Modern/stainless casks with CO2 vs kegs?

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Kev888

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I like casks, and understand their use with a direct/gravity tap, and/or for conditioning with air breathers, and/or with longer beer lines to a beer engine. Great.

BUT a great many casks are used not just with longer lines but also with a CO2 feed... by this point it 'seems' (to me) like their potential advantages are not really in play any more and instead they're being used in the kind of way that a modern beer keg/barrel is probably much better designed to allow..

AFAIK you don't 'need' to use carbonation-changing CO2 pressures to serve from a modern keg (flo-jet pumps can be used to cope with long lines if needed) and I don't happen to know of any reason why you can't prime naturally in kegs just as you would in a cask... I'm probably missing something though, does anyone know the advantages of still using casks rather than kegs in this particular way?

Cheers
kev
 
Hi Kev
I think you're right m8. Surely, if you can prime a corny, you can prime a keg? Most of us - me certainly - use top pressure to preserve beer that is being served for a much longer period than cask ales in a pub. A keg is probably better suited to the job. Maybe a cask is a bit easier to clean and fill - no spear to remove or work round.
Afraid this is just opinion, not first-hand knowledge.
Cheers, Chris
 
Hi,

Her is my 6d (2.5 pence) worth.

Keg beer was the spawn of the devil in the 70's,- I was there, I tried it! - and CAMRA did a brilliant job of saving the nation's national treasure in their fight for beer being properly made, kept, and dispensed.

Since then, things have moved on, and good beer can be dispensed from a variety of containers, including kegs.

Unfortunately, there is still a prejudice against kegged beer, for no good reason, in my view.

I don't see how top pressure on a keg is a heresey.

There are lots of good beers that are dispensed from a variety of vessels made from a variety of materials - steel, wood, rigid plastic, disposable plastic, via different gases and pressures,- it is the quality of the beer in the containers, and whether the method of getting the beer out delivers a beer that the customer likes that is the point. Some customers like beer that I think is rubbish, but I would not deny them their choice, although I might try to educate them if they were associates of mine.

As far as us homebrewers are concerned, I don't think it matters how we dispense, I think we have got lots of options. I have used Polypins, casks, kegs, bottles, Cornies, rotokegs , kingkegs and beerspheres and probably other methods and it is all beer and most of it dispensed all right.

Simon.
 
Thanks chaps, thats sort of supports what I was wondering - if there's no physical advantage to using casks in such a manner then its perhaps more down to historical association and tradition.

Thankfully I'm considering these for my own use, so its purely the practical implications I have to consider, I wouldn't need to worry about marketing - I already know how good and 'real' my beer is and I'm certainly not about to do anything to turn it into bland, over-fizzy rubbish, whatever vessel its served from.

Sadly my consumption rate is so slow that unless I bottled it all, it'll have to be a CO2 system of some sort. So if there's no intrinsic reason why kegs can't be used just as well as casks (in this particular situation) then probably they're the most suited to my needs, and I prefer the modern couplers too.

I'm a member of CAMRA and greatly appreciate their work in improving standards back in the day, however whilst I feel their definition of real ale is/was a useful general tool in the war against cr@p beer and the devious marketing/legal teams of the big producers, I don't consider it a be-all and end-all of good beer, and wouldn't want it to restrict people who aren't trying to cut corners.

Cheers
kev
 
their definition of real ale is/was a useful general tool in the war against cr@p beer
I hate the name "real ale". Why can't it just be called "cask conditioned ale"? The term "real ale" has a meaning in general English which is
different from "Real Ale" as defined by Camra. Now, Camra are not arbitors of English, but have used a clever trick to make many people
think that there's something "fake" about beer that doesn't meet Camra's definition. For that, they suck...
 
Swazi said:
their definition of real ale is/was a useful general tool in the war against cr@p beer
I hate the name "real ale". Why can't it just be called "cask conditioned ale"? The term "real ale" has a meaning in general English which is
different from "Real Ale" as defined by Camra. Now, Camra are not arbitors of English, but have used a clever trick to make many people
think that there's something "fake" about beer that doesn't meet Camra's definition. For that, they suck...

Well, I had a chat with a member a while ago, about making lager, the full decoction way, and it almost ended in fistyicuffs such was the zeal in the drunken CAMRA member. But they are real ALE rather than real BEER so I guess I shouldn'd complain.
 
As home brewers I'm not sure we should be concerned about CAMRA or their definitions. For the most part we are the brewer and consumer, so know what went into our beer. The real test for us is, do we like to drink the results of our labours. Whether that be a kit brew or a full AG step mash. But we are not commercial brewers (most of us), and do not need to market our production. We do not have or need Cask marque plaques by our front door. So in my view we should serve our beer how we like, when we like, and in whatever container suits us in both practicality and size. CAMRA's main purpose is to keep the commercial brewers in check and ensure pub beer is good quality, not homebrewers.
 
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