The principal grain in England was barley, in fact english brewers preferred barley over all other grains, unlike the continent where there’s more variety. Beer can be made from any vegetable matter, so they would use wheat sometimes (though in small proportions in England) as well as oats, but oats is ore difficult to deal with so barley was common. In the east, they used brewer’s yeast, and hops, and they were beginning to grow these and were imported in England for a long time, by Shakespeare’s time they were growing hops in fields, especially in Kent, so that was pretty much it. Some other sweetener sometimes, but it was in essence, barley, yeast, water and hops.

In the middle ages, a lot of beer was made domestically, people in villages, housewives would provide beer for their own family. If they had any left, they would sell that, and some would even become professional beer makers selling it from their houses, but when towns begin to get larger, commercial brewing became the norm. In London, in Shakespeare’s lifetime, there was a sizable brewing industry with major brewers, producing large quantities of beer by 1585, London brewers sold both 106 million liters of beer. 200 million pints, that’s 300 million cans, except there were no cans, but that gives you an idea of the volume. 26 big brewers, 3.2Million per brewer. Large scale operations, turning out over 100k pints of beer a week, using something like 50 tons of grain to produce that beer. They’d supply individuals, but even more than that, they’d supply pubs, inns, drinking houses, etc. There were a couple hundred thousand people in London in a concentrated area, and one reason they didn’t make beer at home in London is that you needed space and a place to store grain, so in the city, it was more common to buy beer. Which was also exported, too, shipped 100s of thousands to Belgium and the Netherlands mostly, but other markets as well. Because beer drinking was popular, there was one pub for every 200 people and even more in London.

Pot was just a word used to describe any container. The pot would have been some drinking vessel, a slang term for drinking vessel. The beer would come from a barrel and then go into the container. People wouldn’t store beer very long, because of the different kinds of beer. Different kinds of beer had names for advertising means, but in England, these names were mostly associated with price. Malt grain beer boiled in water to extract the vegetable matter and then put it in a brew kettle with a preservative and from that, they’d extract a liquid mixture that fermented with yeast and it comes out as beer. This grain/malt they used for the first round, and they would put water on it and put it through the process again with hops, and some preservative, and then ferment it again, but it is weaker now because it’s less vegetable matter. They would then do it once more, and sometimes a 4th time, but that was rare. But it had beer that was strong, less strong, and weak. Double double meant very strong. Double was a strong beer. Double double used higher grain and more alcohol per liter. Double beer [ was a] standard strong beer.

Poor nutrition, no nutrients out of it, [so Jack Cade is saying that] when I get to be boss, no one has to drink that useless stuff, they’ll have good quality beer. [Small beer was a] Poor man’s drink, or a child’s drink or for sick people.

Different strain of yeast. Top fermented was the norm and standard for a long time. Yeast would fall to the bottom =in the fermentation trough, age at a lower temperature so it had to be laggered (a place where you store things) and kept cool. So in places like southern France or Italy, it wasn’t going to happen because the climate was too hot. Beer was being made and is bacteria heaven, it’s warm, very nutritious, so bacteria grows easily with a high spoilage rate (losing 20% of beer made from spoilage in Shakespeare’s lifetime) many brewers sold vinegar on the side to treat beer that was infected. Letting beer sit around makes it susceptible to these infections, if you’re going to let it sit for a while )(which you do with bottom fermented years) you have to have it protected and cold. Now, starting in the late 19th century, we had refrigeration machines, and they could easily make beer with bottom fermentation and the practice travelled to many of the world so most that’s made now is made with bottom fermented yeast, and there’s still some top fermented yeast, popular in Rhone, and stouts are typically made with top fermented yeast. If you can tell the difference between a lager and an ale, then you would say yes, but today it has to do with other influence like grain, quantity of grain used, chemicals or additives, etc.