New York City is rife with casks. A sizable percentage of bars that have their very own Angram engines owe it to a friend of mine here (he’s English) who pushed very, very hard for cask in the States. They have existed here since the early 1990s at least.
While early on a lot of American brewers simply filled a pin or firkin with beer out of the regular fermenters and pretended that was magically cask ale, there are now enough brewers with sense who do it right. A wide variety of actual cask-conditioned beers are available in dozens of craft bars (and not-so-craft bars) around the city, often brewed locally or regionally, and kept at cellar temps. Of course the breweries sometimes do things like dry-hop in the cask, or add citrus to the cask to make a different beer (typically on an IPA base).
A few places are in with the right distributor people to get English casks sent over in good condition, which is always a delight.
are you looking for real ale, or ale served with a beer pump? because the two are separate things. ale can be conditioned (carbonated,) nitrogen dispensed, or hand pulled (pumped.) hand pulled doesn’t make an ale “better.”
“Real ale” is a specific term used to describe ale fermented in the cask and served from the same cask without use of carbon dioxide (i.e., with a hand pump). It doesn’t imply that other beers are fake or worse.
A quick google says there are a lot. I found one article from 2011 that listed a dozen breweries with at least one hand-pumped ale, but I’m sure that’s way out of date by now. Big Time Brewery advertises one real ale on tap at all times. Machine House is a traditional English brewery with all their beers on the hand pump. I’m sure there are others.
Commercial American lagers are so insipid that they have to be cold enough that they have no flavor. Except for that chocolate-cherry recipe my brother cooked up a while back. He said it was a lager, but it was almost as sturdy as Samuel Smith’s Oatmeal Stout.
To be fair, “real ale” means that now, but the idea of its being a definable thing has been backformed from the name of the Campaign for Real Ale, which formed to rail against the generic, conglomerate-produced beer which was dominating the UK at the time of its inception…so although it’s now a class of beer, the idea of ‘real’ ale does have its origins, as the name suggests, in a value judgement that the alternative isn’t as good.
And to anyone not immersed in the history of UK beer culture, I can imagine that ‘real’ anything implies the existence of a fake, ersatz, sub-standard alternative.
You’re right, and it still might imply a quality judgment in the UK.
In the States, “real ale” is in more recent usage to refer to the English style of making and serving beer, distinct from the typical American craft brewery that ages beer in stainless tanks and serves it cold with CO[sub]2[/sub]. While some people certainly have a preference for one or the other, the term doesn’t imply it’s better or worse than the alternative.
For people in the States not familiar with the term, they might think “real ale” refers to any craft beer, as opposed to the mass-produced corn/rice swill, but the term is more specific than that.
It can sometimes, aye. Not least because - despite their well meaning origins - CAMRA have garnered a somewhat snobbish and judgemental reputation. I know some perfectly reasonable CAMRA members, but a bad reputation is hard to shake…
Interesting. Hadn’t realised the term was used in the US at all.
I’m still trying to get my unofficial slogan for Canadian firm Rogers Communications to take hold. Hint: the slogan is the same as the name. Since I’m not Canadian maybe I’m unaware that they’re just a very popular communications company but I didn’t think that those existed.
as a further aside, I interviewed for a co-op job at their US engineering center (by then they had merged into LucasVarity.) They have a sense of humor about the whole thing; early on when the guy interviewing me asked what I knew about the company, he sneaked in a “Besides ‘Lucas Electrics,’ of course!” before I answered.
My Dad’s entire career history is a succession of automotive jobs. Driver of various deliveries (including engine parts), mechanic, driving instructor, driving examiner, chauffeur, escorting abnormal loads, traffic cop, general jobbing driver for hire. One of my earliest memories is of him and me fixing the brakes on his old Renault - I was about 3. We tinkered with motorbikes. I can be excruciatingly tedious about Land Rovers. I’ve spent more time than is strictly necessary fucking about with my van - including the damn electrics! You know what? I’m getting increasingly ashamed that I missed that Lucas reference…
