ALE Spring 2005 No. 317 : Next section

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Beautiful Beer

In early March there was a flurry of media interest in women drinking thirds of a pint of beer.

There's an intiative to offer women one-third measures, especially in what looks like a wine glass. It's partly due to a belief that image-conscious women don't like to be seen using pints or halves and partly a ploy to get them to try a wider range of beers.

The British Beer & Pub Association has begun a campaign called Beautiful Beer to promote beer in new ways, including its health benefits, natural ingredients and drinking it with food.

"Is it the beer or the lifestyle that's fattening?"

The Beautiful Beer campaign is claiming that a glass of 4.6% beer has fewer calories than a similar measure of wine or milk or fruit juice. However spirits have more than six times the calories of beer.

Research into drinking habits has shown that beer's fattening reputation has more to do with the lifestyle of those who drink it (such as bar snacks or the post-beer curry).

Beer With Food Week (March 14th to 20th)

This is an initiative by the Morning Advertiser and backed by Greene King, already running their Beer to Dine For campaign.

It's part of a general industry campaign to position beer (particularly bottled beer) as an alternative to wine with food.

National Organisation for Imported Beers

The likes of Budweiser Budvar and Heineken have set up this new group to champion real imported foreign beers against the fake UK-brewed stuff such as draught Stella Artois and Kronenbourg.

What's in a name?

By the way, there seems to be a regional variation in what a third of a pint is called: a nip seems to be common in East Anglia and possibly the North but there's also a stick (Midlands?) and a pony (South?).

ALE Spring 2005 No. 317 : Next section
Cambridge & District CAMRA