Filtering back cask beer

For a great many years part of the tradition of cask ale husbandry has been the filtering back of beer in to the cask from which it came. Ale pulled off at the start of a new session, beer pulled off during cleaning or beer run off when a new cask had been broached has been seen as good beer not to be wasted and therefore put back in to the cask through a filter pan and papers.

Seen as a legitimate way of maximizing the yield from a cask and helping the profitability of the landlord’s business, most if not all cask ale pubs used to do this. I say used, because for sometime now most of the big brewers have not encouraged landlords to continue this traditional practice.

Having spent the best part of 40 years working as a cellar man, now known as technician by the way, I have seen plenty of reasons why I think filtering back is not a good idea.

It used to go like this…Old Fred at the Dog and Spanner used to have a bucket. The bucket used to live behind the bar. Now into this bucket Old Fred used to put all sorts of beer from all sorts of places. Beer from his drip trays was one, another was beer people had left behind in glasses and not drunk, “Nowt up with that lad.” Sometimes the bucket used to live in the cellar and once again it used to attract all sorts of beer…beer from the bottom of casks, known as cask bottoms, full of spent hops. Sometimes if a cask of mild say was beginning to get a little light in colour due to all the bitter that had been added, Old Fred would add a couple of bottles of Guinness to darken things up a little. Yes this bucket certainly got around. At the end of a typical day the bucket would be quite full and put in a safe place in the cellar, uncovered, and left until time permitted filtering back or a suitable cask became available. I remember the very traditional dirty crust that used to form on these buckets and the wildlife that was attracted to this feast of free beer. The good old days eh!

Apart from contaminating the rest of the cask that beer is being filtered back into, there is a possibility of altering the ABV of the cask. If different products have been returned into the cask or too much beer returned the alcoholic content of the beer may be raised or lowered. If a weights and measures check is done and beer found not to be at the indicated ABV then there might be a risk of prosecution.

All in all despite the tradition behind the practice of filtering back I feel it should not be apart of modern cellar management. With cask beers being the only real growth area in today’s beer market, it is hoped that people will realise that filtering back may well jeopardize this. Consistency and quality are the key market drivers of cask ale sales. Any practice that affects these factors in a negative way should not be continued.

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