A guide to vegan beers, ciders & ales in the UK
In the pub, want to buy a pint, but unsure about which standard lagers, beers, ales and ciders are vegan? This handy list tells you which popular UK pub beers are vegan, and which contain animal products like fish-derived finings, gelatine or cochineal.
Vegan Lager
Amstel – NOT VEGAN
Bavaria – VEGAN
Beck’s – VEGAN
Beck’s Vier – VEGAN
Budweiser – VEGAN
Carling – NOT VEGAN
Carlsberg – VEGAN
Carlsberg Export – VEGAN
Cobra – VEGAN
Coors Light – NOT VEGAN
Foster’s – NOT VEGAN
Grolsch – VEGAN
Heineken – VEGAN
Hoegaarden – VEGAN
Kronenbourg 1664 – NOT VEGAN
Peroni – VEGAN
Pilsner Urquell – VEGAN
San Miguel – VEGAN
Staropramen – NOT VEGAN
Stella Artois – VEGAN
Stella Artois 4% – VEGAN
Tennents – VEGAN
Tuborg – VEGAN
Tyskie – VEGAN
Vegan Beer & Ale
Abbot Ale – NOT VEGAN
Boddingtons (cask) – NOT VEGAN. Cans, bottles and keg however are VEGAN.
Courage – NOT VEGAN
Fullers London Pride (cask) – NOT VEGAN
Greene King IPA – NOT VEGAN
Guinness – VEGAN (Draught, cans and bottles)
John Smiths – NOT VEGAN
Marston Pedigree – NOT VEGAN
Newcastle Brown Ale – VEGAN
Old Speckled Hen – NOT VEGAN
Ruddles – NOT VEGAN
Samuel Smith’s – VEGAN (all except Yorkshire Stingo and cask Old Brewery Bitter)
Tetley’s – NOT VEGAN
Theakstons – NOT VEGAN (all)
(You get the idea…sadly most cask beers are not vegan.)
Vegan Cider (apple)
Aspall Suffolk Cyder – VEGAN
Blackthorn – NOT VEGAN
Bulmers (all) – VEGAN
Magners Original – NOT VEGAN
Old Rosie – VEGAN
Scrumpy Jack – NOT VEGAN
Stella Artois Cidre – NOT VEGAN
Stowford Press – VEGAN
Strongbow – NOT VEGAN
Thatchers Gold – VEGAN
Woodpecker – NOT VEGAN
You can find out whether other beers are vegan or not at the excellent Barnivore website. This list has been compiled from information on Barnivore – if you are in any doubt about its accuracy, please contact the brewery for confirmation.
Ruth
Are the lagers you state as vegan cask or bottled? Cask all used to be not vegan many years ago. I’ve been vegan nearly 30 yrs and my info is a bit outdated!!
The Vegan Punk
The vegan lagers are the bottles or draught (keg). Ales come in casks, they’re not vegan because they use isinglass (fish finings) to clear the beer.
Stone Forest
Hi, VPunk,
Here from Hull.
I made the decision a few weeks ago, so I’ve started asking the question when I go into a bar: “Which of your beers are not made with finings?”
First response this evening: “None of them (it’s only fish swim bladders)”, “OK, see you later.”, “Are you serious?”, “Yeah!”
Next bar (Chilli Devils in Hull, a tiny little bar, which has Atom ales and other Vegan acceptable ales on draught on a fairly regular basis); same opening question; response: “Have you turned Vegan?”, “Yes, a few weeks ago.”, “We have bottles of Atom (Hull, Sutton Fields), Brew Dog (dubiously acceptable, because of their taxidermy thing (My comment)), and a few ciders.”. I had a cider. Chilli Devils, which does three chilli dishes every day, one of which is ‘vegetarian’ (and usually Vegan), also hosts a Vegan evening every Wednesday. I mentioned Brass Castle to the proprietor, who expressed an interest into getting it in. More power to them. Every small step really does count.
Ye Old Black Boy also stocks Vegan acceptable ale, cider, and lager, as does the Sailmaker’s Arms, and in between the two is Hitchcock’s vegatarian restaurant (although that is a pre-book).
“Every journey begins from where you are standing” (Ancient Daoist saying)
Stone Forest
Just to clarify, although my diet and general consumption is probably aceptable to most Vegans, I probably cannot be considered to be a ‘true’ Vegan. My (active) decision is fundamentally ecological: I seek to minimalise any detrimental impact upon the biosphere that my lifestyle may have, because that will have a future impact not only on me, but also upon future generations. Apart from the overwhelming evidence supporting the facts that a plant based diet is both healthy and environmentally sustainable, and that an animal based one is neither, the breeding and culling of animals purely for their outer coverings is bloody cruel, as is the breeding and culling of animals for the purpose of exploiting them either as pets or for leisure activities or for ‘scientific’ experimentation of dubious value. But I don’t believe that any of this makes me inherently ‘Vegan’.
After all, I do smoke tobacco irregularly, and I do drink alcohol, although interestingly (perhaps), since I stopped being an ‘eater of the dead’, I have found that my desire for both caffeine and alcohol have diminished considerably.
Jeff Davies
alcohol, per se, is not “unvegan”. It is typically the processing method that makes it not vegan (barring milk or honey or whatever very occasionally added). And that’s the problem because it is never listed on the bottle. God bless Barnivore.
The Vegan Punk
Cheers for the info!
Stone Forest
Here’s another one from Hull: Bricknell Brewery (http://bricknellbrewery.co.uk)
john andrews
Hi,
Apparently all Bateman’s bottled ales are vegan-friendly (and they taste pretty good). So too, I believe, is Fuller’s London Pride (bottled).
adrian mills
COORS LIGHT- VEGAN
The Vegan Punk
http://www.barnivore.com/products/32244-coors-light-uk
Anne Wood
Mumbles brewery in Swansea South Wales are vegan friendly apart from the Oystermouth stout which has oysters in it.
Suzanne
Does anyone know if Caffreys is suitable for vegans?
david beirne
It’s ridiculous that Bitter and Ales are not Vegan. What possible point can there be in introducing an animal product to a drink brewed and fermented solely from Vegetables?
Julius Mach
Watch out for the cask ales delivered by a “traditional” dray pulled by the brewery horses.