Something called 'table beer' is becoming very popular

So, @patto1ro has been silent, but I decided to be less lazy and see if he ever mentioned Table Beer in his blog - of course he has! The links below include descriptions, history, recipes, and statistics of table beers from the English perspective. He makes no mention of Belgian or German table beers as far as I could tell.

http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2013/05/barclay-perkins-table-beer-1804-1869.html
http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2010/11/lets-brew-wednesday-1804-barclay.html
http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2017/02/1909-maclay-table-beer-28.html

And although not necessarily related to defining what a Table Beer is, here's an amusing story of a 1902 court case where a retailer was found guilty of stealing Bass beer by switching it's label with a table beer... http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2013/11/a-novel-way-of-stealing-bass.html

 

Yeah, it was a few years ago that Notch put out Tafelbier. 8°P, 2.8% I recall it being very saison-like.

 

To me the most misleading statement is the "becoming very popular" part. These folks are running out of things to print, it seems. No "table beer" in these parts unless a brewery one off I missed. Certainly folks are probably looking to call things something "new" when running out of styles that would "appear" unique. Seems the name is more "new" than the beer.

I did find this once in France coming in at a whopping 1.9%--saison like and magic on a 95+ degree summer day. I considered it liquid recycling.

Good discussion.

 

Allagash table beer was excellent and in no way resembles seltzer. Dark City Projet (table beer) was more so like seltzer as an example but letting it sit and warm helped this by kiling some carbonation

 

Yup, that's the one I was thinking of, I just wasn't sure if it was actual table beer or not.

But apparently "Tafelbier" means "table beer" in Dutch.

 

Almost sounds like a Belgian Singel. Or?

 

Not really. The ABV range is 0.4 - 2.8% so much lower than a Single.

Cheers!

 

But the Brewer's Association style description doesn't state an ABV range... which is the main reason I said earlier the description is vague. Without an ABV range the description overlaps with so many other Belgian/French beer styles that it's not much practical use.

 

"Gold to black." What a narrow definition.

 

I don't know exactly what it is but I know it when I drink it.

 

The range I mentioned above (0.4 - 2.8% ABV) is from the Brewers Association definition for a Belgian-Style Table Beer.

Cheers!

P.S. My first post quoting the BA's Belgian-Style Table Beer was only the verbiage (descriptive) part of the definition. I would encourage you to view the entire definition which itemizes various values.

 

Belgian brewers like to be creative and make beer the way that suits their zeitgesit. To use a drawing analogy they like to color outside the lines.

A healthy brewing attitude IMO.

Cheers!

@Ranbot

 

4.8% abv does not a table beer make. The quaffer of that still has the risk of getting a bit too much shine on them if they have a couple.

 

I wasn't really sure what I had to contribute to this debate. Most of the points I'd make had been made by others.

Table Beer was a tax category in England between about 1700 and 1830. Initially as an intermediate category between Strong Beer and Small Beer, until the latter category was dropped around 1800. In 1802, a barrel that cost more tha 16 shillings was considered strong, anything under table. The tax on strong was 10 shillings a barrel, table 2 shillings.

My guess is that one of the main reasons they abolished this system in 1830 was that it was easy to fiddle. If you bought one barrel of really Strong Beer and mixed it with Table Beer you'd have two barrels of beer that would pass for Strong, but you'd have paid 12 shillings tax rather than 20. That's why mixing Strong and Table Beer was agianst the law. But not very easy to police. By shifting the tax to malt, the possibility of this fiddle was eliminated.

After 1830, Table Beer wasn't very common in England. I've only come across a few examples in brewing records. While in Scotland they still pop up until WW I.

 

Ron, is it fair to say that the term of Table Beer was irrelevant in Great Britain during your lifetime? By "irrelevant" I mean that you could not buy a British beer that was labeled as being a Table Beer?

Cheers!

 

Interestingly, Anchor has brewed a Small beer (3.3%) which is described as:

A unique brew reminiscent of an English bitter, with a light amber color and lots of hop character, Anchor Small® Beer is certainly not small on flavor.

Made from the second runnings of our Old Foghorn® mash, Anchor Small® revives the ancient brewing tradition of creating two distinct craft beers from one mash – a sweeter, stronger and more expensive barleywine made for sipping, and a more plentiful drinking beer. We sprinkle warm water over the Old Foghorn mash after the first “wort” has run off, creating a second, lighter brew. Technically, both beers are "ales" because they are made with top-fermenting yeast. Like its forebears, the result is an easy-drinking “session” beer.

For hundreds of years, the term "small beer" was used in English to define the lighter, less expensive counterpart to barleywine. In our revival of this ancient tradition, Anchor Small® Beer is resourcefulness at its best – beer begets beer.

 

Allagash's Hoppy Table Beer was excellent, I reviewed it as a 4.18.

 

It was dead well before my time, old as I am. With the drop in beer strength in WW I, lots of standard beer had dropped down to Table Beer levels. After the war, the weakest Milds had an OG of 1027º (about 2.7% ABV). There was no point brewing a weaker beer, as you would have paid the same tax as on a 1027º beer. Where was the space for Table Beer?

 

It seems to me that in large measure this is why when folks discuss Table Beer that British brewed versions do not commonly come to mind. Belgian Table Beer (tafelbier, bière de table) is a totally different aspect since these beers are more contemporary.

Cheers!

 

Just to be clear when I said "...I decided to be less lazy..." above, I was referring to myself being lazy, not you. You already did the hard research and made it public; you are not obligated to spoon feed it to us.

And following up on @JackHorzempa's last comment and your description of the English table beer term dying out long ago... if you heard a contemporary beer described as a "table beer" would you assume it's a Belgian style [tafelbier, or bière de table]? Not assume anything until given more information or taste it yourself? Something else?

Thanks in advance.