The Shandy

A Mixed up History

The Lamb and Flag Glynneath

Well no tasting this time around. I want instead to set up for a few tastings I will be doing after this post. Shandies. For the uninitiated a Shandy is a beer mixed with a non-alcoholic drink to reduce the alcohol content, often served to children. I first got a taste of a shandy when I was spending the summer in Wales with my cousins. I was in Glynneath West Glam. and the regular family outing for dinner was always at the pub. Attitudes towards drinking are very different in Wales and England. The afternoon pint is a ritual, and Pubs often are community gathering places where families come to eat and catch up on gossip. I was there at the Lamb and Flag  with my aunt and my cousin. I think we had been shopping and were on our way home. The picture on the left shows the patio where we were sitting. My cousin came out with a pint for himself a gin for my Aunt and a Shandy for me. It was in a pint glass cold but no ice. I imagine it would have been made with a Mild Ale, probably 3.5% ABV or there abouts, and bottled carbonated lemonade (bringing the alcohol content down to 1.5 or 1.75% ABV). It was really good. I can still remember the way it tasted, bready and lemony, like a dessert. The next time I can across a shandy was the first commercial issue of one that I remember. Labatt's Twist Shandy. It was introduced in 1985 and had a fairly long run (Until the mid ninties?). There is so little information on it on the net so I cannot see when it was discontinued. It was a very low alcohol, 2.3% I believe, so it was higher than the shandy I had in Wales. It was quite good for a commercially made product and my family kept some in the fridge as we renovated the old 

Labatt Twist Shandy (1985- 199?)

farmhouse. 


So recently a very large beer corporation decided to 
release a very questionable product. When I first saw it I honestly thought it was a joke, as it came out just before April Fool's Day. But, it was an actual product and one they have spent millions on marketing. I was eventually given one by a beer supplier at the restaurant and I took it home, with plans to rip into it and generally deride it online. However, I started to research, as I always do, before I talk about a beer. What I discovered was That MY definition of "Shandy" was too small, it was actually a world wide phenomenon, and the product I was going to deride, didn't seem so out of place anymore. I had actually posted about a "Shandy" without giving it a lot of thought. See Beer # 63 Radlermass brewed by Brick out of Kitchener/Waterloo, and Formosa. So for my own sake I thought it was time to educate myself, so when I do post about this beer, I can take a more scientific slant, instead of the beery-snobby slant, I was going to take.

History

The History of the shandy is as mixed up and muddled up as much as the drink itself. Pinpointing an origin seems as impossible as defining the drink. As far back as humans have made alcohol, they have put stuff in it. Herbs to make it taste better and last longer, honey and fruit to sweeten it, water to weaken it so it could be drunk throughout the day. The Greeks were a good example of this. They only drank full strength wine at Breakfast (talk about getting the day started with a bang!) They would then drink wine through out the day cut with water. How much water depended on the circumstances and custom. In fact the term "Symposium" come from a Greek dinner party where a group of men would gather eat first in silence and then drink voluminous amounts of wine and discuss philosophy, religion, science, politics, while getting increasingly more intoxicated. The Symposium Master would dictate when everyone would drink, how much, and how much water to put in the glass. How civilised! 

S. Cerevisiae Beer Yeast

When one looks back on the history of civilisation, one finds that the advance of man is tied directly to alcohol. If you ask any anthropologist why this is, the answer will be simple: People who drank water died; people that drank alcohol lived. In the unsanitary times of the past water was almost always teeming with pathogens as yet unknown to our lesser advanced relatives. In fact, it was noted in the cholera epidemics of the 1600's in London. That anyone who worked in the breweries, did not get sick. Cholera is a water borne pathogen, and those in the breweries drank beer as it was freely available. It wasn't until Louis Pasteur discovered bacteria in the 1800's that this began to make sense to people. As a side note, Louis Pasteur work on microbiology is grounded in his study of fermentation. In fact the yeast sample that Carlsberg Brewing company preserves in Denmark and is used in all of it's lagers still bears Pasteur's name: Saccharomyces pastorianus. 

So, how does this bring us back to shandies? For saftey's sake people have had to drink alcohol mixed with water to prevent disease. So, did it always have to be water? No. So obviously people had, over time, come to mix different things with their beer to make their experience more enjoyable.

A World of Difference

The variations of shandies would take more than one blog to deal with, in fact I could probably run a sister blog to this one and not run out of material for quite some time. However I am going to list a few of the more interesting shandy variations here before I log off to go sample some.

Regionality is the key to shandy variation. In the U.K. The two most prevalent Shandies are the Ale and Lemonade variety, and lager and Cider. The later is called a snakebite or if it is Guinness and cider it is called a Balck and Tan, a priest collar, or black velvet (also called a poor man's black velvet as there is a cocktail of the same name that contains Guinness and Champagne). The former variety is also called a Shandygaff, although this name is not as common anymore. It also can be made with ginger ale or ginger beer (N.B. try mixing a good lager of your choice with Beer # 72 Crabbie's Ginger Beer. you're welcome).

In North America, especially Canada, Although we have most of the U.K. versions here,we also have a variety of shandies called "drop shots." Dr. Pepper is the most recognizable  A mixture of beer and Cola that half fills a pint glass, and then a shot of amaretto dropped in just before the entire mixture is drank (best if done in one drink). As well there is the Irish Car Bomb: a shot of Irish Liqueur dropped into a half pint of Guinness. The is also a Black Shandy which is also common in Australia which is Guinness and lemonade. This can also be called a Portagaff in Australia. Lager and lime is another one you will hear frequently, which is a pint of lager with a shot of Rose's Lime cordial in it. Another frequent one is a Red Eye, which is beer and varying amounts of Clamato or tomato juice.


Beer mixed with Fanta Orange Soda is called: Quianti in Argentina, Fan-schop in Chile, or if it is plain orange juice it is called a Brass Monkey in the US.


Cola and Beer, other than the Dr. Pepper is called: a Mazout in Belguim, Rafejo in Columbia, or Shandygaff in Japan (can also refer to beer and gingerale in Japan).


Beer and 7-up is call a Sneeuwwijte (Snow White) in The Netherlands.


Lastly Radlermass from Germany, Bici, Bicicletta, or Ciclista in Italy or Panache in France all refer to beer mixed with a sparkling lemonade. Radler and Ciclista both give reference to the fact that it is a cyclist's drink.

Commercial Production

A number of companies have, over the years, produced a commercially available product, as opposed to it being available in bars only. Lately we have seen this trend again in North America. Bud Light Lime burst onto the scene a few years back, another variation of the shandy. Now almost every major brand has tried out some sort of shandy like beverage. Even craft brewers are stretching their pallets and producing more flavoured beers and concoctions. Next I am going to try a few of the beers I believe fall under the category of a Shandy (whether strictly or liberally up to you to decide). I will also include the beer I have been hesitant to even try...




Cheers
CJT