'Restaurant selling beer in litres to face prosecution'
A Polish restaurant in Doncaster has been told selling its Zywiec beer in its 0.3 litre and 0.5 litre glasses is a crime. Although the restaurant has received no complaints from customers, trading standards officers told the couple they have 28 days to replace all the glassware, or face prosecution - The Daily Telegraph
Thousands of pubs around Britain face being put out of business by high beer taxes, The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) has warned. It took its protest about price increases to the opening of the Great British Beer Festival in London where protesters at Earls Court wore "fair deal on beer tax" T-shirts and masks of Alistair Darling - BBC
Drinkers will be paying £5 for a pint in British pubs within four years due to rocketing beer taxes, real ale lovers warn. A pub pint of lager now costs on average £2.82 - a 14p increase since February. Real ale has gone up by 12p a pint to hit an average £2.59. - The Daily Express
Scientists are developing an "electronic tongue" that they hope will one day make a wine taster more reliable than a human palette. The e-tongue can already tell the difference between four grape varieties - Airen, Chardonnay, Malvasia and Macabeu - and samples of the same wine belonging to vintage years 2004 and 2005. - The Daily Telegraph
Melissa Cole, female beer expert, has listed her top 10 beers at the Great British Beer Festival: Breconshire Brewery: Welsh Pale Ale, Grainstore: Rutland Panther, Crouch Vale: Brewer's Gold, Otley: O1, Wychwood: Hobgoblin, Cain's: Raisin Beer, Fuller's: ESB, Thornbridge: Jaipur IPA, Hebridean: Beserker Export Pale Ale, Hog's Back: A Over T - The Times
Taxing pre-mixed drink prices by 70 per cent cut Australian's consumption of alcopops by 30 per cent, but pushed bottled spirit sales up by 46 per cent as teens mixed their own. And because people pour themselves generous measures, Australian alcohol consumption rose 10 per cent - the precise opposite of what was planned. The extra boozing means some A$600,000 a month extra in duties. - The pros and cons of taxing alcopops as discussed in The Spectator
An extra 2million people a month are eating at McDonald's despite the credit crunch gripping Britain. The fast food giant is in such demand that it is trying to fill 4,000 so-called 'McJobs' to help serve millions of hungry customers - Metro
