Many years ago, I studied history at university. There I discovered a practice called “revisionism”. It had two features. Firstly, you established that every well-known story about the past was completely untrue. Secondly, you engaged in robust debate occasionally bordering on the personal with other historians who disagreed with you – either because they believed the old story, or because they believed a version of your story that was minutely different (or maybe, in some cases, just because it was getting a bit personal?)
Tonight I was planning to tell you a magical bedtime story about the origins of India Pale Ale, or IPA. It is a story I have regaled my friends with in the past. But a little research suggests that, in true revisionist fashion, it may not be true and much electronic ink continues to be shed arguing the toss.
So what was the story? The British Army in India needed beer. Beer used to go off on the long sea voyage. So Mr George Hodgson of Bow Brewery discovered that if you added hops then the beer used to keep (and indeed improve) on voyage. A first Hodgson shipment arrived in Calcutta in 1822 and cornered the market. Eventually the East India Company had to ask Samuel Allsopp of Burton on Trent to copy Hodgson’s ale so that there was some competition. In one version of the story, we natives heard about IPA after a consignment was shipwrecked off the coast of Lancashire in the 1830s, and we started demanding it ourselves.
However, I am now indebted to Mr Martyn Cornell, who wrote back in 2010 that “I have been researching this issue for 20 years and have never found any proof that Hodgson invented IPA”. What followed was a highly credible if slightly less romantic story of gradual evolution in taste and in commercial practices. There was no eureka moment. Hops had been a feature of beer production for a long time. Beer had been sold in India from the 18th century. Porter continued to exist with pale ale for the duration of the Raj. Hodgson was a successful supplier of beer to India - because his brewery was so close to London docks- but not the only one. “India Pale Ale” was a marketing slogan, traced to an advert in the Liverpool Mercury of 1835. And in fact it was technically inaccurate. There was a fine distinction at the time between “beer” and “ale” and IPA was technically “beer” – but “pale ale” had a more pleasing ring to it than “pale beer” so marketing and advertising triumphed over accuracy and integrity. For once, I hear you say.
At the end of the Cornell article, there is a comment section in which various people question Mr Cornell’s conclusions and he responds, well, let's just say somewhat robustly. There wasn't much agreeing to differ. I had pleasant flashbacks to my history studies.
So having established the origins of IPA, I think you should drink some. Start by going to your local supermarket and buying Thornbridge Jaipur – a sublime, multi-award winning beer from one of England’s greatest breweries. It is hoppy – it proved too much for the delicate taste buds of my son and his friends when they tried it at age 16/17 – but those of us of more mature years will find much to enjoy. Then, if you want a range of no-nonsense does-what-it-says-on-the-label IPAs, explore the Kernel brewery in Bermondsey.
Or, if you really want to give yourself a treat, go for the Manchester brewery Cloudwater – an ever-changing collection of IPAs, Double IPAs and Double-Dry-Hopped IPAs. I have never tasted anything from them that was anything other than superb.