Shut up about Barclay Perkins - Barclay Perkins Table Beer 1804 - 1869

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I've never written much about Table Beer, have I? Just realised that. Not sure why, just haven't. Guess it's time to put that right.

I suppose I should get things rolling with an explanation of exactly what Table Beer was. First though, I'll explain what it wasn't. It wasn't a specific style. As the example from Barclay Perkins wonderfully illustrates.

What Table Beer was, at least initially was a tax class. In the 18th century there were three tax classes. Which class a beer fell into was decide by its wholesale price per barrel. Here's the information in a handy table:

Excise duty on beer
	strong	table	small	explanation
1761	8s	2s	1s 4d
1782	8s	3s	1s 4d	Beer >11s a barrel strong,
1802	10s	2s		Beer >16s a barrel strong,
Source:
The Brewing Industry in England 1700-1830 Peter Mathias, p.369

The classification Small Beer was abolished in 1802. The whole system disappeared in 1830, when the Beer Act moved all the tax onto malt and hops and beer itself was untaxed.

Its disappearance as a tax category didn't lead to the immediate disappearance of Table Beer. It continued to be brewers, no doubt because there was a demand for a cheap, low-alcohol beer. In the early 19th century, beer was a much safer drink than water, which could often be infected with all sorts of nastiness, including cholera bacteria. Table Beer probably was, as the name suggests, drunk to accompany meals.

Improvements in water supply are probably one of the reasons Table Beer faded away, That and the rise of tea-drinking, couple with the rise of modern, bottled low-alcohol beers such as Dinner Ale.

There's one very important point which is invisible in the table below. After 1860 the character of Barclay Perkins' Table Beer changed completely. Before that date it was a low-gravity Porter, after a low-gravity Pale Mild Ale. That could be a good indicator of when Porter fell from ascendancy in London, replaced by the new favourite Mild Ale.

Wondering why some examples appear to contain no hops? That's because none are recorded on the log. I assume that spent hops from another brew were used.

Barclay Perkins' Table Beer had about 55-60% of the gravity of TT, their full-strength Porter. As this table shows:

Barclay Perkins Table and Standard Porter
year	TT	T	T's % of TT's gravity
1804	1054.8	1029.6	54.01%
1810	1053.5	1031.3	58.50%
1820	1061.5	1025.5	41.46%
1836	1061.8	1033	53.40%
1845	1064.5	1036	55.81%
1849	1060.6	1035.5	58.58%
1857	1059	1037.1	62.88%
1858	1061.2	1036.6	59.80%
Source:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/525, ACC/2305/1/526, ACC/2305/1/547, ACC/2305/1/550, ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553

Here's the same comparing the Mild-like Table Beer with X Ale:

Barclay Perkins Table and X Ale
year	X Ale	T	T's % of X's gravity
1863	1061.5	1049.3	80.16%
1867	1060.9	1041	67.32%
1869	1060.4	1056.8	94.04%
Source:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553, ACC/2305/1/546, ACC/2305/1/572, ACC/2305/1/579/1, ACC/2305/1/573

You can see that there was a much smaller difference in gravity between these two. Another point worth making is that while the Porter Table Beer was always single-gyle, the Mild-like version was often parti-gyled with X Ale. The later versions were pretty heavily hopped, in contrast to the Porter-like one.

Note also the very high fermentation temperature of the 1863 and 1866 versions. I've no idea why those particular beers were fermented so hot.

In the next instalment, we'll be looking at the grists.

Barclay Perkins Table Beer 1804 - 1869
Date	Year	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl	boil time (hours)	boil time (hours)	boil time (hours)	Pitch temp	max. fermen-tation temp	length of fermen-tation (days)
28th Jul	1804	1029.6	1009.0	2.73	69.63%	3.49	0.48				67º
25th Aug	1804	1024.9				4.06	0.56				70º
2nd July	1805	1024.1	1012.0	1.60	50.21%	4.15	0.64				68º
14th May	1810	1031.3	1011.0	2.69	64.86%	2.00	0.28				66º
26th Jun	1820	1024.7	1005.0	2.60	79.72%	0.00	0.00				71º
12th Jul	1820	1025.5	1005.0	2.71	80.38%	0.00	0.00				67º
20th Apr	1836	1033.0	1008.0	3.30	75.73%	0.00	0.00				63º	º
20th Apr	1836	1033.0	1008.0	3.30	75.73%	0.00	0.00				63º	72.5º	3 + ?
16th May	1845	1036.0	1009.0	3.57	75.01%	0.00	0.00				64º
16th May	1845	1036.0	1009.0	3.57	75.01%	0.00	0.00				64º	76.5º	3 + ?
21st May	1849	1035.5	1010.0	3.37	71.80%	0.00	0.00				66º
21st May	1849	1035.5	1010.0	3.37	71.80%	0.00	0.00				66.5º	75º	3 + ?
15th Apr	1850	1038.7	1009.0	3.93	76.76%	0.00	0.00				66º
15th Apr	1850	1038.7	1009.0	3.93	76.76%	0.00	0.00				65º	73º	3 + ?
13th Jul	1857	1037.1	1009.0	3.72	75.75%	0.00	0.00				67º	78.25º	3 + ?
9th Jul	1858	1036.6	1009.0	3.65	75.39%	0.00	0.00				66º	77º	3 + ?
2nd Jul	1863	1049.3	1000.5	6.46	98.99%	0.00	0.00				72º	90º	5 + ?
12th Apr	1864	1036.3	1007.0	3.87	80.71%	0.00	0.00				66º	76º	3 + ?
10th May	1866	1044.0	1006.5	4.97	85.24%	0.00	0.00				71º	85º	3 + ?
12th Apr	1866	1036.3	1007.0	3.87	80.71%	0.00	0.00				66º	76º	3 + ?
30th Apr	1867	1041.0	1026.9	1.87	34.46%	0.00		1.5	1.5	3	º	º	4 + 2
3rd May	1867	1058.4	1016.6	5.53	71.56%	15.50	3.97	1.25	1.5	2.5	65º	74.5º	3 + 2
10th May	1867	1055.7	1018.8	4.87	66.17%	15.08	3.98	1.25	1.5	2.5	º	º
30th Aug	1869	1056.8	1016.1	5.39	71.71%	20.00	5.00	1.5	1.75	3	61º	75º	3 + 2
23nd Sep	1869	1056.2	1015.0	5.46	73.40%	20.00	4.98	1.5	1.75	3	61º	75.5º	3 + 3
16th Dec	1869	1056.8	1016.1	5.39	71.71%	15.80	3.99	1.25	1.5	3	61º	74.5º	3 + ?
Sources:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers ACC/2305/1/525, ACC/2305/1/526, ACC/2305/1/547, ACC/2305/1/550, ACC/2305/1/541, ACC/2305/1/553, ACC/2305/1/546, ACC/2305/1/572, ACC/2305/1/579/1, ACC/2305/1/573

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