Beer historian Martyn Cornell joins me this week to discuss the history of English Mild Ale which was the dominant UK beer style for nearly 80 years.
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Topics in This Week’s Episode (48:22)
- This week I welcome first time guest Martyn Cornell. Martyn has been writing about the history of beer for more than 20 years and is a multiple trophy winner of both the North American Guild of Beer Writers and British Guild of Beer Writers.
- Martyn is the author of the book Amber, Gold & Black: The History of Britain’s Great Beers (Amazon affiliate link).
- We discuss the brief history of Porter which preceded Mild as the most popular beer style in the 18th and first half of the 19th century.
- Martyn explains the reign of British mild which became popular in the 1880’s and remained the top beer until the 1960’s – and now is almost extinct.
- He discusses the beer itself and how it was brewed throughout the period. The style did change substantially becoming weaker particularly after WWI due to taxes and shortages of ingredients.
- We talk about the ingredients and techniques used to brew the beer and why it was served quickly.
- Martyn provides a few tips for those looking to brew a British mild.
- He explains what ultimately replaced Milds as well as provides his closing thoughts.
Sponsors
- Thank you to our sponsor Craft Beer and Brewing Magazine for sponsoring this episode. I encourage you to subscribe to their great magazine!
- And also Anvil Brewing Equipment. Anvil is a new line of kettles, burners and accessories from John Blichmann at Blichmann Engineering. They make top quality brewing equipment built to last a lifetime.
- Also check out BeerSmith, BeerSmith Mobile software and the new DVDs John Palmer and I filmed – How to Brew with Malt Extract and How to Brew All Grain are available now. You can subscribe to the BeerSmith newsletter for free to get some great articles on home brewing.
Thanks to Martyn Cornell for appearing on the show and also to you for listening!
iTunes Announcements: I launched a new video channel for the BeerSmith podcast on iTunes, so subscribe now! At the moment it will only feature the new widescreen episodes (#75 and up). Older episodes are available on my revamped Youtube channel. Also all of my audio episodes are on iTunes now – so grab the older episodes if you missed any.
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