Beer should be served in a champagne flute - sommelier

'Don't patronise a woman' when it comes to her taste in beer. Photo / Thinkstock

Beer is better with food than wine and should be served in a champagne flute or brandy snifter rather than a traditional pint glass, Britain's first "beer sommelier of the year" has claimed.

Jane Peyton said that there was too much snobbery around pairing the drink with food.

She advised serving beers made with champagne yeast as an aperitif or ales with chocolate and coffee flavours with rich desserts such as tiramisu.

"It's actually a much better pairing with food than wine and there are so many special beers for fine dining," she told a magazine.

"But snobbery means it's an uphill battle to convince people of all that. Wine as the drink of people of high status for 5,000 years, and the wine industry with its good PR, has maintained that reputation."

Ms Peyton said many hosts assume that women in particular only want to drink wine at dinner or parties. But a recent survey found that women might consider drinking beer if it wasn't served only in a pint glass.

"Don't patronise a woman," she added. "And if she orders beer, don't assume she'll want a pale, tasteless fruit beer. She might want an imperial Russian stout, which tastes like treacle.

"I'm always trying to persuade more women to drink beer. When I have dinner parties I pour out my ale into champagne flutes and brandy glasses."

Britain is undergoing a craft beer resurgence: there are more than 1,300 breweries and micro-breweries in the UK, the highest number in 70 years. After a decade in which beer sales fell 24 per cent - 6.7 million fewer pints sold per day - there was a 1.3 per cent rise in purchases in 2014.

Ms Peyton told The Independent that pubs were a national treasure and should be saved at all costs.

"They are good for our social health as they are so convivial," she added. "Beers in a pub make people happy."

Ms Peyton, who has written about beer in the books Beer o' Clock and School of Booze and trains bar staff and runs brewery tours, was awarded her title by the British Institute of Innkeeping and the Beer Academy in 2014.

Contenders must suggest beer matches for the three-course British Institute of Innkeeping's annual lunch menu, conduct a tasting of a bottled craft beer and demonstrate how to present a beer in perfect condition in a pub environment.