Saturday 26 March 2016

Let's Brew Wednesday (Saturday edition) – 1858 William Younger Ex Pale Ale

Here’s something doubtless more in tune with modern tastes: a hoppy Pale Ale.

Is it a Pale Ale or an IPA? No effing idea. It’s not even a sensible question for an 1850’s beer. There wasn’t really much of a consistent demarcation between the two. All I can say is that this looks pretty close to a beer like Bass Pale Ale, the classic English IPA.

Younger’s used pretty much an identical mashing schemes for all their beers, with the exception of their Stouts which had lower mashing temperatures. Their Pale Ales were mashed just the same way as their Scottish Ales.

I’m really struggling for much to say about this beer. Other than that it was pale and hoppy. Very hoppy. Loads of Goldings in the boil and loads more as dry hops. Leaving an impressive IBU count of 142. And that’s using BeerSmith’s default of 5% alpha acid content. Most of the old analyses of Goldings show over 6% alpha.

This looks like a Stock Pale Ale, meaning a long secondary conditioning is appropriate. Anything from 3 to 12 months. If you’re the patient sort. And the real FG would have been lower. These export beers usually had 80% plus attenuation.


Me done. Recipe. Off for a walk now . . .



1858 William Younger Ex Pale Ale
pale malt 14.75 lb 100.00%
Goldings 90 min 4.00 oz
Goldings 60 min 4.00 oz
Goldings 20 min 4.00 oz
Goldings dry hops 2.50 oz
OG 1063
FG 1016
ABV 6.22
Apparent attenuation 74.60%
IBU 142
SRM 5
Mash at 154º F
Sparge at 185º F
Boil time 120 minutes
pitching temp 61º F
Yeast WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Flippin' 'eck!
That OG-IBU ratio looks just daft,like something I would brew.
No way in holy hell I can get that yeast. If I wanted to brew this up,what yeast could I sub in?
And
Brett?

Brandon said...

Ron,
Why must you continuously chip into the established narrative about Scottish Ales with facts and evidence? This is insanity! Whats next, no "smokey" water? Yes, it really says that... http://www.bjcp.org/2008styles/style09.php

Pisshead Philistine said...

No way in holy hell I can get that yeast. If I wanted to brew this up,what yeast could I sub in?


A quick check of the YeastBot database shows a cross-reference of WY1728. Hope this helps.

Anonymous said...

Thanks very much for that,but not much help.
I am very very restricted as to what yeast strains I can get in Thailand.
Fermentis and Mangrove Jacks are the easiest.
I have(I can see eyes rolling) Funktown and a few Saison strains,various Brett strains that people have sent me.

J. Karanka said...

MJ British Ale yeast? If you can taste the yeast between those 142 IBUs let me know.

A Brew Rat said...

I would recommend Fermentis US-05 as a reasonable substitute for a Scottish ale yeast.

Unknown said...

Yeah,if I can taste the yeast!
Didn't effing dawn on me, that.
Cheers

Mike said...

I've always understood that the wort can only absorb so much iso-alpha acids and becomes saturated beyond 100 IBU or so, depending on the OG of the beer. There's also research that says beyond 85-90 IBU you start to lose your ability to taste any difference.

It would be interesting to have a lab analyze the actual IBU of this recipe, to see what they really are. Then another experiment would be to brew another version that gave you 90 IBU and see if drinkers can tell the difference between the two.