ale aficionados, put away your beer-temperature thermometers and look past your peccadillos around dispensing – thanks to advances in technology great beer can come out of kegs now!
Craft-heads: Know your beer history, The craft beer explosion in the UK and owes a huge debt to the centuries-old traditions of brewing ale in casks. Quite simply, today’s craft beer enthusiasts stand on the shoulder of giants.
Now that’s settled, raise a glass and toast the fact that the UK is home to more than 2000 breweries, the overwhelming majority of which are independently owned.
Words by Andrew Tromans
Birmingham Beer Blog 