Vikings to Stella Artois — a short history of festive beers

BrewDog lose B Corp certification. The 25 most important IPAs in America right now. Beer made with olive oil. Foster's "gouging" ABV drop. Three great summer recommendations. Get a Hoppiness hat.

Hello Beer Lovers,

Since we’re now officially in the countdown to Christmas Friday Night Beers is getting in the fa-la-la-la mode and having a look at what’s on offer in terms of festive season beers.

In doing some research on holiday season beers, I learned they started with Vikings who made winter beers during “Jul” — also known as “Yule” — as a way of honouring the gods during the winter solstice. When Christianity, and Christmas, arrived a millennium ago, the tradition continued.

Those Scandinavians are credited with exporting their yuletide festivity to England, in the form of Wassail — the medieval custom involving the consumption of a hot ale. The word is derived from the Old Norse “ves heill” and Old English "wes hal” — meaning “be of good health” or “be of good fortune”.

Scandinavian migrants later took their dark and malty Christmas beers to the United States in the 18th century.

Strangely, as I researched this, I also learned that Stella Artois, the famous Belgian lager, was first created as Christmas beer in 1926. Which when you think of it, with the star, it is appropriate. But it was also a lager variation on what was then a recently-established Belgian practice of drinking English-style Scotch Ales at Christmas that had started around the turn of the 20th century.

(As an aside, it's interesting how history gets rewritten by marketers —  in 1988 when Brouwerij Artois became a founding member in the merger creating Interbrew — later AB InBev — the 1926 bottle label inspired the brand redesign, which also incorporated the horn symbol and the 1366 date of the original Den Hoorn brewery. Basically, it allows AB InBev to infer the star has been around 1366!)

In more modern terms, San Francisco’s Anchor Brewing released Our Special Ale for Christmas in 1975, a dark spiced ale that changed from year to year and gave impetus to American versions of winter holiday ales.

So with all that in mind, I’ve found 10 Kiwi festive beers available now (or soon to be) for your Christmas wish-list.

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Brewdog Loses B Corp Status

It seems the BrewClown… whoops, I mean BrewDog, can’t stay out of the news. Today I woke to learn that they’d been stripped of their B Corp status — something founder James Watt once boasted about, saying they been recognised for trying “to build a better world”.

The Guardian reported BrewDog lost its B Corp status less than two years after joining the scheme, which offers certification of a company’s ethical commitment to the environment, community and staff.

BrewDog has been called hypocritical for running a World Cup ad campaign highlighting Qatar’s poor human rights record despite being criticised for the treatment of its own workers.

BrewDog also apologised last year after current and former employees signed an open letter alleging a “culture of fear” in which workers were bullied and “treated like objects”.

BrewDog, in an internal memo, spun it differently — saying they had decided to “step aside from our B Corp certification for the time being” because the certifier had “requested additional measures”.

The summation by one Twitter poster was succinct: “You can’t fire me, I quit!”

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Beer of the week No 1

I popped into Urbanaut in Kingsland the other day for a quick pint before heading into town to meet friends for dinner. “We’re just staying for one,” my wife said. Oh how I wish I hadn’t agreed to that, because the Miami Brut Lager I ordered was so damn delicious I just had to have another one. But in the interests of domestic harmony, I suppressed the burning desire to go back to the bar. This beer is now officially low carb and while I’m not here for low carb specifically, it makes this hoppy lager very dry and quenching and oh-so-drinkable. And watch out for Urbanaut’s soon-to-be-released mixed six-pack of low carb beers. It’ll be a summer mainstay here I reckon.

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Get your Hoppiness hat

OK, so this is a shameless plug, but I also reckon it’s a pretty cool hat. It’s understated and very much IYKYK. There’s only 100, 50 in blue / charcoal and 50 in black / charcoal so if you’d like one, or know someone for whom it would be a perfect gift, you can get them for $38, plus shipping. If you get two, shipping is on me.

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