Thursday, August 1, 2013

Albany Ale: Submitted for Your Approval

For a while now I've been saying that Albany Ale was a "thing"—a definable product—and not simply beer made in Albany. It may have started that way, but by the mid-19th century, folks had an expectation of what Albany Ale was.

Brian—the third best Albany Ale researcher this side of the Pecos—sent me a few scans I think bolster my theory. Mr Welch came across a series of menus from the Parker House Hotel, in Boston Massachusetts, listing Albany Ale. I've written about the lack of Albany's hometown beer on the menu of Stanwix Hall—one of Albany's fancy-dancy 19th-century hotels—but it appears that Albany Ale hadn't yet lost its charm, ten years earlier, at one of Beantown's wold-class establishments. Brian sent four menus, but two—one from 1865, the other 1875—will serve my purpose for this exercise.

Right: 1865    Left: 1875

While the neat-o factor of seeing Albany Ale listed on a menu in Boston is pretty high, there's actually some pretty significant circumstantial evidence supporting my idea. Looking at the earlier 1865 menu, Albany Ale is listed among London Brown Stout, Bass' Pale India Ale, Muir's Scotch Ale, and Gualt's Porter. Those are all 'things'—with definable characteristics—styles, or at least kinds, of beer. A guest at the Parker House would expect their Pale India Ale to be pale and bitter; their London Brown Stout to be dark and roasty; and their Scotch Ale to be pale and strong. So, doesn't it stand to reason that one would also have a certain set of expectations of Albany Ale?

If you ordered spaghetti and meatballs off the menu of a restaurant, you'd probably expect spaghetti and a red, tomato-based sauce with a side of meatballs, to arrive at your table. What if the next time you ordered that same menu item, it came with a while cream sauce—and next time, with pesto. It may all be wonderfully tasty, but it wouldn't be what you were expecting. It would have been the same for the Albany Ale listed on the Parker House's menu. Something listed as "Albany Ale" isn't going to be a broad range of beer—pale, amber or brown—simply sold on the merits that it's good beer from Albany. That beer—that Albany Ale—was a 'thing'. The good people of Boston knew what they were getting when they sauntered up to the bar at the Parker House and ordered a mug of Albany Ale.

The next menu brings up another scenario. The 1875 menu's Albany Ale is listed as Taylor's Albany Ale–obviously from the über-brewery of John Taylor. There a couple of scenarios as to why this menu lists the brewery name and the earlier 1865 menu doesn't. First, while Albany Ale as a defined 'thing' may have been known, the breweries that made Albany Ale may have not been. The names Guinness and Allsopp may have meant something to a Bostonian in 1865—Amsdell and McKnight may not have. 

What I think, however, is the more likely reason for the addition of Taylor's name on the later menu, is that it's possible that Taylor had become synonymous with Albany Ale. Taylor had dominated the Albany brewing scene throughout the 1850s and 60s, and though the brewery's production numbers had dropped significantly by the mid-1870s, it looks as if the brewery's reputation had followed it to Boston. It's not that other breweries weren't making Albany Ale, it's just that Taylor's name was the one they associated it with.

So, submitted for your approval: Albany Ale was a "thing".

What that thing was, remains to be seen.

Personally, I'm leaning towards an XX ale.

8 comments:

  1. The menu data is interesting. Clearly this was an important establishment, the menu design and print quality show that.

    I believe that the main attribute of Albany Ale in what might be termed the international market (which would include posh hotels and restaurants in major American centers which would have been frequented by foreigners), was strength. All here have seen over time the calculations of Professor Beck which seem to have originated in 1834 although republished many times after:

    http://books.google.ca/books?id=AEu4AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA395&dq=albany+ale+Beck&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-3j6UbmRKqm4yQGygoAY&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=albany%20ale%20Beck&f=false

    Lewis Beck was based in New York City, he was a chemistry professor there. The bottled ale, and the Albany Ale on the menus was bottled beer, is over 10% ABV. It would have been considered equal in this respect to the best Scotch Ale or Burton, indeed superior since the latter rarely reached 10% ABV.

    So the "thing" IMO was a very strong bottled ale. And once established, a reputation lasts a considerable while, so people ordering it at posh hotels certainly in the periods covered by the menus would have expected a strong beer. The second menu has the price of the Albany Ale as higher than draft imported pale ale - to me that can only mean it was stronger. The imported pale ale had to be circa 6.5% ABV, so the Albany Ale must have offered a premium in alcohol albeit being domestic in origin.

    Clearly a range of Albany Ales was manufactured over time, but the international image of it IMO was that of a very strong beer, likely sweet too (high FG as has been discussed elsewhere seems to have been a characteristic). And true enough in the first menu the Albany Ale is somewhat cheaper than the imported India ale but not by that much - again I feel it was surely stronger in alcohol to warrant being as close as it was.

    Gary

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    1. Maybe. I agree that it most likely was pretty strong, but how strong was strong? We've have testimony from Thomas Read in 1835 saying he used between 3 and 3-1/2 bushels of barley (and some honey) per barrel. That puts his beer around 8 to 8.5%. Also, there's a 40 year difference between the 1875 menu and Beck's analysis. A lot can happen in 4 decades. the mid 1830s is also on the cusp of Albany (little a) ale becoming the "thing"called Albany (big A) Ale. Was the 10%+, bottled Albany Ale the same as what was in the cask that measured to 7.5%? We're they parti-gyled version of the same beer? Or were they two completely different beers denoted as Albany Ale because they were made in Albany. On a related note Albany "XX" Ale seems to be the brew most widely distributed. A beer falling between 7 and 8%, is more in range with a double strength brew rather than one of 10%.

      I've speculated before that the Albany Ale of the mid-19th century may have had a moderately high ABV, but wasn't so strong that it priced it self out of the general market. Perhaps it was a good middle of the road beer—advertised on a tree en route to a western Pennsylvania oil boomtown, but also on the menu of a swank Boston hotel. The menus seem to support that. Albany Ale falls right in the middle, price wise. Don't forget, supply also plays a role in price.

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    2. Correct that... On a related note Albany "XX" Ale seems to be the brew most widely distributed. A beer falling between 7 and 9%, is more in range with a double strength brew rather than one of 10%.

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    3. Yes, and I've seen again now the earlier discussions here and elsewhere of the Taylor range mid-1800's, mostly seemingly taken from that poem which mentioned 3 beers: a light amber; a pale XX, and an Imperial Astor Cream Ale. I would think there were 3 strengths in the bands you mentioned, perhaps 6-7%, 8-9%, 10-12%. So I'd think that the one sampled in the 1834 was in the third band, and this is the one, parallel broadly to the best Scotch or Burton, that received international acclaim. But who knows...

      Gary

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  2. Correction: in 1865 the Albany ale was the same price as Alsopp's draft India, which I feel points even more to the domestic product being stronger (more than if it was somewhat cheaper, I mean).

    Gary

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    1. I agree that is was probably stronger than a 6 to 6.5% IPA.

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  3. It could have been a circa-8% beer, but I'd guess higher where priced the same as or exceeding imported draft IPA. If 8% was the norm from the 1830's testimony - not unreasonable when one considers where the X's started in London mild ale - I'd just think a hotel one had to go one better, even a generation later.

    Is it known what Taylor's range was at the time the later menu was issued? This and other pricing info may help pin it down.

    Gary

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  4. Just a further thought, which is that it is noteworthy Wahl & Henius (1903) do not mention Albany Ale, or not that I could find. They were writing only a generation after its heyday and still in the period when ale brewing was active in Albany. They refer to Kentucky Common Ale, California Steam Beer, and Pennsylvania Swankey, but nothing about Albany. Their detailed discussion of American top-fermentation beers, while interesting, is clearly dependent on and indeed follows their discussion of English top-fermentation brewing. From this, one might conclude that Albany brewers became highly skilled at brewing different types of classic ale but didn't invent a new type. It was a thing, but not of new class with a unique taste. I would think the best productions (the Imperial and Burton and XXXX Ales that you see in those lovely old ads) were excellent English-style stock beers. As good as they were (and are in the hands of modern brewers), they fell out with public taste for whatever reason. But mid-1800's, lager hadn't yet become the new thing, people still liked the ale and stocked flavours. So these menus beers, probably from 8-10% ABV, were fine bottle-conditioned ales, perhaps like North Coast Stock Ale of today. That's what I think Craig, at this juncture.

    Gary

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