Beer School : Measure for Measure

In a scene from the book The Lord of the Rings, four weary hobbits settle into The Prancing Pony for some much needed rest. One of the group, Merry, approaches the table with great care, a flagon in his tiny hands, dwarfing his small frame. “This, my friend, is a pint,” he proclaims. “It comes in pints? I’m getting one!” replies Peregrin Took. Their delight is perhaps matched by the British traveller who encounters a Bavarian pub and the litre of beer it serves in one glass (or maybe the student who dares to drink a yard of ale). But although Germans are, on average, an inch and a half taller than Brits, isn’t matching volume of serving to size of patron a bit, well, Middle Earth?

Since Roman times, Britain acquired thousands of units from its various ruling cultures, many based on lengths of the body, such as the foot. But one man’s foot is another man’s very tight shoe. So, in 1824, an Act of Parliament standardised the system to mean that weights and measures were the same wherever and whoever you were. It established the new imperial gallon, the volume of ten pounds of distilled water at 62 °F (a pint was set at an eighth of a gallon), and abandoned all other definitions formed over the ages. Of course, globalisation saw this system replaced with the metric in the following century, and since 1985 retailers are not supposed to sell in imperial measures without stating the metric equivalent. But thanks to the impermanence of our drinking culture, beer and cider could still be sold in pints without the equivalent 568ml turning up everywhere, and that’s why we don’t do the gigantic litre measures of southern Germany.

Here’s a few other drinks measures steeped in history and a little randomness:

Jigger

Today a jigger refers to a piece of bartending equipment rather than a set volume with the size varying according to the most appropriate measure or double measure of spirits. The origin of the name is uncertain but a couple of colourful theories prevail above others. One harks back to the days when sailors in the British navy received a daily ration of rum, apparently nicknamed for the “jiggermast” sails on their ships. Others believe it stems from the name of the “Jiggar boss”, the boy who supplied canal workers with a tot of whisky. Take your pick.

Schooner

Completely lacking in legal definition, this serving size relates more to glass than to defined unit. Winner of most confusing country is Australia, where asking for a schooner of beer at the bar will get you 425ml, or three-quarters of an imperial pint… except in Adelaide, where you’ll get just half a pint or 285ml. In Canada, it’s simply a large glass, though the most common size is around two US pints. In the US, your request will be honoured with a beer in a round, stemmed glass between 532ml and a whopping 946ml. The UK schooner traditionally refers to the glass used for serving a large sherry, except up North where half a pint of Newcastle Brown Ale is called a “Geordie schooner”. However, in 2011 government legislation relaxed the laws restricting what measurements beer could be sold in and allowed for British publicans to follow the Australian example of using the schooner for two-thirds of a pint.

Shot

When 106 US students were challenged in 2003 to pour a shot, they overpoured on average by a quarter. But who says what a shot is, and why the name? Again, there is no singular origin story, but rather several, and many to do with guns and bullets. One suggestion relates to the earliest meaning of the word shot, “a rapid movement or motion”, the type of which gets your booze from bottle to glass. A shot is typically a single standard measure of spirits, but a standard drink measure varies across the world. In Australia, it’s equivalent to 10g of alcohol, in Japan it’s 20g, and in the UK it’s 8g (the lowest in the world). For a 40% abv spirit, that’s 25ml, though drinks merchants in the UK can choose to serve either that or 35ml as a single measure. Simple.

Pint

Ever tried to use an American recipe that calls for cups of everything instead of an actual weight? Irritating. Their volumes are no easier either. If you thought a pint was a pint, think again. There are two American pints, the liquid pint, clocking in at 473ml, and the less-common dry pint, 551ml. This is because the United States chose to use two older measures of a gallon — the Queen Anne wine gallon and the Winchester corn gallon — that the British chose to discard for their new Imperial system. Just to make things even more confusing, if you ask for a pint in a US pub you’ll be given a glass that’s 500ml, not quite as satisfying as a proper, big, British pint. Go across the border to Quebec, however, and the traditional French pinte will get you two imperial pints. But the now-obsolete Scottish pint or joug trumps (pun intended) them all at an enormous three imperial pints.