Reminiscences

[CD]

I always felt that Reginald Maudling took some of the fun out things, when in his budget fifty six years ago this month, he made home-brewing entirely legal. Prior to that it was a clandestine activity, with very few people outside the brewing industry knowing how beer was made.

One such was my Dad, who had been secretly slipped a recipe and instructions for making 5 gallons of ale at the 1955 Motor Show. The main ingredients, both stocked by Boots, were a less palatable vitamin supplement than Virol, and unspecified hops (kept for making sleep-inducing hop tea). A tin of Golden Syrup for pale ale, or Black Treacle for brown ale, loads of sugar, and 4oz of baker’s yeast completed the requirements, and as you might guess my Dad described the result as ‘an acquired taste’!

I made my first couple of brews the following year, the first my friends and I just managed to force down between clenched teeth, but with no mention of sterilising things, the next one went down the drain.

Has anybody else memories of those bootlegging times, when there were no books or magazine articles telling you how to brew, no local home-brew shops, and enthusiasts scoured second-hand shops in search of a glazed earthenware bread-crock, as they made perfect fermenting vessels?

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I remember my Dad dabbling with kits from Boots the chemist which he brewed in the airing cupboard it didn't last long so i guess the end result was poor.

.

 

[CD]

Boots were aware there was brewing going on from all the jars of malt extract and hops they were selling, and they were among the first, if not the first, to offer beer kits for sale. I think you will find that was after April 1963 though.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I think you will find that was after April 1963

It was probably the mid 70's when my Dad was making their kits.

 

[CD]

I thought so. Muntons latched on soon afterwards, and the rest is history.

You may not believe this but I assure you its true, whoever my Dad got that recipe from advised him to always refer to it as ‘Homebrew’ and never as ‘Beer’, and to always buy the hops and malt from Boots on two different days!

 

[marshbrewer]

Was brewing county wine illegal as well? Because people have been doing it around here for ever.

 

[CD]

No, wine making was perfectly legal. For some reason if you wanted to brew beer you had to apply for a special licence and possibly pay excise duty. After that budget the magazine ‘Amateur Winemaker’ started to provide much needed information, and the first books to appear on the subject were published by them.

 

[chesters-mild]

Anyone remember C J J Berry?
I still have his paperback from the 60s/70s - And the advise to use a small fish tank heater in the mash to keep the temp. up!
No Grainfather etc. then.
Cheers

 

[MickDundee]

I didn’t even know there was a time when homebrewing beer in the UK was illegal. You learn something new every day.

Why was it illegal? ££££?

 

[An Ankoù]

Anyone remember C J J Berry?
I still have his paperback from the 60s/70s - And the advise to use a small fish tank heater in the mash to keep the temp. up!
No Grainfather etc. then.
Cheers

Yep "First steps in winemaking" is still my go to book.

 

[ITMA]

I didn’t even know there was a time when homebrewing beer in the UK was illegal. You learn something new every day.

Why was it illegal? ££££?

For the same reason distilling is today. Because Governments like to control, and they like revenue wherever they can get it.

"The amount of revenue involved is very small indeed, and is probably less than the cost of collection"

(From Hansard: https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1963/apr/03/home-brewing-of-beer)

Old Reggie Maudling didn't legalise home brewing beer because he wanted to free the people. It's just that the revenue collected from issuing licenses had become so small it wasn't worth collecting anymore.

 

[CD]

Anyone remember C J J Berry?
I still have his paperback from the 60s/70s - And the advise to use a small fish tank heater in the mash to keep the temp. up!
No Grainfather etc. then.
Cheers

C.J.J. Berry was the editor-publisher of ‘Amateur Winemaker’, and my faded copy of his ‘Home Brewed Beers and Stouts’ starts “Budget Day, April 3rd, 1963, was a memorable day for the thousands of home brewers in this country”.

Ken Shales’ Brewing Better Beers followed, published in 1967, and was dedicated to ‘the Right Hon. Reginald Maudling Esq., M.P. . . for righting a wrong of over eighty years standing’. (Just under that dedication, in my copy, is the embarrassing fact that on Feb 16th 1974 I brewed 10 gallons of beer from 4lbs SFX and 1lb Co-op malt, 1lb crystal malt, 4oz hops, and 6lbs sugar. Apparently it was ‘Very Good’ !

 

[An Ankoù]

C.J.J. Berry was the editor-publisher of ‘Amateur Winemaker’, and my faded copy of his ‘Home Brewed Beers and Stouts’ starts “Budget Day, April 3rd, 1963, was a memorable day for the thousands of home brewers in this country”.

Ken Shales’ Brewing Better Beers followed, published in 1967, and was dedicated to ‘the Right Hon. Reginald Maudling Esq., M.P. . . for righting a wrong of over eighty years standing’. (Just under that dedication, in my copy, is the embarrassing fact that on Feb 16th 1974 I brewed 10 gallons of beer from 4lbs SFX and 1lb Co-op malt, 1lb crystal malt, 4oz hops, and 6lbs sugar. Apparently it was ‘Very Good’ !

I have Ken Shales "Advanced Home Brewing". It is a thoroughly awful book. I much prefer Dave Line, who, in spite of his optimistic brewhouse efficiency, seems like the sort of chap you'd like to share a pint or two with.

 

[CD]

I have Ken Shales "Advanced Home Brewing". It is a thoroughly awful book. I much prefer Dave Line, who, in spite of his optimistic brewhouse efficiency, seems like the sort of chap you'd like to share a pint or two with.

Dave Line’s ‘The Big Book of Brewing’, first published in January 1974, must have converted thousands of people from malt extract to grain brewing, and he was rightly featured as a ‘Real Ale Hero’ in an issue of Camra’s quarterly ‘Beer’. My first attempt at mashing was done on the 17th July that year, and I was so impressed with the improvement that I decided I would call in and thank him when in his area, which was quite often. To my everlasting regret I never got around to it, and I was stunned to note the footnote in a later edition that he died in 1980.

On a happier note I’m off to the Tucker’s Maltings Beer Festival tomorrow, organised by the Brewers as opposed to the Drinkers . It is amusing to see that SIBA manage to describe each beer in just two words, instead of the fifty or more it would take Camra. I am very pleased to see in the beer list that those that are 'naturally hazy' are asterisked, so I can naturally avoid them. One wonders if those who assess beers on taste alone are satisfied with ugly partners!

 

[ITMA]

I remember reading Dave's book as a schoolkid, would have been about 1988 - got the book from a library and I would have had no clue what all the grain stuff was about.

I recall reading a passage somewhere in the book where he says (I'm paraphrasing) "I've been doing homebrew for many years and whilst many think it's not good for you, it's never done me any harm". A minute later I noticed the same sad footnote you mentioned.

I hope he was a nice man, he seemed it from the book. We need enthusiasts like him.

 

[Justin Dean]

If they could tax it they would, oh hold on they do: VAT. Its a Scam.

 

[Slid]

Anyone remember C J J Berry?
I still have his paperback from the 60s/70s - And the advise to use a small fish tank heater in the mash to keep the temp. up!
No Grainfather etc. then.
Cheers

I had 2 books by CJJ Berry - the second one was just recipes - back in the early 1980's when I first did HB. I also had a heating element from boots that went inside the fermenter, stuck to the side with two rubber suckers. I doubt the fermenting temps were ideal.
The beer was either Boots kits or extract brewing with DME and greenish brown hops that came in plastic bags. Kits were a bit basic, at best. DME brews were a bit better.

 

[Gunge]

I have Ken Shales "Advanced Home Brewing". It is a thoroughly awful book. I much prefer Dave Line, who, in spite of his optimistic brewhouse efficiency, seems like the sort of chap you'd like to share a pint or two with.

I'm intrigued... what was so awful about the Ken Shales book? I don't have it and not familiar with it, but I do still have ragged copies of all the Berry and Lines stuff. I used to have a glossy thing that was exclusive to Boots ( McDonalds being the publisher, I think), but that disappeared years ago. Wish I could find it.

 

[An Ankoù]

I'm intrigued... what was so awful about the Ken Shales book? I don't have it and not familiar with it, but I do still have ragged copies of all the Berry and Lines stuff. I used to have a glossy thing that was exclusive to Boots ( McDonalds being the publisher, I think), but that disappeared years ago. Wish I could find it.

I'll dig it out from wherever I've chucked it and give you a few indicative quotes. It's his written style which is over-fussy and condescending, if I remember right. I'll have to identify it from the back cover as the cat pisssed on it in the early eighties and I had to rip the front cover off.

Was it this one?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/BOOTS-BOOK-HOME-WINE-MAKING/dp/0723407940

 

[Gunge]

Looking forward to the quotes! No that's not the book I had in mind... there was a lot of red on the cover IIRC and it was just about beer, no wine.