Tuesday 26 March 2013

William Younger's Porter 1851 - 1869

I'm not sure why I've never examined William Younger's Porter closely. Because there are some odd things about it. Very odd things.

First, that they couldn't decide on the brewhouse name, calling it both P and BS. The latter name, presumably short for Brown Stout, would imply it was a Stout. Then why sometimes call it P? And in terms of gravity, it's definitely in Porter rather than Stout territory.

The level of attenuation is very patchy, varying from 57% to 73%. The top end is what I would have expected. In the 1850's and 1860's, London Porter was 70-75% attenuated.

In some ways these Porters are very unlike Younger's other beers. The boils - especially in the 1850's - were longer. Their other beers were boiled for 90 minutes at most. The difference wasn't as big in the 1860's, but was still there. The pitching temperature of the Porters was higher - other beers were pitched at 56-60º F, as was the maximum fermentation temperature, which for other styles didn't exceed 70º F. Unsurprisingly given the higher temperature, the fermentation was also shorter, by one to three days.

In the 1850's, the hopping levels were similar to in London: 2.75-3 lbs per barrel. By the 1860's, they'd fallen to about half the level in London, where the hopping rate had remained constant.

I've been saving the oddest until the last: the grists. The percentage of brown malt is very high in the examples from the 1850's. So high that they must have been using diastatic brown malt, something that I thought had disappeared before this date. The pale malt percentage was more normal-looking in the 1860's, but the percentage of amber malt is very high in some examples. Note that brown malt had been dropped by then.

Other than the single example that's just pale and black malt, none of the grists look like English ones. It's all very odd.


William Younger Porter 1851 - 1869
Year Beer OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl boil time (hours) boil time (hours) Pitch temp max. fermen-tation temp length of fermen-tation (days) pale malt brown malt black malt amber malt
1851 BS 1057 1017 5.29 70.18% 21.75 3.08 2.25 64º 73º 3 + 2 42.92% 32.45% 24.63%
1851 BS 1056 1015 5.42 73.21% 23.87 2.86 2.25 63º 72º 4 + 1 24.73% 56.08% 19.19%
1851 BS 1060 1022 5.03 63.33% 23.46 2.61 2.25 63º 72º 3 + 2 24.32% 55.16% 20.52%
1851 BS 1060 1021 5.16 65.00% 25.26 2.93 2.5 64º 73º 3 + 2 26.08% 59.14% 14.78%
1851 BS 1060 1024 4.76 60.00% 27.37 3.17 2.25 64º 71º 3 + 2 26.08% 59.14% 14.78%
1851 BS 1063 1023 5.29 63.49% 7.50 0.91 2 64º 72º 3 + 1 30.60% 69.40%
1852 BS 1057 1018 5.16 68.42% 23.87 2.93 2.25 64º 72º 3 + 3 24.73% 56.08% 19.19%
1858 BS 1052 1022 3.97 57.69% 18.33 2.75 2 61º 72º 3 + 3 56.95% 14.35% 14.35% 14.35%
1858 BS 1054 1022 4.23 59.26% 16.67 2.22 2.33 62º 72º 3 + 2 56.95% 14.35% 28.70%
1868 Bg 1046 1020 3.44 56.52% 8.00 1.45 3 61º 69º 3 + 2 92.25% 7.75%
1869 BS 1041 1017 3.18 58.54% 7.69 1.18 2.5 3 61º 66º 2 + 3 45.26% 13.69% 41.06%
1869 P 1048 1018 3.97 62.50% 2.75 62º 67º 2 + 1 68.80% 10.40% 20.80%
1869 BS 1042 1018 3.18 57.14% 7.50 1.46 2.5 3 61º 67º 2 + 3 68.80% 10.40% 20.80%
Sources:
William Younger brewing records held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document numbers WY/6/1/2/5, WY/6/1/2/14 and WY/6/1/2/21.


1 comment:

Jeff Renner said...

Image please?