Small beer (also known as small ale or table beer) is a
lager or
ale that contains a lower amount of
alcohol by volume than most others, usually between 0.5% and 2.8%.[1][2] Sometimes unfiltered and porridge-like, it was a favoured drink in Medieval
Europe and colonial
North America compared with more expensive beer containing higher levels of
alcohol.[3] Small beer was also produced in households for consumption by children and by servants.
History
At mealtimes in the
Middle Ages, persons of all ages drank small beer, particularly while eating a meal at the table. It is hard to establish the associated alcoholic content, since systematic records of brewing practice do not exist much before the
Georgian era.
It was common for workers who engaged in laborious tasks to drink more than ten
imperialpints (5.7 litres) of small beer a day to quench their thirst. Small beer was also consumed for its nutrition content. It might contain traces of wheat or bread suspended within it.
In 17th century England, it was an
excise class which was determined by its wholesale price. Between the years 1782 and 1802, table beer was said to define that which cost between six and eleven
shillings per barrel and the tax on this class was around three shillings. Cheaper beer was considered small beer while the more expensive brands were classed as strong (big) beer. The differences between small beer and table beer were removed in 1802 because there was much fraudulent mixing of the types.
Small beer was socially acceptable in 18th-century England because of its lower alcohol content, allowing people to drink several glasses without becoming
drunk.
William Hogarth's portrait Beer Street (1751) shows a group of happy workers going about their business after drinking table beer.[2] It became increasingly popular during the 19th century, displacing
malt liquor as the drink of choice for families and servants.[4]
In his A Plan for the Conduct of Female Education, in Boarding Schools published 1797, writer
Erasmus Darwin agreed that "For the drink of the more robust children water is preferable, and for the weaker ones, small beer ...".[5]Ruthin School's charter, signed by
Elizabeth I, stipulates that small beer should be provided to all scholars, and larger educational establishments like
Eton,
Winchester, and
Oxford University even ran their own breweries.[6]
To a large extent, the role of small beer as an everyday drink was gradually overtaken in the British Isles by tea, as that became cheaper from the later 18th century.[citation needed]
Contemporary usage
Small beer and small ale can also refer to beers made from the second runnings from the stronger beer (e.g.,
Scotch ale). Such beers can be as strong as a
mild ale, but it depends on the strength of the original mash. This was an economic measure in household brewing in England until the 18th century, and still produced by some
homebrewers.[7] it is now only produced commercially in small quantities in Britain, and is not widely available in pubs or shops.
In
Belgium, small or table beer is known as bière de table or tafelbier and their many varieties are still brewed. Breweries that perpetuated in this type included De Es of
Schalkhoven and Gigi of
Gérouville in the
Province of Luxembourg.[8] In the US, a Vienna lager was a popular table beer before
prohibition.[9] Small beers are also produced in Germany and Switzerland albeit using local brewing methods.
In Sweden beer with an alcohol content of 2.25 per cent by volume, or less, sold as lättöl ("light beer"), is legally classified as a soft drink (lättdryck), exempt from alcohol tax and age restrictions, made by virtually all breweries, sold in all grocery stores and commonly served in company lunch canteens.[10]
When David Balfour first meets his uncle Ebenezer in
Robert Louis Stevenson's novel Kidnapped, Ebenezer has laid a table with his own supper, "with a bowl of porridge, a horn spoon, and a cup of small beer". The small beer, horn spoon, and the porridge, indicates Ebenezer Balfour's miserliness, since he could afford much better food and drink, but it may also be meant to convey the "trifle" meaning as an indication of Ebenezer's weak, petty character.
In the song "There Lived a King" in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera The Gondoliers, small beer is used as a metaphor for something that is common or is of little value.[11]
Adam Smith uses small beer in a few examples in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. These include a comparison of the value of small beer and the value of bread,[13] and a longer description of why cheap alcohol does not result in greater drunkenness.[14]
William Cobbett in his work "A History of the Protestant Reformation" refers to a 12th-century Catholic place of hospitality which fed 100 men a day – "Each had a loaf of bread, three quarts of small beer, and 'two messes,' for his dinner; and they were allowed to carry home that which they did not consume upon the spot." (Pg. 90, TAN Books, 1988)
^Tim Webb (2011), "Table beer", The Oxford Companion to Beer, Oxford University Press, p. 783,
ISBN978-0-199-91210-0
^Alicia Underlee Nelson (2017). North Dakota Beer: A Heady History. Arcadia Publishing. p. 38.
ISBN978-1-625-85919-8.
^Swedish law (Alkohollagen 2010:1622). "Beverages that are alcohol free or have an alcohol content of at most 2.25 per cent by volume are soft drinks". Retrieved 10 January 2020.
^Wilson, William G. (1939). Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How Many Thousands of Men and Women Have Recovered from Alcoholism (4th ed.). New York City: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services Inc. p. 1.
ISBN978-1893007178.