Minimum alcohol pricing is nigh

elperello wrote: »

You are really in the wrong thread looking for that advice.
You could start your own and see what advice you get.

Most of the folks on here enjoy a drink. They just don't enjoy being asked to pay an extortionate price for it.

As for myself I haven't been drunk this decade

i think im in the right thread looking for this advice.

The title is about alcohol pricing. I'm looking for the "minimum" amount i need to spend. And as you said people here like a drink and don't like paying extortionate price.

So i think it is a valid question.

redarmyblues wrote: »

The big winners from this will be home brew/distill suppliers the losers publicans and street drinkers, beware the law of unintended consequences.

Speaking of that, figures suggest that alchohol consumption has actually increased since the year before.

Last May, six years after the law got the green light in Holyrood, minimum unit pricing of alcohol was finally introduced in Scotland. After being held up by appeals from Scottish drinks manufacturers, campaigners and politicians could at last use the latest and greatest weapon against the scourge of inebriation. Alcohol can no longer be sold for less than 50 pence per unit in Scotland. Surely the imbibers of cheap cider and supermarket beer deals would now have to curb their habits?

Well, the first proper results are in – and the policy has been about as potent as a lager shandy. Nielsen, a data specialist company, found that 203.5million litres of alcohol were purchased from shops in Scotland over the 46 weeks to 29 March. Minimum pricing should have, according to Scottish government figures, raised the price of roughly half of all alcohol sold in shops. Yet the figures suggest an increase in sales of 1.8million litres on the same period in 2017/2018. That’s hardly what the anti-booze lobbyists would have expected.

So it hasn't worked, despite the line being pushed out that alchohol sales in Scotland have decreased since this was introduced.

There has also been a huge rise in the use of street meds since the minimum unit pricing was introduced. Apparently the rise is caused by people who were previously drinkers who couldn't afford the same amount of drink they would before, so pushers have been introducing them to these instead.

Dealers are said to be selling it for “pennies” to vulnerable people, including those in settled homelessness accommodation, where staff have witnessed a spate of deaths linked to the drug.

Has anyone in the HSE looked at this and allocated more money to dealing with addiction? I thought not. This could also lead to more petty crime as these new users have to get more money to feed their habit. Don't imagine that once they are hooked the pushers won't increase their prices.

Of course none of the neo puritans pushing this here will care about that. Not unless it begins to affect them. Then watch their calls for something must be done. :rolleyes:

sdraobs wrote: »

Can the paid pro-alcohol lobby group please let themselves known here. I suspect certain posters are trying hard to peddle their rhetoric to protect their employer's interests.

you mean i could be getting paid for this? by who?

odyssey06 wrote: »

Damn you beat me to it.
DIAGEO IF YOU ARE LISTENING I AM HERE.

and i would happily take payment in kind too. the odd barrel of porter wouldn't go amiss.

https://www.thejournal.ie/minimum-unit-pricing-ireland-4703692-Jun2019/

I suppose all the people who commented negatively in that article about MUP are part of the paid pro-alcohol lobby group as well lol

Thelonious Monk wrote: »

Can you recommend any kit beers? I've done extract brewing a couple of times and it's a pain in the ass and way too much sediment. I know I'm probably just not doing it right but something easier would be appreciated.

This really depends on what type of beer you usually like to drink, what categories would you normally go for in the pub or offo? Personally I'm very much a dark ale / stout man first and a hoppy IPA man second, so my brewing experience is fairly skewed towards these styles.

The nicest one I ever made (by a long shot) was The Craft Range's Citra IPA, it's currently out of stock everywhere but Home Brew West tell me it'll be back in sometime during mid-July. Costs about €23 for the kit (40 pint bottles) or a little less when it's discounted, I got it for around €19 last time around. The Citra hop blast was incredible

The Bulldog Easter Chocolate Stout is absolutely delicious. A more expensive kit coming in at around €25-€30 again for 40 bottles, but totally worth it and fairly strong at 6%-6.5% (the kit is 6% and carbonation drops / priming sugar is said to add roughly 0.4% give or take) Legitimately tastes like a chocolate milkshake with hints of Guinness.

In terms of making a properly cheap one, the UK Brew Mexican Czerveza (I'm quite sure I'm spelling this wrong) is, if you remember to stick a slice of lime in the glass before pouring, absolutely delicious - and if you started it in July it'd be ready for the spell of warm weather we usually get in and around the end of August / beginning of September. It costs around €12 for the kit and an extra couple of euro for a bag of dextrose (it's intentionally a light tasting beer a la Corona or Sol so you wouldn't actually want to use fancier sugars or malt extract)

Regarding sediment, I have several techniques I use during a brew which are possibly overkill for kit brewing, but it does mean I've never had the sediment issue. For starters, if you haven't got one already, get a second fermenting bucket with a tap attached. This will be your bottling bucket - not only can you leave most of the sediment behind in the primary fermenter by eaving the last litre or two behind and holding the siphon a little above the bottom of the bucket to avoid sucking in dead yeast and trub, the tap itself is set a little above the bottom of the bottling bucket, so if you leave it for an hour or two to settle after siphoning and clamping the lid on, the sediment should settle below the tap level. It does mean that from a 23L batch, you'll probably only get 18-19L (so 36-38 pint bottles) but it definitely lessens the sediment issue significantly.

On brew day, I basically pour the kit ingredients into the empty, sanitised bucket and then fill it with 3 or 4 litres of boiling water straight from the kettle. After that, take a paddle or wooden spoon (again, boil this first to sterilise it) and stir the sh!t out of it until everything is dissolved. Most brewing guides will tell you to oxygenate at the end once you've topped up the fermenter to 23L of cold water, but what I do (which takes more time, but has been hugely successful in jump starting fermentation - even in a recent case where I accidentally killed most of my yeast by dropping the sachet in boiling water before making the kit) is to actually oxygenate after each litre, so when you pour another litre into the fermenter, stir it in vigorously with your paddle until there's loads of foam and froth sitting on top, then do the next litre. Once it's up to 23L, stick on some very upbeat music and just go to town splashing and stirring it, I usually get a couple of Avicii songs queued up and make a point of switching direction repeatedly with the stirring so as it makes more bubbles - you're trying to get as much oxygen as possible to dissolve into it. Pitch the yeast after 10-15 minutes of this stirring of the full fermenter.

When I do it this way, I usually start hearing bubbles within just a few hours of sealing the fermenter, which is significantly less than many brewers report - and on one or two occasions I've managed to get the yeast "shockwave" where you drop it in and it immediately "erupts" with activity under the surface. Looks amazing when it happens.

Finally, discard the advice in the instructions about how long you should ferment, and give it a full two weeks at a minimum - three preferably. On top of this, when you bottle, leave the bottles for two full weeks before sticking them in the fridge, then wait as long as you can (ideally another week or two) before drinking - this allows any floating yeast or sediment to clump together in the cold conditions and sink to the bottom. Then just be careful pouring, so you leave the sediment in the dregs at the bottom of the bottle!

One extra note - if you're doing a style with aroma / dry hops (so where you add the hops to the fermenter after it's been sitting for a few days), in my advice, discard any and all instructions you might have got with the kit and wait until one day before bottling to add the hops. Also, don't boil the hops, just open whatever bag they come in and dump them straight in. This gives the most intense "ipa" hop taste in my experience - the aroma seeps out through the airlock if you do it too soon before bottling, and it likewise boils off completely if you follow Bulldog's moronic "make tea with the hops and pour that in" idea.

It does take practise but I've been at it for over a year now and I can't remember the last time I bothered buying beer in an Offo

sdraobs wrote: »

Can the paid pro-alcohol lobby group please let themselves known here. I suspect certain posters are trying hard to peddle their rhetoric to protect their employer's interests.

can you come back and tell us who this pro-alcohol lobby is?

Simply put, I don’t think there should be any more intervention by the government to super markets or off-licenses. The fact that the Vintners Federation of Ireland exists at all is laughable. They have clearly colluded with the government for years to interfere with supermarket and off-license sales which is fraudulent.

Price fixing is a scam plain and simple. People who choose to operate pubs or nightclubs are expected to be able to do so without any help from the government.

They should also be able to adapt to customer expectations when they experience a fall in sales such as price reduction and not collude with the government to inflate the prices for the off trade. Doing so is a sign of weakness and greed and is deplorable.

Having said all of that, throughout the years, the government have been crippling the pub and nightclub industries by increasing restrictions of opening hours while also charging them incrementally more for their liquor trading licenses and also lowering the drink driving limit to virtually zero.

So, naturally enough people will choose to drink at home which is less hassle and is often more pleasant than waiting to be served. Not to mention being quieter too.

AND NOW THIS…………!

The government can pedal the health spin all they want. However, the majority of disorderly offences happen outside after people have been to the pub/nightclub. The bulk of us drinkers are responsible about it. So, why should we be literally paying for the mistakes of the minority?

https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/cider-is-cheaper-than-milk-aai-call-for-minimum-unit-pricing-for-alcohol-941121.html

Alcohol Action Ireland are calling on the Government to introduce minimum unit pricing for alcohol as a matter of urgency.

The charity carried out its annual price review and found that 1 litre of cider can cost as little as 88 cent, which is cheaper than a litre of milk in most places.

A woman in Ireland can reach her alcohol quota of 11 units a week for less than €5.

A man can drink his recommended guideline of 17 standard drinks for €7.50

Upping the prices won't 'fix' anything. At the moment AAI don't have any real solid opposition.
Upping the prices will just encourage more and more people to brew, craft or distill at home. Which imho is a much worse case scenario.
That, and encourage people to take advantage of the EU prices.
If they think there is a problem now, wait until they see the problem when people have plenty of cases of wine, spirits and/or beer in their house.

I know several people who make their own wine and it's delicious.