Brown ale breweries, such as Whitbread, introduced a second weaker and cheaper brown ale that was sometimes just a sweetened version of dark Mild. These beers had an original gravity of around 1.037. After World War II, most breweries stopped producing these stronger brown ales, with the exception of some breweries in the northeast of England. The majority had an OG in the range 1.030–1.035, or around 3% ABV, much like Manns Brown Ale today. North American brown ales trace their heritage to American home brewing adaptations of certain northern English beers, and the English influence on American Colonial Ales. English brown
Cock ale Cock ale Cock ale, popular in 17th and 18th-century England, was an ale whose recipe consisted of normal ale brewed inside a container, to which was later added a bag stuffed with a parboiled, skinned and gutted cock, and various fruits and spices. The "Oxford English Dictionary", which describes Cock ale as "ale mixed with the jelly or minced meat of a boiled cock, besides other ingredients", dates the drink's earliest mention to the mid 17th century, in Kenelm Digby's "Closet Opened" (published in 1669). Included as a recipe, Digby's guide prescribes: A similar recipe was printed in 1739 in