The best foreign singers of the 20th century. The most famous singers in the world

The rich, long-standing culinary traditions of Great Britain are known throughout the world. And this applies not only to dishes, but also to traditional English drinks. As with many other things, British residents usually refrain from bold experiments when making their drinks, so the recipe and composition remain unchanged for many centuries. By the way, among traditional English drinks, much more space is devoted to alcohol; recipes for making aromatic strong drinks are passed down from generation to generation and are extremely valued by the British. It is enough to at least remember the great popularity of such a traditionally British establishment as a pub, which serves beer, whiskey, ale and much more.

7. Pimms

Now Pimms (Pimm's) - a summer cocktail, a cruchon, an alcoholic drink with fruit, is drunk in the warm season throughout the UK. Pimms is an unusually democratic drink. It is served to the Queen and her personal guests at races, regattas and other events of the London social season , and in any pub in the country. This drink is an integral part of the “Great British Summer”. This is how this time of year is jokingly called here. The irony, of course, refers to the weather, which can give out any surprises. However, no weather can influence such “icons” of the British lifestyle as the Pimms cup.

6. Squash

No, this is not a sport or a vegetable. Squash is a typical British soft drink made from fruit, juice, water and sweeteners. This drink is actually very refreshing and thirst quenching, especially in summer.
In the UK the most popular brand squash is Robinsons. This brand originally produced this drink for tennis players during the Wimbledon season in 1935.

5. Cider

Another drink that has spread throughout the world, but is associated with Britain, is cider, which is essentially fermented fruit juice. Most often, cider is made from apples or pears, but variations are possible. Carbonated and sweetish cider does not taste alcohol at all, but you should be careful, it can easily get you drunk.

By the way, in the 18th century, on farms, half of the labor of workers was often paid in cider.

4. Gin and tonic

Gin and tonic - alcoholic cocktail, which contains two main ingredients (gin and tonic, naturally), plus lime and ice. The ratio of the main ingredients differs depending on the recipe.

The history of this alcoholic drink is associated with British soldiers who were in India. In the 19th century, quinine tonic was very popular among them; it was given to soldiers to prevent them from contracting malaria. The taste of this drink was very bitter. To make it more enjoyable, tonic began to be mixed with gin, which was also popular at the time. Lime, which the soldiers used as a drink, saved them from scurvy.

3. Ale

Another common drink among the British is ale (ginger beer), which is made with barley malt and tastes like beer, but the taste of ale is richer and denser, and the color is darker. Once you get to the pub, you are supposed to order a pint of ale (568 ml), because draft ale is the best. The British have been drinking ale since the mid-17th century, especially because it was believed to protect people from infection.

2. Whiskey

Whiskey is the oldest British whiskey alcoholic drinks, it has been prepared for several centuries. Whiskey can be made from malt, grain, or a mixture of the two. The British prefer Scotch malt whiskey. They drink it in 25 grams and, unlike Americans, it is drunk neat, without ice. The most popular varieties are Glenmorangie, Glenfiddich or Laphroaig.

1. Tea
a drink that is traditionally associated with England all over the world. The British nation has not changed its deep love for this for many years. aromatic drink and consumes it in huge quantities every year.

The most “English” version of this drink is tea with milk. It is very important to pour milk into tea, and not vice versa. The British are convinced that otherwise the tradition will be broken and the flavor will change. Tea drinking is the most important activity that almost determines the neat English daily routine. Besides, it’s best to have long conversations over a cup of tea. small talk, this is a reason to get together with family or a group of old friends.

Top 7 traditional British drinks updated: August 12, 2017 by: Ekaterina Kadurina

Whiskey! - you say. And you will be right and wrong at the same time. In fact, whiskey, of course, rules, but besides it there are interesting alcoholic “specialties”. Some are famous all over the world, some are purely regional, and can only be found in small villages (in this case, you will receive a bonus for perseverance: they are always amazingly tasty). Here are just the very best.

Whiskey

Where would we be without him? Old traditional drink, popular in Britain for several centuries. Common options: malt, grain and mixed grain or malt, which must be indicated on the label.

Scotch single malt whiskey is considered the best; the British usually drink this at home. Whiskey is available in any drinking establishment, the traditional serving is 25 grams. Americans, as a rule, drink it with ice (on the rocks), the British - in pure form(straight or, more precisely, neat, but let’s not get too carried away), especially if the whiskey is good. The guest at the bar will be offered both options. If you want to try a new or known good whiskey, order without ice. In Scotland, by the way, they may not offer ice unless the client asks: there they consider such tricks with a thoroughbred drink to be an unworthy activity.

As for buying whiskey for home (or for your room), if you need a high-quality, well-known, solid, but still not top variety like Glenmorangie, Glenfiddich or Laphroaig, then the easiest and cheapest way to find it is in the supermarket. Just choose a store not near the metro, but a large one (they are usually not in the very center) - you will find there all the high-quality standard famous varieties, 30-35 options, maybe even more. Usually supermarkets sell whiskey up to 18 years of aging maximum. The average price is from 25 to 40 GBP. Prices on the page are as of August 2018.

And if you need something like that, elite, then there’s nowhere to go - you have to look for a specialized whiskey shop. Google map will definitely help you. The prices there, of course, are appropriate.

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Cider is an insidious drink: it is drunk easily and imperceptibly, like juice, but it is quite intoxicating. So you need to be more careful with him.

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The most common alcoholic drink in Britain is ale. Known for almost two thousand years, made from barley malt, different from beer dark color and a richer, denser taste. The second criterion is the most unmistakable: even if there are comparatively light visually varieties of the drink, then there is no liquid ale in principle.

Russians (and not only them) often mistakenly call ale beer, but this is wrong. Beer in Britain is bad and usually bottled. If you tried something on tap in a pub, randomly poked it into one of the taps on the counter and got a dark, dense drink, then it was probably not beer, but ale.

The traditional portion of ale is an English pint, that is, 568 ml; in pubs this is what they pour by default. Ale can be regular, red, pale (pale, somewhat lighter and lighter, often with pronounced floral notes in taste and aroma) and dark (the richest). Standard varieties are easiest and cheapest to buy in the supermarket, but the most interesting ones should be looked for in rural markets and delicatessen stores. Good draft ale in several varieties can be found in any pub.

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Cider

The third popular option is cider. It is essentially fermented fruit juice, traditionally apple or pear in Britain. English cider is very different from French or Belgian, one might even say that these drinks have only the name in common. It is also available in any pub, the traditional serving is a pint.

British cider is a fairly carbonated drink and can be sweet or dry. On dry it is usually indicated that it is dry, that is, dry. It should be remembered that cider is an insidious drink: it is drunk easily and unnoticeably, like juice, but it is quite intoxicating, so you need to be more careful with it. The best cider is on tap or in bottles, but you shouldn’t buy canned cider. Sometimes they distinguish “farmer’s”; it is richer and always dry.

Mead is the same drink that we learned about back in school, from Stevenson's ballad. There is not only heather, by the way.

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Rarer variants

So, we’ve dealt with the most popular alcoholic drinks in Britain - but here’s a whole mini-bar of lesser-known, but also deserving of the closest attention, non-children’s drinks in English:

Summervine(summerwine), that is, “summer wine.” Made from fruits (any kind), many people in villages still make it at home. If you've ever tried Russian village jam made from jam, it's very similar. So to speak, the English folk version of the chatter: there is no need to talk about quality, try it at your own peril - and don’t say in the morning that we didn’t warn you.

Muldvine(mulled wine) - English version mulled wine. Sold only before Christmas, unlike Russian - it rarely comes with fruit, but is significantly more spicy. There is also mulled sider - the same thing, but not with wine, but with cider. Sold in small glass mugs on tap, in season - a wonderful thing.

Trying to order mulled wine in a British pub is a great way to stump everyone. This name is not used here, bartenders do not understand it, especially in pubs. Order maldvine - you can't go wrong.

Stout(stout), a dark, bittersweet drink similar to very dark beer, is actually a very popular option in the country, we don’t even know why they do it with the “rarer” options. The most famous variety of stout in Russia is, of course, Guinness, but in general there are a lot of them. Stronger than beer, the traditional serving is a pint. Stout will definitely be available in any self-respecting Irish pub (as if there are others?)

Mead traditionally translated into Russian as “honey”, pronounced in English as “honey” - the middle sound is soft, something between “e” and “i”. This is the same drink that we learned about back in school, from Stevenson’s ballad. There is not only heather, by the way. The drink has existed for a couple of thousand years; from a recipe point of view, it is brewed with honey and some plants or fruits, and then fermented water. Heather honey, accordingly, is boiled with heather flowers (more precisely, with the tops of the stems). The taste is something between mead and ale, usually sweet.

Traditionally, honey is produced in Scotland; it is rarely sold in London, mainly in fine alcohol or delicatessen stores. It is useless to look for it on tap. In the eyes of tourists, especially those who are not strangers to poetry, it looks very romantic, but the taste, to put it mildly, is specific (like many drinks made from other ancient recipes) and not everyone likes it.

Illustration copyright Thinkstock

From the bar furniture to the noise level in the drinking establishment, everything in a modern pub is designed to maximize alcohol consumption. These design and marketing gimmicks have influenced one generation of Britons more than others, says .

My first encounter with alcohol took place in the late 1980s.

It was the morning after one of the parties at my parents' house. My sister and I (both about nine or 10 years old) were home alone and started combing the living room in search of forgotten cans.

I remember that I acted methodically: I took the jar, shook it to see if there was anything left inside, and if so, I started drinking.

I can still feel the metallic taste of stale Heineken beer on my tongue, not to mention the cigarette butts in the same can.

The real acquaintance happened during drinking sessions at the university.

I remember my first week as a complete bout of excitement from cheap alcohol - a harbinger of what awaits me in the next four years.

In 2004, we drank 9.5 liters of pure alcohol - that's more than 100 bottles of wine - every year

At one ball I drank so much free wine that I started vomiting. The entry in my diary that evening, written in turquoise pen, consisted of four words, too large and clumsily written: “I got drunk. I felt sick. Newcomers’ Ball.”

But it is what it is: sometimes you load people into taxis, sometimes they load you.

Recently I wondered if my generation has developed some kind of abnormal relationship with alcohol. Looking at the numbers, I realized that this was indeed the case.

I discovered that 2004 was Peak Drunkenness. Britons drank more then than in the previous century and the following decade.

The alcoholic apogee was reached through the efforts of those of us who were born around 1980. No generation of 20-year-olds has ever drank so much. How did this happen to us?!

Anyone who studies the phenomenon of drunkenness is familiar with this diagram. It reflects changes in annual alcohol consumption in the United Kingdom, which is calculated in liters of pure alcohol per capita.

Of course, none of us drinks alcohol in its pure form. A liter of pure alcohol is equivalent to 35 pints of strong beer (an imperial pint is 0.57 liters - Ed.).

In 1950, Britons drank an average of 3.9 liters per person. Let's look to the right. At first the line barely rises. Then, in 1960, it goes up. The rise becomes more gradual in the 1970s.

The upward trajectory ends in 1980, but this turns out to be temporary. By the end of the 1990s, consumption began to grow rapidly again.

With the onset of Peak Drinking in 2004, we began to drink 9.5 liters of alcohol per person - the equivalent of more than 100 bottles of wine - and so on every year.

It's impossible to pinpoint the reasons for all the ups and downs of the drinking curve, but scientists say economic downturns, marketing techniques and gender factors are influencing how Brits drink.

In the meantime, let's look at an ordinary pub as it was half a century ago.

Post-war pub

In the late 1930s, a group of observers began to record what was happening in British pubs. The result was the book The Pub and the People.

The part of the pub where working-class men congregated was called the “cellar” or “crypt”: “Running along the base of the bar, the mahogany top of which is well worn and well worn, runs a strip of sawdust about six inches wide ( 15 cm – Ed.), where people spit, throw cigarette butts, matches and empty cigarette packs."

And, of course, they drink. In post-war Britain, drinking was mainly done in pubs. Mostly men drank, most often beer.

Little has changed two decades since The Pub and the People was published. Only in the 1960s British culture drinking, fundamental shifts have emerged.

Part of the reason for the change is that the British have learned - or been persuaded - to love the drink they drink. for a long time abhorred.

Bavarian Josef Groll brewed the first batch of pilsner, a light, golden beer known as lager, in the town of Pilsen in the Czech Republic in 1842.

Rumors about him spread around the world. Soon, brewers from Germany began to brew their own pils, and the word "pilsner" no longer meant beer made in Pilsen, but new type drink

Lager was conquering the world, but the British remained loyal to home-grown pale ales. Their alcohol content was less than the 5% alcohol content typical of many lagers, which was more in line with British drinking habits.

The popularity of the lager was literally explosive and spread very quickly after many years of unsuccessful marketing." Pete Brown

“The strength of mild beer was about 3%,” says beer writer Pete Brown. “Men who worked in factories and mines drank pint after pint of it after work, partly to , which replenishes the body’s moisture reserves without getting drunk.”

This answered tax system kingdom, since the taxation of beer depended on its strength.

Even the delight that Prince Albert experienced from the lager ( 1819 - 1861, Prince Consort, husband of Queen Victoria - Ed.) did not convince the British.

Brewers actively popularized lager after World War II. The generation that came of age in the late 1960s and was hungry for change finally became their clientele.

“The popularity of lager was explosive and spread very quickly after years of unsuccessful marketing,” says Brown. “We still drink mainly in pubs, they are still dominated by men, and the beer is still the same strength. But Heineken is the first in history of beer advertising in Britain keyword- "refreshing".

The ad aired in 1974, and the campaign did "pretty well," Brown says. Britain's hot summer two years in a row - in 1975 and 1976 - was the time when the word "refreshing" really took off. Lager suddenly started selling.

In one of the videos, a man reads a newspaper while sitting in a chair. The furniture in the room is covered with sheets of wrapping paper.

Lager is firmly rooted in British identity

Hearing that someone is coming, he jumps up and pretends to study the wallpaper. An angry wife enters. The renovation should be completed by the time I return, she says. The man waits for the car door to slam, sits back down in his chair, lifts a piece of paper and a foaming mug of Heineken beer appears.

The camera pulls back and the viewer sees a dog whistling and painting a wall with a roller clutched in its paw.

The advert is quirky but thoroughly British. There is a nagging wife, a disobedient husband, and an absurd pet painting the walls - a direct reference to the "Dulux dog", an old English sheepdog, whose image is used in advertising for a popular brand of paint.

I remember how during the holidays with cousins and sisters in the late 1980s, older boys imitated the dancing gait of George the Bear from the Hofmeister beer advertisement.

Lager now accounts for three quarters of all beer consumed in Britain. The drink is firmly rooted in British identity.

A pint of lager is the main choice for guys who like to joke and watch football.

The truth cannot be hidden if it is in wine

Around the same time, the British fell in love with another imported drink - wine.

In 1960, wine accounted for 1/10 of the total alcohol consumed in Britain. But a few years later the government made it easier for British supermarkets to stock wine.

By 1980, drinking volumes had roughly quadrupled—and nearly doubled between 1980 and 2000.

Of the 4,000 UK adults surveyed this year, 60% said they preferred wine over all other alcoholic drinks.

The significance of wine is that it is drunk mainly at home. Thus, pubs are no longer the only center of attraction for British drinkers.

“The rise in popularity of wine represents one of the most significant changes in British drinking culture in the last half century, driven by sales in takeaways and supermarkets,” writes James Nichols, director of research at the charity Alcohol Research UK. , which studies alcohol problems in Britain.

The success story of wine in Britain is also a tale of women drinkers, whom pubs have traditionally ignored.

The history of wine in Britain is a tale of drinking women

As the authors of the book Pubs and Men noted, some rooms were closed to women: “The crypt and beer hall were exclusively for men, they were taboo for women who drank in the “drawing room.” A pint of beer in the drawing room cost one penny more ".

Another custom did not allow women to stand at the bar. Even the dictionary used by the book’s compilers would be perceived as a manifestation of sexism.

"Women didn't have a place in drinking establishments until relatively recently," Claire Herrick, a geographer at King's College London, told me.

It was believed that “women should drink sweet sherry, and if beer, then half a pint, but not a pint.”

This, according to Herrick, was due to fears that women would become more masculine than men and compete with the latter if they drank the same drinks.

The bartender poured a pint for my friend and then, without asking, reached for a half-pint glass for me.

Today it is taken for granted that a woman can walk into a pub and order whatever she wants.

This is a reflection of profound changes in the financial and social status women over the past half century.

By 2004, women's alcohol consumption had nearly doubled.

Rave wave - club boom

The 1980s were a special time for the British drinks industry.

After almost 30 years continuous growth alcohol consumption stagnated at roughly the same level from 1980 to 1995, when high unemployment ruled Britain's thirst.

But the alcohol industry didn't hesitate. She has targeted a new generation of British drinkers and has launched a transformation of drinking establishments.

One of the industry's initiatives has been the introduction of a new category of drink, born of a culture that previously posed a threat to alcohol producers.

The rave culture began in the youth of my generation. Even the most introverted of us bought glow-in-the-dark bracelets and T-shirts with a smiley face on the chest.

Ravers didn't need beer, they preferred ecstasy

As I remember now, No. 1 of the British charts in 1992 - the song The group Shamen (who played first indie rock and then acid house and techno), Ebeneezer Goode, and her choral chorus "Es are good". ( "E - good." "E" is slang for "ecstasy." The song was initially banned by the BBC for promoting drugs - Ed.).

My friends and I sang along, not knowing why.

Ravers didn't need beer, they preferred ecstasy. This may be partly why pub attendance fell by 11% between 1987 and 1992.

The industry has hit back. The government legally presented club owners, as alcohol policy consultant Phil Hadfield put it, with a stark choice - “work within the system or close up shop.”

Some preferred the second option. The more successful ones opened licensed dance floors, as was the case with the Ministry of Sound club ( began operating in 1991 as a non-alcoholic establishment and over time developed into a club chain - Ed.).

Small high tables have replaced the old low tables with chairs, as it is believed that people drink more while standing

Beverage makers saw this as a chance to “re-position alcohol as a consumer product to compete with the nighttime drug economy,” wrote alcohol market researchers Fiona Masham and Kevin Brain.

New and stronger drinks were launched, targeting a youthful and diverse demographic. culturally party: strong lagers in bottles, new beers and ciders.

In the mid-1990s, the time had come low alcohol drinks, alcopops - for example, Hooch. Later, energy drinks containing caffeine and guarana extract appeared.

The goal was for alcohol not to be perceived as a mind-numbing depressant, but to become a palatable, stimulating drink appropriate to youth culture.

Dance clubs, according to Masham and Brain, helped revolutionize the alcohol industry in the 1990s.

At the same time, work began to transform British pubs. With the advent of alcohol pops, pub chains such as Firkin Brewery have decided to convert old buildings - banks, theaters and even factories - into drinking barns.

Glass panels replaced the exterior brick walls. The overhaul, Masham and Brain say, was aimed at attracting "a new base of consumers who preferred to spend free time V dance clubs, gyms and shopping centers."

In other words, not just older men.

In new pubs, small doses of strong alcohol - shots have become popular ( analogue of the Russian shot glass - Ed.).

Whiskey drinkers in Scotland had always drank it with beer, but shots themselves were a novelty in the rest of the kingdom.

Bartenders also became a novelty, starting to sell shots to customers directly at tables, from which they sometimes had to remove “barrels” and holsters.

"Vertical drinking" has become the norm here, with small high tables replacing low tables surrounded by chairs, as people are thought to drink more while standing than sitting.

Having lost their foothold, customers grabbed the glass and began to drink faster. The noise made it difficult to chat, so we had to drink instead.

“Many bars have removed interior walls and furniture to accommodate more of what the drinking industry, in its humanistic way, calls “vertical volume drinkers,” write Simon Winslow and Steve Hall, a sociologist and criminologist who has studied economics. nightlife Britain.

Marketing tactics in pubs, bars and clubs, such as happy hours and other great deals, also encouraged Britons to drink more.

In 2005, when changes in legislation allowed pubs to stay open longer ( after 23.00 – Ed.), some managers in "vertical method" pubs were offered bonuses of up to £20,000 for using sales techniques to make a profit (say, selling more singles than doubles).

At the same time, due to inflation and income growth, the real price of alcohol constantly decreased from 1984 to 2007.

One liver specialist told me, “My patient, who drinks 100 to 120 units of alcohol a week, can now afford three times as much alcohol as he did in the mid-1980s.”

Purposeful drinking

The fall in alcohol prices and the promotion of stronger and easier-to-drink drinks have given rise, according to researchers, to the phenomenon of “purposeful drinking.”

People over 40 may get drunk one evening, but this will not be their main goal. But for young people from 20 to 30 years old, this is exactly the goal.

By 2004, Britons were drinking twice as much as half a century earlier.

For young people, alcohol has become synonymous with a “good evening,” says the book Alcohol, Drinking, Drunkenness. They deliberately speed up the process of intoxication by first taking it to the chest at home, and then play drinking games and mix everything up.

By 2004, Britons were drinking twice as much as half a century earlier. The country has reached the Peak of Drunkenness. My generation climbed to the very top.

More than 500 people a year are killed on British roads due to drunk drivers.

Young drivers are most often responsible for drunken accidents. Most were men, and almost a third of the victims were women.

About half of violence victims say they believe their attackers were under the influence of alcohol.

In the 1996 film Trainspotting, there is a terrifying scene in which one of the characters throws a beer glass at a customer's face.

Throwing glasses ( glassing from Englishglass - "glass" - Ed.) has become quite common and some pubs have started using plastic glasses or safety glassware.

It says something about British drinking culture that footage from Trainspotting was used in a media campaign to mark the 10th anniversary of Revolution Vodka bars.

It is tempting to link the amount of alcohol we consume to the incidence of alcohol-related disasters, but there are other factors at play.

Drinking when you're happy, drinking when you're sad, or when there's a can of beer lying around in the refrigerator - for many of my peers, any excuse is good.

The number of victims of drunk driving, for example, has been declining since the 1970s, perhaps due to media attention to the problem and improved treatment of offenders. British roads have become safer because we're drinking at home more often.

The process of reducing road deaths temporarily reversed from 1999 to 2004, a period of sharp growth in alcohol consumption. It is difficult to say what is the cause and what is the effect.

The Peak Drinking generation is harming itself. There are no nerve endings in the liver, so we do not feel what is happening in it.

But statistics show that deaths from liver disease rose consistently each year in England and Wales until 2008, when the figures stabilized.

Several experts told me that stricter alcohol policies, which have made alcohol less accessible, have had a positive effect on reducing the number of deaths from liver disease.

Other alcohol-related diseases - degradation nervous system, poisoning, etc. - also began to decline after the Peak of drunkenness. And again we don’t know where the cause is and where the effect is.

Now the younger generation drinks less, and many of its representatives are generally teetotalers.

This may be due to financial difficulties, an increase in the number of non-drinkers for religious reasons, and an increase in the amount of time people spend online.

It's hard to say how long the decline will last, but this generation's relative indifference to alcohol has led to per capita alcohol consumption in Britain falling to just 7.7 liters in 2013.

For many of my peers, going to a bar after work on Friday is the norm. Drinking when you're happy, drinking when you're sad, or when there's a can of beer lying around in the refrigerator - any excuse is good.

Even when we are over 30, when we have a husband or wife, children, a job and a mortgage, we well understand those who lose their wallet while drunk, vomit in a taxi, sleep without undressing, and barely crawl to work with a hangover.

Drinking is part of our identity. Perhaps it couldn’t have been any other way. After all, we grew up to the accompaniment of alcohol advertising on TV, surrounded by a sea of ​​cheap booze spilled in supermarkets.

Today, liquor advertising is heavily regulated, but sponsored by wine producers culinary competitions television and T-shirts with beer company logos remind us that alcohol remains a normal part of everyday life.

The peak of drunkenness also left behind a mental burden. Many of us depend on a cold glass of white wine or a spirited gin and tonic at the end of the day more than we'd like.

It's important for me to recognize that drinking is a choice for me, not a necessity.

But if I suddenly decide not to drink one night with friends, I frantically search for an explanation and try to convince people that no, I'm not pregnant.

Sobriety Month is seen as a show of willpower, and charity campaigns like Dry January show how ingrained alcohol is in our lives.

It would also be understandable if drunkenness were our own conscious choice. Sometimes it seems that it chose us.

Britain is different as an island nation European countries its specificity in the most different areas life. This also applies to alcohol.

The answer to the question of what the British drink seems simple. However, even experienced travelers, besides beer and gin, often find it difficult to name other popular alcoholic drinks or confuse them with Irish and Scottish ones.

Beer

When thinking about what they drink in England, many people first of all remember. This foamy drink is not as common in Britain as in, despite the fact that it has been brewed here since the 13th century.