In Canada, we do not worry about things like the amount of beer you get in a glass. You may as well - and often do - ask for a "big" or "small" glass of beer as opposed to a pint. And what is "big" or "small" in one place bears no resemblance to what is on offer down the road. "Pint" can mean anything from the 12 oz standard bottle to the UK pub pint glass at least 20 oz. A "half" needn't necessarily be 50%. In the Halifax of my youth, you actually ordered "two" which meant two eight ounce glasses. In the Upper Ottawa Valley "pinting" is just a euphemism for the act of drinking. But in British Columbia things are even worse as regulations actually require that confusion be the law of the land:
The federal government insists that anyone who claims to be selling a pint in Canada had better pour a full Imperial pint measuring 20 ounces, or 568.26 millilitres. The province's Liquor Control and Licensing Branch, however, stipulates that individual servings of draft beer cannot exceed 500 millilitres or 17.5 ounces. In a random survey of 15 pubs in Metro Vancouver that advertised ``pint'' sales, the Vancouver Sun found pubs served 17 ounces on average, representing a three-ounce discrepancy with the federal law, but within the bounds of provincial regulations.
Excellent. I am used to the idea of Federal and Provincial law implicitly conflicting with each other but you would think that one regulator might check with the other. To be fair, in many places, the actual serving size - whatever it is - is set out by ounces or millilitres in the menu or on the chalk board. Unlike the US shaker glass question - which I discovered is not about minor Protestant furniture making sects at all - this is also not really about some maybe trying to rip someone off. There is just no concept of a standard bar serving or even the consumer demand for it. Unlike in Britain, no one really cares how much is in one unit of beer. Maybe it's because we Canucks just measure consumption by the number of units, by how many beer we had last night - not exactly how much.
Comments
rompinreggie - August 24, 2009 11:26 am
Alan,
Great topic. My usual pub is up to $4.75 a "Sleeve" It is not a Pint, not a glass, we locals call it a "Tweener" A pint, which may provide 1" more beer is $5.25. There appears to be no standard. The only other pub in town has a different programme all together. For your followers, have them check the thickness of the bottom of the glass. I have noticed some pub owners, change their glassware(Overnight), and the new issue will have a 3/4" thick bottom. People like Dominion Glass probably use this gimmick as a sales tool, and the greedy will bite, but s--t disturbers like me, will take note.
Libarbarian - August 24, 2009 7:52 pm
When my then-girlfriend now-wife worked in London pubs back in the day (okay, 1985) the constant refrain from customers was "Top it up love". If the bitter wasn't flowing down the sides of the glass the regulars were ticked.
cbjerrisgaard - August 25, 2009 2:38 am
I wrote a post about this today as well. Its scary how royally screwed we are when it comes to being beer lovers. Short pour, expensive, and restricted in terms of variety thanks to impossible importing documentation...
Alan - August 25, 2009 8:54 am
Cry freedom, comrade!
Yeti - August 25, 2009 9:54 am
I'm so old I can remember when (as an illegally young patron), I was served draft in 8-oz. glasses with a white line around the top to prevent short-changing of the customer. That was a welcome Ontario government intervention, IMO. As I recall, the price was 15 cents a glass.
rompinreggie - August 25, 2009 12:46 pm
Hey Yeti, We in B.C. used to have that white line. It was called a plimsel(sp) line. Pub owners association got rid of that idea when a facist government was elected. After the line disappeared, the line was the diameter of a dime. I have a good pal that drinks Guiness, draft, in pints. He is so tight, he checks all his pints with dime. It is also rumoured, he can squeeze a fart out of the Beaver on a Canuck nickel.
Reign - August 25, 2009 4:08 pm
Yeti, when I was in high school, ( 1972 ) we used to go down to the local bar/eatery where the noon left over food was served ( $2.00 ) and the 8 oz. glass of draft was 10 cents. ( Put a pinch of salt in and watch the show ).
Yeti - August 27, 2009 3:36 am
Reign, salt in the beer is bringing back memories of the old-time draft rooms, with the hot-dog ferris wheel on the bar, right beside the pepperettes and the murky, revolting-looking jar of picked eggs. After pounding the cheap draft for a few hours and eating some of that horrid bar food, we'd adjourn to an all-night diner and down a huge heap of pork, bread, fries and gravy. I'm not sure how we survived, but I don't think nutrition had been invented back then. :D