Ale Brewing in Late Medieval and Early Tudor Times
An Article by Bruce Parker
Andrew Boorde was adamant about his ale. In his "Dietary" of 1542, Boorde made himself clear:
"Ale is made of malte and water; and they the which do put any other thynge to ale than is rehersed, except yest, barm, or goddesgood (SYNONYMS FOR YEAST - BP) doth sophysicat there ale. Ale for an Englysshe man is a naturall drinke. Ale muste have these properties, it muste be fresshe and cleare, it must not be ropy, nor smoky, nor it must have no wefte nor tayle. Ale shulde not be dronke under .V. dayes olde. Barly malte maketh better ale than Oten malte or any other corne doth...."
Boorde’s advice was not free of caveats:. "Yet it doth make a man fatte, and doth inflate the bely, as it doth appear about the doche (DUTCH) mennes faces and belyes." Boorde apparently felt that being mistaken for a Dutchman was an embarrassment that Englishmen should try to avoid at all costs.
A casual stroll down the beer aisle of most grocery stores serves up a
reminder of the enormous variety of brews, from light beers to hearty
ales and stouts, now vying for a warm place in the hearts and bellies
of consumers. But what did late medieval and Tudor-era ale taste like?
How different would that ale be from what we’ve become familiar with in
our own time?
There is a slightly tenuous consensus among many traditionalist brewers
that the ales of that age must have had less carbonation, perhaps a
great deal less. But there is debate on that point. Fred Hardy, in a
1995 article posted to a brewing website, begs to differ: "As for
carbonation, the Celts and Brits had the same pressure vessels as did
the Burton brewers who shipped India Pale Ale around the world. They
are called "barrels," and the coopers’ art was well-established in the
British Isles before the Roman invasion."
Hardy also noted a more primitive method for producing a satisfying foam.
"........probably more than a few Brits and Celts would plunge a hot
poker into the mug to release dissolved CO2 and produce accompanying
foam. At a time when central heating was unknown, the alcohol and
actual warmth of the drink were probably welcomed."
Whether hops were added to English ale, providing preservative
qualities as well as the bitterness that modern drinkers have become
accustomed to, is another contentious topic.
"Hops may have been first introduced into the British Isles in the
early medieval period, but they were not commonly found in beer until
the Reformation," maintains Tofi Kerthjalfadsson in an article on
Elizabethan brewing. "Even through the 17th century, unhopped ales
could be found. Hops were fairly expensive, and so were used in much
smaller quantities than we would find in a modern India Pale Ale....."
It’s not difficult to imagine that the addition of hops to English
ales, with their accompanying bitterness, took a bit of getting used
to. But having poorly-preserved ale go sour could be a small-scale
disaster, with a wasted product and disappointed, surly consumers to
boot.
It is not surprising that yeast was regarded with awe and a sense of
wonder in the sixteenth century. It took the studies of Louis Pasteur
in the late nineteenth century to make yeast somewhat more
comprehensible as a living, active organism. The Tudor-era brewer and
baker didn’t have any idea why yeast worked the way it did, but the
early synonym for it, "goddesgood" still speaks volumes about the high
regard in which it was held.
It has long been posited that in the damp climes of England and much of
northern Europe, relatively weak ales, referred to as "small ales,"
were often the everyday drinking fare, with stronger ales consumed on
more festive or celebratory occasions, including the feast days of
pre-Reformation England. Regardless of the strength of the ale on any
given occasion, there is a fairly general consensus that ale was
consumed in large quantities, in no small measure because the purity
and healthfulness of water was suspect. Then, too, the very procedure
of ale-making, with its boiling of ingredients and its subsequent
production of alcohol greatly reduced a number of health risks.
At the same time, there are researchers who feel that it’s possible to
overstate the amount of ale consumption in medieval and Renaissance
England. Karl Hagen, in his study "The Economics of Medieval English
Brewing" chose to look at the amount of land in England that would have
had to be devoted to the production of barley and to a lesser extent
wheat, oats and other grains of potential use in ale-making and came to
the conclusion that ale-consumption in the land was considerable but
could well be exaggerated by many historians. He concludes that there
simply wasn’t enough land to support ale quantities that enormous,
particularly in light of the demand for grains to produce bread to keep
the population fed. And since a hungry population was sometimes a
rebellious population, the consequences of poor resource management
could be deadly.
But in times of relative plenty, almost every indication points to a
variety of strengths of brew, from watery and relatively light to
heavy, malty, and strong in alcohol content. The addition of herbs such
as yarrow, marsh rosemary, sweet gale, and who knows what else, no
doubt added to the variety of distinctive tastes the ales offered.
The fact that ale was not easy to transport, particularly over land,
and was not an uncommon commodity points to the conclusion that it was
primarily a locally-produced product, with many an "ale-wife" laboring
over a batch of brew in the home. There is some speculation that as
some of these home brewers inevitably became more highly regarded than
others at making a tasty concoction, their homes became popular
gathering places for people willing to pay to enjoy some of the brew.
They essentially became "public houses," what we would regard as
"pubs," the scene of many a laugh, many a fight, many a song since then.
