Chilled Marks and Spencer’s 0.5% Southwold Pale Ale
I took this picture of Marks and Spencer’s 0.5% Southwold Pale Ale in the fridge of their store on Finsbury Pavement in the City of London.
Not that it needed to be cooled today, as it was real bass monkey weather.
Two Units Of Adnams Beer
This picture shows eight bottles of Marks and Spencer’s 0.5% Southwold Pale Ale, which is brewed by Adnams.
Astonishingly, there are just 2 units of alcohol, which cost just £12.80 in total.
But even more astonishingly, the beer has a good taste for a low-alcohol beer.
The Finest Low-Alcohol Gluten-Free Beer In The World
In some ways this is an open letter to Archie Norman and Jonathan Adnams, who are respectively chairman of Marks and Spencer and Adnams Brewery.
Adnams brew Southwold Pale Ale 0.5% for Marks and Spencer.
I have three medical conditions.
- I am coeliac, which means I must avoid gluten.
- I’ve had a stroke and am on Warfarin, which means I can’t drink too much alcohol.
- I have a need to drink lots of fluids and I find beer is best.
So I need a low-alcohol and gluten-free beer, that has all the thirst-quenching properties of beer.
I should say that my grandfather had the same need to drink a lot and he eventually turned into a serious alcoholic and died at the age of just forty.
I am now seventy and started drinking halves of Adnams at fourteen in Felixstowe Conservative Club, whilst playing snooker with my father. Since a stroke seven years ago, I’ve probably never drunk more than ten units of alcohol in a week.
The Southwold Pale Ale 0.5% satisfies my need for a low-alcohol beer and it has a quality taste, that I very much like.
When I was diagnosed as a coeliac twenty years ago, one of the problems was finding a decent gluten-free beer. So I had a discussion with a brewer at Adnams and he said that their beers could be gluten-free.
But I never tried one!
However, after testing a few bottles of Southwold Pale Ale 0.5% , I was convinced that the beer was low enough in gluten not to have any ill-effects on my body.
But then surely, a low-alcohol beer must be made with less barley to create the low-alcohol level!
I think Southwold Pale Ale 0.5% is a superb beer.
Don’t just take my word for it!
In the reviews on the Marks and Spencer web site, these are some of the titles.
- Favourite Low Alcohol Option
- Best Low Alc Beer I’ve Tried Yet
- Excellent Low Alcohol Pale Ale
Two other reviewers complain about the availability of the product.
Research shows that as many as one-in-fifty of the population of the UK could be coeliac.
Conclusion
Improving the availability of this product could be good for all concerned.
Then
A Low-Alcohol Beer With Flavour
I was buying my usual gluten-free IPA in Marks and Spencer in Islington, when I saw this beer next to it.
This beer is just 0.25 units for a half litre bottle.
It also has flavour, as it is brewed by Adnams.
But the amazing thing was I had no adverse to the beer despite being coeliac, although I’ve never claimed to be a serious one.
The Spanish Like Their Beer
I took these pictures in Spain
I actually drunk four or possibly five different varieties of gluten-free beer in my week in the country.
I was also surprised to see gluten-free Brewdog and beer from St. Peter’s in El Cortes Ingles.
The Beer In Spain Makes Up For The Lack Of Rain
Before I was diagnosed as a coeliac, I used to like my beer. For a few years afterwards, I could drink bottles of Guinness from Park Royal, but like the brewery they are now history.
But in this trip to Spain, I have drunk four different gluten-free beers and as I post this, I’m seinking a bottle of Estrella Damm Daura and very reasonable it is too!
I used to get it from Waitrose, but her upstairs got it replaced with the aptly named Celia.
One day, I intend to share a bed with a Celia, whilst we drink appropriately bamed bottles.
I’ll add that to my bucket list!
By the way Cecelias need not apply!
I
Gluten-Free Eating In Las Palmas
Spain is not a difficult place to be gluten-free.
The Hotel
In the hotel, I only are breakfast, which usually consisted of fruit juice, eggs, ham, cheese and coffee.
There was no gluten-free bread, as you can get in most three or four stars hotels these days.
But that I can do without.
Snacks
I did take about ten EatNakd bars and M&S Honeycomb Crisps, but Ialso found some Spanish bars, that were labelled Gluten-Free in large letters.
They would have done at a pinch.
I also had a couple of good salads.
Balalaika
I ate in this restaurant on Monday night.
The restaurant had the best allergy-friendly menu, I’ve ever found. Not from a point of the food, but from the way the information was presented.
For gluten-free food, I just avoided any item with a large red dot, with a gluten sign in the middle.
Kitchen Lovers
I ate here on the Tuesday night.
Kitchen Lovers
I’d been pointed to the restaurant by Lonely Planet’s guide to the Canary Islands (p 74)
It’s all, they say it is.
I didn’t book, but then November wasn’t busy in Las Palmas.
It was one of the best restaurants, I’ve eaten at in Spain. You have to remember that C and myself tried quite a few.
I paid 33 euros for two courses and a glass of wine.
I could spend that in say Carluccios in Leeds!
Restaurante Molinet
I ate here on Wednesday night after seeing the gluten-free sign on the facia.
It is a restaurant to watch, as it had mixed reviews, so it could go either way.
But at least it serves gluten-free San Miguel lager.
I wish them lots of success.
Tailpiece
If you have to be gluten-free like me, you won’t starve in Las Palmas.
Megabrew
The merger of the world’s two largest brewers; Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller, that is reported here on the BBC, will not affect me one jot, unless the new company decides to use its power to make it more difficult for everybody to buy real beer and cider.
What to me is frightening about the merger, is that they don’t have one gluten-free product, that I would drink. So single-mindedly they will force people down the route of their chemically produced crap.
I have a feeling that if this merger goes ahead, there will be repercussions that they don’t like!
I Finally Buy Celias In Waitrose
They’ve been a long time coming, but today I relieved Waitrose in Islington of six Celia gluten-free lagers.
If anybody should find any Celias in an obscure Waitrose, send me a picture.
Is My Life Going Round In A Curious Circle?
In the 1970s, my late wife; Celia and myself lived, with our then three sons, on the eleventh floor of Cromwell Tower in the Barbican.
The shops in those days in the area were not very numerous and with the exception of the excellent market in Whitecross Street, getting everything we needed wasn’t easy. There was no supermarket, unlike today where there is a Waitrose in Whitecross Street.
So often on a Saturday, we’d take the boys up the hill to the Angel and shop in the Marks and Spencer and the Woolworths in Liverpool Road opposite the Underground station.
I’ve since found out that the Marks at the Angel is a long-established store and it may have been the one my grandmother spoke about, that she used around the time of the First World War, when she and her family lived just down from the Angel by the Regent’s Canal.
Woollies went a few years ago and much to the regrets of many of the locals is now a Waitrose.
My friends, who knew Celia, and myself often share a laugh over the fact that when I can get it, I drink a Czech gluten-free lager called Celia. A few weeks ago, I heard that the beer will be stocked in Waitrose, so I wrote to them asking where it will be stocked locally. This is an extract from their reply.
I’ve looked into this and I’m pleased to tell you that this should be available at both our Islington and Barbican branches from tomorrow.
As these are two branches, that we would have walked past together in the 1970s, long before they opened, I just can’t help thinking that life is truly strange!
Could anybody, who spots Celia lager in their local Waitrose please let me know?
Thanks!
The Anonymous Widower 