It is usually seen as the favourite tipple of pensioners in flat caps who sit in the corner of the pub, but traditional cask ale is undergoing a makeover.

A new report has revealed there are now 8.6 million people quaffing cask ales in the UK, with more and more 18 to 24-year-olds choosing the drink.

Bosses at Banks’s Brewery in Wolverhampton today raised a glass to the Cask Report 2010, which also revealed an extra 3,000 pubs are now serving Britain’s national drink.

The number of young people drinking cask beer has jumped by 17 per cent.

And, despite a slight dip last year, the number of women drinking ale has doubled since 2007.

In terms of winners and losers, brands owned by multi-national brewers John Smith’s, Tetley’s and Boddingtons have seen their share of the market shrink to 16 per cent.

The battle of the boozers has been won by the microbreweries and regional operators like Wolverhampton- based Marston’s, which employs about 1,000 people at its West Park brewery in Wolverhampton, where it produces Banks’s.

This year has seen the firm launch a new nine-pint take-home cask while its cask ale sales are about three per cent up on last year — it has about 23 per cent of the UK market.

Joanne Wyke, brand manager at Banks’s, said: “The report confirms what we’ve been noticing here at Banks’s — that more people are discovering cask beer. And what’s most encouraging is once they’ve discovered it, they stuck with it.”

Cask Report author Peter Brown said: “More people than ever are drinking cask beer and are interested in the regional styles that make them relevant to local customers and give them provenance.”

He said another reason for the growth in real ale is that it goes better with food.

Birmingham-based pub operator M&B runs food-led brands including Vintage Inns and Toby Carvery. Rachel Evans, M&B’s drinks quality manager, said: “Cask ale is a fantastic match to food, with natural ingredients and strong flavours which complement many of the dishes on our menus.”