is it really illegal to.........

[pinstripe]

Is it really illegal in a pub to serve a drink in 'the same glass'? Is this not a health and safety recommendation that has become accepted as law. If I request my pint to be put in the same glass can the landlord legally do so?

[Old_Geezer]

I'd have thought it should be ok but who know with the daft laws we have these days ? If you use the same glass you know the last thing it held was beer, if it is "clean" well it may not be as clean as hoped: how do you tell ? Reuse is best.

[rockyracoon]

I sometimes have my drink put in the same glass, never heard of a law about it.

[carlton23]

In the last 60yrs of supping beer or anything else for that matter, I can`t think of an occasion where I have had a clean glass for my second or third and so on. Ahh, memories.

[AB Editor]

In some pubs round here you're lucky if your first glass is a clean one!

I've had a look around. It seem like it might be a piece of advice which has taken to be "law" and then repeated enough so people believe it. I cannot find anything even vaguely backing up the claim.

[baza]

the first time I encountered the clean glass thing was ooop north in the mid sixties when keg beer reared its ugly head, 6 of us went into a pub and behind the bar were some glasses part filled, these were topped up, the head was well frothy. Too much gas?
Over the years it seems now to be everywhere even my local Legion club.

[IggyB]

Its nothing to do with health and safety, its instead a strict interpretation of the Food Safety Act 1990 which says that food (which includes drinks) be served in a clean container. This was the original interpretation but inspectors have now mellowed on this point. That said most places give clean glasses to stop the beer pipe getting covered in whatever germ the drinker has left in the washback of the old pint he is having refilled... Common sense really, colds and flu would be spread easily.

[hammerman]

Personally, i keep the same glass all night, just to save the washing up etc

[emmie]

never heard of any law about refilling someone's glass, not anytime i worked in hostelries.

[New Judge]

If you go to a beer festival in most cases you "buy" a glass (which you can redeem when you leave or keep it if you wish) and you use that glass for the duration of the session.

[emmie]

NJ, that is if you can see straight after a few pints of wallop. x

[Old_Geezer]

Well if they stopped using those swan neck things and dipping it into my pint there wouldn't be a concern.

[New Judge]

Quite so, OG. There is no good reason to serve cask conditioned ale via a swan neck. The only reason it is done is to force it through a "sparkler" in order to produce a head (and so serve less than a pint of liquid). Real Ale does not necessarily have a head (and it only has one if it is lively enough to produce one by itself as it is poured). It should be served either from the cellar by a simple beer engine with no pressurisation and no sparkler or (best of all) by gravity direct from the cask.