When does a CASK beer become a KEG beer?

[Maysie]

I have just been reading this article and have totally confused myself:
http://www.cask-marque.co.uk/beer-infor ... ask-vs-keg

If (as home-brewers) we brew a batch, then store it in say a corny/sankey keg, does that mean it is no longer a cask ale? Or is it simply a cask ale stored in a keg?

Or is it to do with the way the beer is drawn off of the keg that really matters?
Or is it just the pasteurisation of the product prior to storing that changes the definition?

I have really lost myself up my own backside trying to work out the 'official' line on this - which I am sure is really simple - just not to me!

TIA

 

[Jimmy321]

I would say that beer severed from a corny is a Keg beer (taken that it's forced carbed).

I would say that beer served from say a king keg could be called cask beer for the time it is served from the CO2 pressure from fermentation or priming sugars, once that needs topped up with CO2 I would say that's a kegged beer.

 

[brewtim]

Let me google that for you:

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=difference+between+cask+and+keg

 

[wezil]

I have a simple way of dealing with this question, and it goes along the lines of good beer, bad beer. The container that it's transported in only matters to snobs and certain sections of camra :whistle:

 

[Rhys]

Answer in the my sig.
CAMRA was and is an important player but now narrow, and seems pedantic.

 

[bobsbeer]

I would say it is how it is kept. Force carbed = keg. Primed = cask. Even if you add a bit of co2 to serve it still remains cask in my book. It doesn't matter what container you put it in. A cask was traditionally made of wood. You don't see many commercial ales in those these days.

 

[pittsy]

Imo it's all b***ocks , a bowl of cornflakes is still cornflakes even if it's on a plate and not in a bowl .

 

[calumscott]

I would say it is how it is kept. Force carbed = keg. Primed = cask. Even if you add a bit of co2 to serve it still remains cask in my book. It doesn't matter what container you put it in. A cask was traditionally made of wood. You don't see many commercial ales in those these days.

Yup, that's where I am too.

 

[IPA]

I would say it is how it is kept. Force carbed = keg. Primed = cask. Even if you add a bit of co2 to serve it still remains cask in my book. It doesn't matter what container you put it in. A cask was traditionally made of wood. You don't see many commercial ales in those these days.

:thumb: That's exactly how I see it

 

[ericmark]

Interesting so as I understand it cask and keg are names for a container but with beer one expects the container called a cask to contain live beer and one called a keg to contain beer which has been processed to keep better with less care required. But since they are just the names assigned to a container which could just as easy contain gun power or nails the calling of a beer cask is no guarantee of type of beer.

Since traditional ale contains no hops then "cask ale" should in theory be as would have been made hundreds of years ago and you would have the strong first ale and weaker ale the latter used as a purified water kept pure due to alcohol content. However it is unlikely and beer bought in the pub is of this type the whole idea of drinking light ale instead of water is just a historical thing and today we expect a completely different brew.

The whole question is one of marketing commercial beers and transporting them and since in the main we don't transport home brew it is really anything to do with home brew however to discus home brew we do need labels to describe taste nice and horrid is not really enough. As a result we compare to commercial brews so we have.
Ale, Bitter, Lager, Mild, Draught, are names we associate with a taste and although Lager refers to a method buying a can of concentrate and processing it without using the lager process but with a taste similar to beer which does use that process we would still call it Lager as we are describing the taste not the process.

I expect bitters added to my beer and to drink a "cask ale" with no hops added I would likely not appreciate the taste in the same way as if you ask for coffee and are given tea you may like them both but is given the wrong one you don't like it as your brain is expecting something else.

Tradition is not easy as with something like IPA was designed to be transported and keep in warmer climates and the paler it becomes the less alcohol it has read Wikipedia it states most ale contains hops ask an historian and the tell hops only started to be used in the 13th Century and traditional ale has no hops.

So in real terms we are not talking about beer making but how to use the English language to convey to others a taste found in a beer so if it tastes like a commercial keg beer call it keg and if it tastes like a commercial cask beer call it cask.

To my mind if there is live yeast in the beer it's a real ale if it's been sterilized it's not. It does not matter if heat or chemicals are used. I would expect anything with cask label to be live and with keg label to be sterilized however if a pub was to swap labels I don't think they could be taken to court for it as just a matter of trust and way of describing the produces taste.

Other descriptions may be different within the food trade to butter bread one must use butter as margarine can kill some people so asking if you want some spread on it may be a better phrase but as far as beer goes I am unaware of any requirement to say things like may contain traces of dandelion, burdock root, marigold, horehound, ground ivy, or heather however I could also be nuts!

It would be interesting to hear if there are any legal labels required may be they have to have a warning "May contain alcohol"!

 

[graysalchemy]

Agree with bob but for me the most important part about cask ale is serving with a handpump, no gas (apart from a cask breather).
:thumb:

 

[anthonyUK]

Agree with bob but for me the most important part about cask ale is serving with a handpump, no gas (apart from a cask breather).
:thumb:

From what I understand a cask breather is a contentious issue for CAMRA. I don't see the issue personally.
I think CAMRA are over reacting and I would much rather be served decent beer at the expense of subscribing to a rose tinted view of traditional methods.

 

[Sandimas]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who think CAMRA have lost the plot on this one. Keg beer got a terrible name in the 70s due to the dire products the brewery's were producing, everyone has woken up to this now thanks to CAMRA and we've seen an amazing increase in the quality of beers available in UK pubs.

But to now take on craft brewers just because of the way they package their product doesn't seem right to me, a disappointed long-term CAMRA member. Good beer is good beer, full stop, in my book.

 

[graysalchemy]

Agree with bob but for me the most important part about cask ale is serving with a handpump, no gas (apart from a cask breather).
:thumb:

From what I understand a cask breather is a contentious issue for CAMRA. I don't see the issue personally.
I think CAMRA are over reacting and I would much rather be served decent beer at the expense of subscribing to a rose tinted view of traditional methods.

I agree :thumb: :thumb:

But to me cask ale has to be served through a hand pump, and I am with camra on keg ale, craft brewers need to look at how they can package their beer so it is not served with gas, there are options available eg the ecofass kegs which can still be served with a hand pump (yes i know its a keg), though obviously non would be approved by camra.

Not keen on kegged beer because it tends to be to gassy for me, brewdog is way to gassy for my taste though nice tasting beer.

 

[sam.k]

why does cask ale need to be served via hand pump? my local serves their 6X from the cask (wooden) straight from the spigot, no pumps, cask breathers or stupid little whipped cream sparklers and its quite honestly the best pint of ale in the city.

 

[dennisking]

Not keen on kegged beer because it tends to be to gassy for me, brewdog is way to gassy for my taste though nice tasting beer.

That's more or less my take on it. Cask breathers make sense. Cannot understand CAMRA's stance on cask breathers. It would mean more pubs can sell a cask ale instead of kegged ale. But lets not forget what CAMRA have achieved. I still have a reoccurring nightmare where I walk into a pub and all I see is Watney red pumps, not nice.

 

[anthonyUK]

But lets not forget what CAMRA have achieved. I still have a reoccurring nightmare where I walk into a pub and all I see is Watney red pumps, not nice.

CAMRA have made a big impact but there's no point in dwelling on the past.
You have to move with the times in some things.

 

[graysalchemy]

why does cask ale need to be served via hand pump? my local serves their 6X from the cask (wooden) straight from the spigot, no pumps, cask breathers or stupid little whipped cream sparklers and its quite honestly the best pint of ale in the city.

Fine if you like a flat pint :lol: :lol:

I had a stout from one of Manchester's finest Marble Brewery in their bar in the northern quarter, unfortunately it was gravity feed and as flat as a pancake. Not something I enjoyed, and it actually put me off their beer.

 

[dennisking]

You have to move with the times in some things.

That's exactly what I'm saying. If CAMRA sanctioned cask breathers it would make cask beer more readily available and less chance of a **** pint. The customer would probably not know the pub is using a cask breather.

 

[cab01942]

Some interesting observations here. I would add the following:
in the English language dictionaries describe the words as synonyms so cask and keg are interchangeable; keg usually makes reference to capacity (like hogshead etcetera) rather than material of manufacture. Words get corrupted over time and their use and meaning changed in common language: which becomes acceptable even though (arguably) wrong. Certainly all will have heard the historical term powder keg: which was made from wood thereby circumventing an argument I heard put forward decades ago that kegs were made from metal.

And as someone has already suggested, does it really matter if what you draw from it is pleasing to the senses? CAMERA is a misnomer by definition as it extols the wonders of real beer and should be CAMERB. But ale and beer have become interchangeable over time and have come to mean the same thing. I still don't know what a 'real ale' is. Many of those endorsed by the organisation are (to my taste buds) awful heavy, claggy, over-hopped, too strongly odorous offerings that I find quite objectionable, whilst others I find delightful: just as I find many of the industrially produced brews - good and bad!