Industry support for Beer With Food Week
Phil Vickery, celebrity chef and licensee of the King of Prussia in Farnham Royal, Berkshire
"Beer With Food Week is a fantastic idea. It's not just about training pub staff about beer but getting the public to understand more about beer and the range of flavours it offers. We need to be more like the French in our approach to beer and value it like the French value their wine."
Richard Fox, founder of the UK's first beer and food consultancy the F&B Partnership
"Beer With Food Week is a great way to link two really good things taking place in pubs. The food in pubs is the best it has ever been and there is a fantastic range of beers available from microbreweries' cask ales to imported beers. At the moment these two things are not linked together and there is such a big potential for pubs to do so."
Michael Bedford, The Trouble House, Tetbury, Gloucestershire
"I don't think we are too far off the day when beer lists will share a table with the wine list at many pubs."
Mike Dorber, the White Horse, Parsons Green, London
"It's all about the image of beer and how it is marketed and sold to the customer with the right sort of theatre and occasion. There is still a lot of education to be done on the public but in my experience people are very willing to try beer with their food when you suggest it to them."
Roger Protz, editor, Good Beer Guide
"We have made tremendous progress since the Beer With Food campaign was first launched a few years back. Special Beer With Food lunches and evenings have definitely caught on and more people are thinking about enjoying a bottle of beer with their food instead of wine.
"Licensees have to work hard to tell customers what is available and get the presentation and promotion right. It's very gratifying that customers in Tesco stores are now buying copious quantities of Greene King's Beer To Dine For."
Mike Benner, chief executive, Campaign For Real Ale
"It is about time that more breweries and pubcos realised that there are over 2,000 British beers to be enjoyed at the dining table and that beer lists can be offered alongside, or instead, of wine lists.
"We offer our support to the MA and GK with this initiative and I urge all pubs to sign up to this campaign and start considering how to promote beer with food."
