Looking Back To Innovate: Elveden Ales

I met Nick Stafford at a beer launch last week and, to my surprise, he said he felt small brewers needed to be more innovative. Nick runs Hambleton Ales in Yorkshire and is a former chairman of SIBA, the Society of Independent Brewers, which looks after the interests of micros and small regional brewers.

I told him that Britain's small craft brewers had been wonderful innovators, revitalising the entire industry with their verve and determination. Pale summer beers, for example, were developed by micros. They've been brilliantly successful and now command an important sector of the beer market.

The fact that we can now enjoy porters, stouts and India Pale Ales based on 19th century recipes is the result of craft brewers dipping in to old brewers' books to restore these lost and historic styles. Nick himself won the first ever Camra Champion Winter Beer of Britain award with his Nightmare porter.

The brewing minnows have fostered organic beers, too. It's true that Caledonian, a sizeable Scottish regional, was the first on the organic scene with Golden Promise, but most of the other beers made without agricultural chemicals come from SIBA members.

Britain has a rich brewing past. It would be tragic if the wide portfolio of beers made over the centuries in these islands were lost under a tidal wave of bland international lagers.

The fact that we still produce - despite the best efforts of the global brewers - large amounts of ale is the result of that small strip of sea called the English Channel that divides us from mainland Europe. While Europe was switching to pale lagers in the middle of the 19th century, the British continued doggedly to produce beers my warm fermentation. In fact, it was the first pale ales from Burton-on-Trent that inspired German and Czech brewers to switch from dark lagers to the pale variety.

I suspect there are still old beer styles, hidden away in brewers' books in dusty cupboards, of which we know little or nothing. One came to light just a couple of weeks ago when I was given a bottle of Harwich Charter Ale, brewed to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the Essex town's royal charter.

The beer was brewed by the tiniest of micros, Elveden Ales near Thetford in Norfolk. With the help of the Brewery History Society, Frances Moore (right) based her beer on an Arctic Ale, created by the great Burton brewer Samuel Allsopp in 1852. picture courtesy of Harwich.net Allsopp, one of the first brewers of India Pale Ale for export to the colonies, was asked to produce a beer for a different kind of sea trip. Sir Edward Belcher led an arctic expedition in 1852, which sailed from Harwich. Belcher reported that Allsopp's Arctic Ale proved to be "a valuable antiscorbutic", which meant it helped fight off scurvy, the bane of all sea voyages in those days. He added that the beer was "a great blessing to us, particularly for our sick" and that it refused to freeze until the temperature dropped to 12 degrees F or -11C.

The beer was brewed a second time for the 1875 arctic expedition under Sir George Nares, which set out for the North Pole and got to within 400 miles of the target before scurvy forced the men to retreat. The expedition's senior medical office wrote to Allsopp's that the beer "kept splendidly in the arctic region andwas highly appreciated by the men".

Alfred Barnard, the celebrated brewery writer of the Victorian era, tasted some of the 1875 vintage when he visited Allsopp's in 1889. He described it as "a nice brown colour and of a vinous, and at the same time, nutty flavour, and as sound as on the day it was brewed." The beer had a gravity of 1130 degrees with an alcohol content of around 11.25%.

The Elveden Ales version is a slightly more modest 10%, but that should keep the arctic winds at bay. Frustratingly, I can't tell you about the recipe or whether the beer is available to buy because Elveden has its answer machine on and hasn't responded to my calls. I shall report back and in the meantime congratulate all concerned in recreating yet another great British beer.

Elveden Ales The Coutryard Elveden Estate Elveden Thetford IP24 3TA