UK's 'strongest beer' condemned

7zark7

7zark7

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[size=+1]UK's 'strongest beer' condemned[/size]
A Scottish brewery has been branded "irresponsible" after launching what it said was the UK's strongest beer.

With an 18.2% alcohol content, a 330ml bottle of Tokyo*, made by BrewDog, contained six units of alcohol - twice the recommended daily limit.

The company insisted the beer's high quality would help tackle the country's binge-drinking culture.

But Alcohol Focus Scotland branded the Fraserburgh-based brewer's argument "deluded".

The brewing company's latest product uses jasmine, cranberries, malts and American hops, and is then fermented with a champagne yeast to make the high alcohol content.

A bottle of the beer will be priced at £9.99.

BrewDog founder James Watt said: "Mass-market, industrially-brewed lagers are so bland and tasteless that you are seduced into drinking a lot of them.

"We've been challenging people to drink less alcohol, and educating the palates of drinkers with progressive craft-brewed beers which have an amazing depth of flavour, body and character.

"The beers we make at BrewDog, including Tokyo*, are providing a cure to binge beer-drinking."

But Alcohol Focus Scotland chief executive Jack Law warned high alcohol percentage beer could cause as much damage as drinking to excess.

"This company is completely deluded if they think that an 18.2% abv, (alcohol by volume), beer will help solve Scotland's alcohol problems," he said.

"It is utterly irresponsible to bring out a beer which is so strong at a time when Scotland is facing unprecedented levels of alcohol-related health and social harm.

"Just one bottle of this beer contains six units of alcohol - twice the recommended daily limit."

A spokeswoman from the British Liver Trust added: "The notion of binge-drinking is to get drunk quick, so surely this beer will help people on their way?"

BMA Scotland warned a "high percentage" of the population was regularly drinking more than the recommended amount.

BrewDog ran into controversy recently when drinks industry watchdog the Portman Group said its Speedball drink should be withdrawn from sale until its marketing was changed.

Speedballing is the name given to combining heroin and cocaine.

BrewDog has produced a run of 3,000 limited edition bottles of Tokyo*.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8170813.stm

Published: 2009/07/27 13:41:48 GMT

© BBC MMIX
 
Whats the difference? Its strong but its also expensive and you could just as easily go buy 40% whisky and it would work out cheaper to consume the same quantity of alcohol. People will always find something to cry about.
 
Much of the high price is due to excessive taxes. The companies should be able to sell any strength beverage they want, just clearly label the alcohol content so the user knows what they are getting. Prohibitionists should mind their own business and leave other people alone.
 
The Narrator said:
whoa thats crazily high

someone in the UK taste one pronto and see if it tastes like ass or not
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I don't usually touch alcohol, but if I see this product in the shops I don't think I can resist trying it! :)
 
lol @ publicity stunt. that's all it is.

might buy a few bottles though... but at £10 each it won't be many.

p.s. their own website only says 14%: http://www.brewdog.com/tokyo.php

The irony of existentialism, the parody of being and the inherent contradictions of post-modernism, all so delicately conveyed by the blocky, pixelated arcade action have all been painstakingly recreated in this bottles contents.

This imperial stout is brewed with copious amounts of speciality malts, jasmine and cranberries. After fermentation we then dry-hop this killer stout with a bucketload of our favourite hops before carefully ageing the beer on French toasted oak chips.

It is all about moderation. Everything in moderation, including moderation itself. What logically follows is that you must, from time, have excess. This beer is for those times.
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Hhaha fuck that I can get a 40 oz of 9% malt liquer in the US for $2.50 with tax.. CAMO my nicka's.. lol
 
Yeah, scots kids are really going to pay the probably absurd pricetag to buy gourmet high alcohol craft beer instead of buying the cheapest vodka they can find. Sure.

For me, about 15 percent is the limit for when beers start to become a boozey alcoholic mess. Aging them will help sort that out, but I have tried 18 percent beer and it was too nail-polish remover for me. As a homebrewer it does indicate skill on the part of the brewer, but honestly when I see things like this or like dogfish head's 120 minute IPA i just think 'man, these guys just gotta be compensating for something else being too small'
 
That higher alcohol %'s do not contribute to binge drinking is bs. Speaking from anecdotes, the vast majority of the binge drinking I've seen and been involved in revolved around drinks with higher %'s.

and so is this

BrewDog founder James Watt said: "Mass-market, industrially-brewed lagers are so bland and tasteless that you are seduced into drinking a lot of them.
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Yeah, that's right, since it's so bland and tasteless I drink more. :sigh:
 
^ yeah, that doesn't make much sense, hehe.

they've posted a response to this on their website:

http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article.php?id=130

RESPONSE TO BREWDOG TOKYO* STORY, 28 JULY, 2009

Richard Dinwoodie of Borough Market's Utobeer & co-owner of the multi award-winning Rake bar says:

"As the only London stockist of BrewDog's Tokyo we would like to refute the claims made about BrewDog's Tokyo beer in the article dated July 28, 2009.

"As a responsible drinks retailer we are not focusing on the alcoholic strength of the beer but the artisan nature and quality of the product.

"For a third of a pint of Tokyo we will be charging in excess of £6 and there is no way that this encourages binge drinking, particularly when you can currently purchase a 100ml of 7.5%ABV White Lightning at Sainsbury's for 15.4p yet we are charging £3.17 for the same quantity of Tokyo beer at 18.5%, you do the maths!"

"The customers in our bar and at our market stall often buy one of these beers to treat it like a fine cognac or whisky and to put into brandy balloons to share, not to down in one.

"The focus on this one special beer is utterly spurious, BrewDog offers a range of beers starting 2.4%ABV, so to single this particular beer out is just a case of pandering to binge drinking mania.You don't ever see a story about ‘well done BrewDog for producing a great tasting low ABV beer', this is just sensationalism and scaremongering of the worst kind."

And in response to the comments that it exceeds the daily allowance for women, leading female beer writer Melissa Cole says: "This is not a beer to drink alone, it is to share as the ideal digestif to a good dinner; claims that this encourages binge drinking are nonsense, if nothing else the price point is utterly prohibitive."
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^ now that makes more logical sense.

you won't see this stuff on the supermarket shelves next to alcopops. they are a tiny microbrewery and kids would seriously grudge spending so much money on a tiny amount of beer. i live near there and the kids are more into Buckfast - far superior bang for your buck. ;)
 
As if people are going to binge drink on bottles of beer costing a tenner each. You can pick up 3 bottles of cheap wine for that. In many ways they're doing exactly what the health experts say - making drinking more expensive.

It's also a special edition as the standard Tokyo is 12%. I'm sure its probably quite nice. I've tried several of the Brewdog beers. Their "Paradox Grain" is an imperial stout aged in whisky barrels and is very tasty. They stock "Punk IPA" in Tesco. They seem to be an American-style microbrewery - very strong flavours, lots of American hop varieties. A bit different from the standard array of UK ales.
 
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