International Beer Day lands on the first Friday of every August. Those who celebrate this occasion would undoubtedly agree with Catharine Parr Traill (1802-1899), who writes in her 1857 work The Canadian Settler’s Guide… “There is nothing that the new settler complains more feelingly of, than the want of good beer and ale.” This book, originally entitled The Female Emigrant’s Guide was intended to help women prepare for life in the backwoods of Canada. In it, Traill provides recipes for treacle beer, maple beer and beet beer, assuming that every family will already be growing hops in the garden.

If you are mainly interested in consuming beer rather than making it, take a look at Cakes and Ale: A Dissertation on Banquets, Interspersed with Various Recipes, More or Less Original, and Anecdotes, Mainly Veracious. This book by Edward Spencer Mott (1844-1910), published under the name Edward Spencer, is filled with the author’s entertaining and informative thoughts on food and drink. It includes his recommendation of Champagne and Guinness’ Stout, with the note that, “It should be drunk out of a pewter tankard, and is specially recommended as a between-the-acts refresher for the amateur actor.” The book also includes a recipe for Ale Punch: “One quart of mild ale in a bowl, add one wine-glassful of brown sherry, the same quantity of old brandy, a tablespoonful of sifted sugar, the peel and juice of one lemon, a grate of nutmeg, and an iceberg.” One hopes that the author’s idea of an “iceberg” is on the scale of an ice cube!

If you are a beer drinker, we encourage you to enjoy a cold one while reading the short story “Bird in the Bush”. This story, by Walter Rollin Brooks (1886-1958), features Mr. Ed, a beer-loving horse who can hold his own drinking alongside the stablehands.

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