Pete Brown

The Story of Our Most English Fruit

The Apple Orchard

A Sociable History of Beer

Man Walks into a Pub

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In Defence of British Food

Pie Fidelity

A History of Britain Through One Pub. Pete Brown

Shakespeare's Local

Having written Man Walks Into A Pub, an irreverent book about beer drinking in Britain, Pete Brown thought he deserved a holiday. Leaving Britain was one thing, but getting away from beer proved impossible. For while the British believe beer is, well, British, it seems a few others have cottoned on to the fact its damn fine drink. In fact it turns out there are seven countries that make more beer than Britain and - hard though it is to believe - there are at least five countries that drink more beer per-head of the population than we do. The Germans claim beer as their own; the Czechs, it turns out, invented lager; the Chinese like their beer made from rice and the Spanish see it as trendy new drink, far more fashionable than wine. What's going on? After a great deal of thought (about 15 seconds), Peter Brown decided the only way to find out was to go on the biggest pub crawl ever. Drinking in more than three hundred bars and pubs in twenty-seven towns in thirteen different countries on four different continents, Pete puts on a stone in weight and does irrecoverable damage to his liver in the pursuit of saloon bar enlightenment. On his way he meets a wild cast of bleary eyed eccentrics and samples legendary local brews in legendary quantities, from Dublin to Tokyo. It's an epic challenge, a hilarious, life-changing, globe-trotting adventure to the heart of Beer.

One Man's Quest for the Meaning of Beer

Three Sheets to the Wind

The original India Pale Ale was pure gold in a glass -- a semi-mythical beer from the late 18th century, brewed in Britain to travel halfway around the world, through ocean storms and tropical sunshine, and arrive in perfect condition for a long, cold drink on an Indian veranda. And although you can still buy beers with 'IPA' on the label today, most are, frankly, pale imitations of the original. For the first time in 140 years, a keg of traditional Burton IPA has been brewed for a voyage to India by canal and tall ship, around the Cape of Good Hope; and the man carrying it is award-winning beer writer Pete Brown. Brazilian pirates and Iranian customs officials lie ahead, but will he even make it that far, having fallen in the canal just a few miles outside Burton-on-Trent? And if Pete does make it to the other side of the world with 'Barry' the barrel, one question remains: what will the real IPA taste like? Weaving first-class travel writing and new historical research with assured comedy, Hops and Glory is both a rollicking, raucous history of the Raj and a wonderfully entertaining, groundbreaking experiment to recreate the finest beer ever brewed. .

One Man's Search for the Beer that Built the British Empire

Hops and Glory

The craft beer boom is the biggest thing to hit brewing and drinking for more than a generation. What started off as a small band of idealistic hobby brewers is now a multi-billion-dollar global industry, but even its most passionate fans can’t actually agree what ‘craft beer’ is, with some arguing that it’s simply marketing hype, and others claiming it doesn’t exist at all. Award-winning beer writer Pete Brown digs into this decades-long argument and in doing so, creates a fascinating, complex and hugely satisfying answer. He dismantles the main attempts to define the term ‘craft beer’ and argues that it is, in fact, undefinable, before shifting emphasis from beer to the broader, older idea of craft in search of answers. He shows that arguments around craft beer have largely forgotten what craft is all about – if they were even aware in the first place. He explores the ever-changing nature of work, the meaning of knowledge, the evolution of language and the ways in which we engage with our immediate environment and the wider world. Arriving back at beer from such an oblique angle, he rediscovers the real reasons why so many people are so passionate about craft beer, and argues that situating beer in a broader understanding of craft shows that the term is rich in meaning, even if it can’t be pinned down to a measurable definition. Written in Brown’s trademark pub stool conversational style, Craft: An Argument provides a new perspective on the biggest trend in global food and drink, as well as making you long for a beer.

Craft: An Argument

'An absorbing love letter to the English apple tree...lyrical and joyful' - TLS 'A delightful book' - Sunday Times Shortlisted for the André Simon Food and Drink Book Award 2016 A Radio 4 Book of the Week 'Wonderful, revelatory ... very moving' - Sheila Dillon, BBC Radio 4 'His ability to laugh at himself, openness to wonder and willingness to go wherever the search takes him make Brown an engaging writer and The Apple Orchard an entertaining journey' - Mail on Sunday Taking us through the seasons in England's apple-growing heartlands, this magical book uncovers the stories and folklore of our most familiar fruit. 'An orchard is not a field. It's not a forest or a copse. It couldn't occur naturally; it's definitely cultivated. But an orchard doesn't override the natural order: it enhances it, dresses it up. It demonstrates that man and nature together can - just occasionally - create something more beautiful and (literally) more fruitful than either could alone. The vivid brightness of the laden trees, studded with jewels, stirs some deep race memory and makes the heart leap. Here is bounty, and excitement.'

Beer is the most popular alcoholic drink on the planet, but few who enjoy it know much about how its four ingredients – hops, malted barley, water and yeast – miraculously combine. From the birth of brewing in the Middle East, through the surreal madness of drink-sodden hop-blessings in the Czech Republic and the stunning recreation of the first ever modern beer, Miracle Brew is an extraordinary journey through the nature and science of the world's greatest beverage. Along the way, we’ll meet and drink with a cast of characters who reveal the magic of beer and celebrate the joy of drinking it.

Hops, Barley, Water, Yeast and the Nature of Beer

Miracle Brew

WINNER OF THE DRINK BOOK AWARD AT THE FORTNUM & MASON FOOD AND DRINK AWARDS 2017. Pete Brown has visited hundreds of pubs across the UK and is uniquely placed to write about pubs that ooze atmosphere, whatever the reason, be it food, people, architecture, location or decor. The best pubs are those that always have a steady trade at any time on any day of the week, and where chat flows back and forth across the bar. They're the places where you want to drink weak beer so you can have several pints and stay longer. Some are grand Victorian palaces, others ancient inns with stunning views across the hills. Some are ale shrines, others gastropubs (though they probably don’t call themselves that any more). A precious few are uniquely eccentric, the kinds of places that are just as likely to have terrible reviews on Trip Advisor as great ones, because some people don't realize that the outside toilets, limp sandwiches on the bar and really disturbing full-size mannequin glaring at you from the corner are all part of the charm. This charming collection of 300 pubs explores what makes each one ooze atmosphere, be it food, people, architecture, location or décor, and looks at the quirks of local history as well as different trends and types of pub. Full of pen portraits of punters or publicans, legends, yarns and myths, this entertaining book is the perfect gift for regulars of that well-loved British institution, the pub.

A Cultural Institution — from Country Inns to Craft Beer Bars and Corner Locals

The Pub

When Steve woke up one morning, he was naked in a bed he'd never been in before. He couldn't remember what he'd done, or how he'd got there. However, it didn't take him long to realise that his heterosexual London life, his job, his rugby matches, his women and his freedom were over. He was now the sex slave of another man - and would have to learn to do as he was ordered by his owner. But Steve is surprised how quickly he can adapt to his new life as a slave.

A Slave's Life

"In lively and witty fashion, celebrated British beer writer Pete Brown presents a complete natural history of beer and shares the incredible story behind each of its four ingredients- malted barley, hops, yeast, and water. Miracle Brew explores the origins of fermentation, the lost age of hallucinogenic gruit beers, and the evolution of modern hop varieties that now challenge wine grapes in the extent to which they are discussed and revered."--Book cover.

A history of Britain told through the story of one very special pub, from "The Beer Drinker's Bill Bryson" (Times Literary Supplement) Welcome to the George Inn near London Bridge; a cosy, wood-paneled, galleried coaching house a few minutes' walk from the Thames. Grab yourself a pint, listen to the chatter of the locals and lean back, resting your head against the wall. And then consider this: who else has rested their head against that wall, over the last six hundred years? Chaucer and his fellow pilgrims almost certainly drank in the George on their way out of London to Canterbury. It's fair to say that Shakespeare popped in from the nearby Globe for a pint, and we know that Dickens certainly did. Mail carriers changed their horses here, before heading to all four corners of Britain--while sailors drank here before visiting all four corners of the world. The pub, as Pete Brown points out, is the 'primordial cell of British life' and in the George he has found the perfect example. All life is here, from murderers, highwaymen, and ladies of the night to gossiping peddlers and hard-working clerks. So sit back with Shakespeare's Pub and watch as buildings rise and fall over the centuries, and 'the beer drinker's Bill Bryson' (UK's Times Literary Supplement) takes us on an entertaining tour through six centuries of history, through the stories of everyone that ever drank in one pub.

A Barstool History of London as Seen Through the Windows of Its Oldest Pub - The George Inn

Shakespeare's Pub

Rick Priestley

The Last Argument of Kings

It's an extraordinary tale of yeast-obsessed monks and teetotal prime ministers; of how pale ale fuelled an Empire and weak bitter won a world war; of exploding breweries, a bear in a yellow nylon jacket and a Canadian bloke who changed the dringking habits of a nation. It's also the story of the rise of the pub from humble origins through an epic, thousand-year struggle to survive misunderstanding, bad government and misguided commerce. The history of beer in Britain is a social history of the nation itself, full of catastrophe, heroism and an awful lot of hangovers. 'a pleasant antidote to more po-faced histories of beer' Guardian 'Like a good drinking companion, Brown tells a remarkable story: a stream of fascinating facts, etymologies and pub-related urban phenomena' TLS 'Packed with bar-room bet-winning facts and entertaining digressions, this is a book into which every pub-goer will want to dip.' Express

A Sociable History of Beer (Fully Updated Second Edition)

Man Walks Into A Pub

Taking us through the seasons in England's apple-growing heartlands, this magical book uncovers the stories and folklore of our most familiar fruit. 'An orchard is not a field. It's not a forest or a copse. It couldn't occur naturally; it's definitely cultivated. But an orchard doesn't override the natural order: it enhances it, dresses it up. It demonstrates that man and nature together can - just occasionally - create something more beautiful and (literally) more fruitful than either could alone. The vivid brightness of the laden trees, studded with jewels, stirs some deep race memory and makes the heart leap. Here is bounty, and excitement.'

In Britain, we have always had an awkward relationship with food. We've been told for so long that we are terrible cooks and yet according to a recent YouGov survey, our traditional food and drink are more important than the monarchy and at least as significant as our landscape and national monuments in defining a collective notion of who we are. Taking nine archetypically British dishes - Pie and Peas, A Cheese Sandwich, Fish and Chips, Spag Bol, Devonshire Cream Tea, Curry, The Full English, The Sunday Roast and a Crumble with Custard - and examining them in their perfect context, Pete Brown reveals just how fundamental food is to our sense of identity, perhaps even our sense of pride, and the ways in which we understand our place in the world.

A journey through British food, from the acclaimed author of The Apple Orchard In Britain, we have always had an awkward relationship with food. We've been told for so long that we are terrible cooks and yet when someone with a clipboard asks us what the best things are about being British, our traditional food and drink are more important than the monarchy and at least as significant as our landscape and national monuments in defining a collective notion of who we are. Taking nine archetypically British dishes - Pie and Peas, A Cheese Sandwich, Fish and Chips, Spag Bol, Devonshire Cream Tea, Curry, The Full English, The Sunday Roast and a Crumble with Custard - and enjoying them in their most typical settings, Pete Brown examines just how fundamental food is to our sense of identity, perhaps even our sense of pride, and the ways in which we understand our place in the world.

Pete Brown

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