A Short Beer by Karen McBurnie

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A Brief Look At The Short Beer An Appreciation We remember a time not so long ago when a draft was simply a glass of beer. A small glass was commonly known as a â&#x20AC;&#x153;short beer,â&#x20AC;? though it has had many other affectionate regional names. Why make a big deal about such a tiny thing?

Sociability of a Short Beer Let’s go for a quick one. Say you meet a pal in the street and—no worries—it’s not going to hijack your day to step inside and catch up over a short beer. It’s also a perfect lunchtime portion, and there’s no need for a nap when you get back to the ofﬁce. Have as Much as You Like There’s no big commitment with a short beer. You can have one, or half a dozen, adjusting your intake to the circumstances as you go. Draftiness A short beer is ﬁrst and foremost a thirst quencher. Before the microbrew boom, tap beer was most often a cheapie pilsner or lager, something you certainly wanted to quaff as cold as possible. The Pitcher Yes, you often get small glasses with a pitcher, and that’s nice. We like that when we go bowling. But in a barroom a pitcher makes you look like a college kid. Then, there will inevitably be some competition to put it away faster than your tablemates so you won’t feel gypped. This is bush league stuff.

And we hasten to add that a ordering a pitcher solo is out unless you’re really into being pathetic in public. The Pint It seems a strange bit of Anglophilia for our great Republic of nativist No-Nothings that it is now nearly impossible to order a beer in America without asking for “a pint.” Not that you’re going to get a full pint, but that’s what we call ‘em these days. What have we become, a bunch of tweedy, crumpet-munching Limeys? The British love their beer, and they like a highly regimented society, too. The upshot at the junction of these is the almighty Imperial pint. By UK law beer must be served in a regulation portion glass as deﬁned by the Weights and Measures Act of 1824. That means a pint or half pint, although in 2011 a new two thirds pint “schooner” was introduced, but from all accounts it has been largely shunned. In the U.S. we don’t have comparable restrictions for drink sizes in bars, yet by some unexplainable mechanism, the so-called pint has become the customary way to dole out the suds. Unfortunately, without a legal standard there is no way of knowing how much a pint glass at your

local holds. It could be anything from 12 to 20 ounches. The adoption of the “pint” synched well with the new crop of drinking establishments. Lately every new or remodeled bar is born an identikit Irish pub, a chain-store mall regulation sports bar, or a hybrid thereof. The no-nonsense regular old neighborhood tavern isn’t seen as viable because it is not focused exclusively on a young crowd. New York City’s old-man bars have been going the way of the dinosaurs, and the short beer is dying out with them.

When Did We Go Pint Peculiar? Long ago, in the 1980s even, before the craft beer explosion (which took its sweet time taking hold in NYC and left a graveyard of failed brewpubs) if you had a taste for excellent beer you’d surely be an imported beer aﬁcionado. For tap beer, that would usually mean visiting a German or British themed restaurant. German bars were few, and not as fashionable as Ye Olde Pub. One thing led to another, regular bars began having Guinness or Bass available on draft and

Egghead Corner: Small Beer vs. Short Beer Something to keep in mind: a short beer isn’t necessarily a small beer. Small beer refers to a weak, or low alcohol, brew. It was a favorite beverage in medieval times, not surprising since potable water was a rarity and beer and wine were the safer tipples, touted as aiding digestion and chock full of wholesome nutrition. You must admit it beats drinking germy water and catching cholera. Small beer remained popular into Colonial times and was often served to children. In his Autobiography, distinguished Founding Father Benjamin Franklin recommends it for breakfast. As a ﬁgure of speech, small beer came to mean something trivial or of little importance. Plainly this derives from the weakness of the drink. Small beer can also be deﬁned as a brew made from the “second runnings” of a strong beer mash. This is distinct from brewing a low alcohol beer in that this small beer can be nearly as strong as a regular beer. Anchor Brewing Co. makes a small beer (to be technical, a small ale) from the second runnings of the mash used for their superb barleywine, Old Foghorn. They call the result Anchor Small Beer, and you can read about it here.

next thing you know, bang zoom, the pint glass was everywhere. Well, not the British pint glass, but the first available option, the standard mixing glass. The problem with that is it’s thick and heavy, unpleasant in the hand, and cold, wet and very relaxed fingers can easily let the smooth sided glass slip to the floor. Also, it is a fairly butt ugly piece of glassware. Nowadays, if a bar doesn’t have a dozen taps we feel cheated. Ironically, while we are burdened with more choice, conformity reigns in glass size. In many countries there are two, three or more glass sizes, but here we are stuck without options. Locked into ordering a pint means you won’t be able to try all those exotic varieties in a single visit. Yes, in some fancy places they will sell you a “flight” of tiny samples, but that is simply too precious for everyday drinking. Does This Beer Look Good On Me? OK, we decided against naming this section Does This Beer Make Me Look Fem? Another import from the British Isles is the assumption that a big glass is butch. In fact, the French House bar in Soho serves its beer only in half pint glasses, chiefly to encourage patrons to order wine instead of beer, but also because pints are not served in France.

Perhaps more importantly, it wards off the lager louts — the lads who cannot be seen holding what they consider a girls’ glass. A Maven Speaks Out On the World Wide Web he is the obsessive proprietor of Uni Watch and the keeper of the Permanent Record; some know him as the genial host of Show and Tell; but did you know that our friend Paul Lukas is also the world’s leading exponent of the short beer? He is a fan to such a degree that “gimme a draft, in whatever glass you have that’s smallest” is always the order of the day in an unfamiliar tavern. Paul enjoys the sociability a small pour encourages. With frequent reﬁlls comes more opportunity to gab with the bartender, one of the primary pleasures of a saloon. And the price of a short beer isn’t much of an investment if you deem the joint unworthy and ﬁnd you want to make a quick exit: “The other day a guy was texting while he served me!” Reason enough to abort, and needless to say, Paul won’t be back there. The low price gives you a chance to be a big shot on a small, very affordable scale because buying a round is a cheap thrill when it’s a buck a draft. A ten spot or a twenty gradually fragmenting into an odd jumble of bills and coin over the course of an afternoon is for Paul another

A.K.A.: Regional Names and Nicknames A small draft might be a “pony” or a “middy” in Australia depending where you are. Noted photographer, and transplanted Sydney native, Scott Roper tells us what kind of Aussie would ask for such a tiny beer: “Generally only someone who is in a hurry or someone who is trying to cut back, or someone who is broke will order one, or a Sheila. Mind you kind of defeats the purpose if you, over the course of the night, order 20 of them.” Sections of the Midwest with a heavy German heritage may serve you a “schnitt” of beer or a “snit,” a 3-oz beer back to a shot or, for some reason, a Bloody Mary. “Un demi pression” is your glass of draft in France and a short beer in Spain is “una caña.” No ramble about short beers is complete without mentioning bottled beverages. Instead of the typical twelve ounces, if you can find them, some breweries still make a mini size. A seven ounce bottle can be called a “little nip” or even a “pork chop” in Pennsylvania. Brewers currently offering ponies include Little Kings Cream Ale, Bud, Miller, Rolling Rock, and Coronitas from Corona. Ponies are mass-market industrial beers because a second size bottle would be an expensive complication for a small operation. A case of little bottles is a great choice for a summer barbeque. They cool quickly on ice, and go down so fast there is no chance your beer will go warm on you. It pains the G“A”F staff to report this news item, but web surf-research has unearthed something seriously creepy associated with the pony bottle: the Corona-Rita, a mockery of a Margarita containing a Coronita rudely upended into the glass, looking everything like a car crash of a drink. It appears on the menu at Chili’s, but our dedication to scientific study doesn’t extend to field trips to chain restaurants, so this is second-hand. The pictures online were depressing enough for us. If the masterminds at Chili’s don’t have Sandra Lee hawking this one they’re missing out completely, because this thing is a tablescape and a cocktail all in one.

important pleasure of saloon culture. I know just what he means; the slow, steady transformation of paper into silver has some of the fascination of watching an ant colony steadily breaking down a dropped cookie. He also enjoys watching the rhythm of serving a rail full of customers; by the time your barkeep makes it all the way down the line it is time to consider another round. There are other advantages to a glass of beer. Pacing yourself is naturally easier. You will see this is the technique of experienced barﬂies. Any fool can close a bar, but it takes stamina and a thorough knowledge of your limitations to hang with the all-day crowd.

There Are Aesthetics to Consider An eight ounce pony glass, like this issue’s cover illustration, is just plain handsome. A heavy bottom, sides curving up to the tulip-ﬂare top; for a utilitarian piece of barware it is surprisingly graceful. There are plenty of other attractive beer vessels; goblets, tankards, thistle and tulip glasses. The Belgians are the kings of variety with a unique glass for nearly every brewery. The UK “No-nik” pint* with characteristic bulge a few inches from the rim is an elegantly modern design, perhaps underappreciated because it is so ubiquitous. The No-nik’s ugly stepsister is the straight sided conical glass you get most places in our benighted country when you ask for a pint, except it is just a plain

* What to Know About the No-nik The No-nik (or possibly Nonic) pint is in fact a fairly modern addition to a long line of British beer vessels, gaining popularity through the years over a straight-walled glass, a dimpled mug, and a 10-sided mug. The No-nik doesn’t even seem to be a British invention; it is an oversized version of the brand’s water glass that has been around for about a century. Patented in 1914, it soon became the archetypal hotel water glass. Short and squat, the bumper ridge facilitates stacking while protecting the rim from chipping, hence the name “no nick.” Now you know.

mixing glass, nothing sexy foreign after all. For my money a small glass of beer just looks pretty, especially paired with a shot of something strong. As it is with pin-up models and Martini recipes, here is a case where proper proportions are crucial. Your boilermaker of choice may be rye, brandy, or blast of whiskey blended in Canada or the States, but whatever you dish up, a short beer looks better next to a shot glass than a great hulking pint of suds. Chasing a jigger of spirits with a pint is a race that will never come out even. How Can I Get a Short Beer? So you say you want a short beer. How do you order it? This can still be tricky since terminology is not universal. Type of saloon, age of the bartender, and most importantly geography, are factors. The most perfect place to enjoy your short beer is in a corner tavern or neighborhood bar, the type of places where “gimme a draft” is heard. If they only carry bottles, no go. And we don’t need to tell you that this does not apply to high-class joints. There you’ll probably be ordering by brand, and they’ll certainly be serving you a fancy glass that’s smaller volume anyhow. Order up a short beer, or ask for a glass or

a mug, or if you must, go along with the accepted vogue and order a half pint. Do not feel that you will be perceived a cheapskate, or a hobo. But do not be surprise if you are looked at quizzically, are told that they do not have different sizes, or, as happens often, they don’t listen and put that big mixing glass of beer in front of you.

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