Read February's The Edge as a PDF - The Edge Magazine

“I always keep a copyof The Edge in theglove-compartment ofmy motor. It doesn’tpay to leave it ondisplay on theparcel-shelfand show people yourbusiness in myparticular lineof work.”James Bond 007What the starshave to say...“This Uzi 9mmslug was taken outof my nose.”“Ding Dong!”FatimaWhitbreadBIG HEADTrophy BitterLeslie Phillips“I’d do almostANYTHINGto get myhands ona copy.”Kelly BrookIt is, as Jane Austen might have said(had she been a beer drinker), a truthuniversally acknowledged that a person’stastes do not remain constantthroughout their life. Few of us, Ishould imagine, listen to the samemusic now as we did when we were10. Fewer still read the same books orwatch the same films as we did whenwe were 5, unless there is somethingseriously wrong with us.Evident as this change in taste maybe, it does not lead inexorably to theconclusion that our tastes alternatebetween two opposed extremes on aregular basis. The change is more oneof a progressive nature, whereby a setof preferences is established graduallyover our childhood and teenage years,and becomes more or less fixed duringearly adulthood, so that by the age of25 we are broadly definable as beerdrinkers as distinct from wine drinkers,rock fans as distinct from hip-hop fans,book-lovers as distinct from film-lovers,and so on.Or not, it would appear, if you areinvolved in the beer and pub industry.Take a look at the selection of beersavailable in your preferred pub (asyou’re reading this, I assume you drinksomewhere with a fair choice of ales,not just a couple of national-brewerybitters). Now think back to what yousaw there six months ago. Much thesame selection? Or rather different?And if different, why? Has the selectionof people who use your local changedthat much in six months, causing thedemand, and therefore the selection,to be altered? I doubt it. Here’s what’shappening.People who run breweries andbeer-supply agencies seem to thinkthat each person has two sets of tastebuds, one of which we use during theSummer, the other during the Winter(presumably keeping the ‘spare’ set ina cupboard while it’s out of use). TheWinter set, so the theory goes, isincredibly sensitive to hop bitternessand citric character, and must on noaccount be exposed to such tastes incase it causes an explosion. Therefore,any person using this set of taste budswill only want to drink dark beers with asweet malty character, or a burnt roasttaste.The Summer set of taste buds,however, has been blunted by a thousandyears of exposure to hydrochloricacid, to the point where it can only gainany sense of fulfillment by beingexposed to pale beers with virtually noDavid Sherman’sBEVERAGEREPORTHAVE YOU BEEN SEASONALLYADJUSTED?body or complexity and about a hundredtonnes of hops per pint. It is,naturally, a hanging offense to comeout with the wrong set of taste budsand expect to drink dark beer in theSummer.Do you actually know of anyonewhose tastes conform to this modelinvented (in recent years, I might add)by the British beer industry? Do yourtastes, or those of your friends, changemiraculously when the sun comes outand the temperature goes into doublefigures? Mine certainly don’t, and I’veyet to meet the person to whom thisdescription applies.There has, of course, always beena tradition of seasonal beers, but it hasnothing to do with the crass marketingventure we’re now being exposed to.Strong ale, for example, has alwaysbeen seen as a Winter drink, due tothe warming properties of the alcohol.Mild, on the other hand, is traditionallya drink for the Summer and harvesttimes, its increased sugar contentbeing beneficial to the well-being ofagricultural workers. But try finding apint of Mild during the Summer andyou’ll be a disappointed drinker; you’llbe told by the majority of landlords thatdark beer is a Winter drink (yeah, cosno-one drinks Guinness in Ireland, orindeed in Africa, during the Summer,do they?).I don’t personally like Golden Ales(this will not come as a shock to myregular readers), but many people do,and they don’t like them any less justbecause it gets dark at five o’clock. Sowhy are they constantly beingdescribed (even by those who drinkthem all year round) as ‘Summerbeers’? They’re not. They’re just citricbeers, light-bodied beers, pale beers,Golden Ales..... call them what youmay, they bear no more relationship tothe Summer than they do to a wetWinter weekend in Wales.Why can’t brewers allow publicansto simply do what the customers want -to provide a range of beers to suit alltastes, all year round?Beats me.n Congratulations to Milton Brewery ofCambridge, who have just won firstAND second place in Camra’sChampion Beer of East Anglia competition,with Nero (a sweet stout) andPegasus (a traditional bitter) respectively.Essex’s Nethergate Brewery wonthe Speciality Beer category withUmbel Magna.Again!Page 12 The Edge 077 646 797 44