Let's Brew - 1921 Barclay Perkins BS Exp

This beer must have been a relief after the war years. Finally, a full-strength Stout again. Hang on, it wasn't available in London. As it was an export beer.

Really an export beer. Written in red at the top of the record it says “For exportation only”.

I assume that’s because of the strength. It would have been uneconomical to brew this beer for the domestic market due to the price controls that were still in place. You could only charge a maximum of 9d per pint for anything with a gravity over 1054º. The domestic version of BS was 1055º, exactly what you would expect, as that was the most profitable gravity to brew to.

Interestingly, it says “Sterax lined casks”, presumably meaning the casks it was racked into for maturation. It’s one of the few pieces of evidence I’ve come across for lined casks being used in the UK.

The grist is pretty complicated , with five malts. Though what’s missing caught my eye: flaked maize, which was a standard ingredient in their Ales. There is, however, a small quantity of oats. Presumably so they could sell some of it as Oatmeal Stout. It’s not clear from the brewing record what form they were in, malted or flaked. The latter would be my guess.

The mild malt in the recipe is my substitution for SA malt. The pale malt was PA malt in the original. I thought it was odd having PA malt – the highest quality pale malt – in a Stout. But there’s a note next to it saying that it was used in error and should have been SA malt.

Some of the roasted malt – 0.25 quarters of the 3.5 quarters in total – was added in the copper. It was usual for Barclay Perkins to throw some of the black malt into the copper for their Stouts. I assume that it’s for colour.

There’s only one sugar and that’s No. 3. Surprisingly, there’s no caramel, which turns up in most of their beers.

The real FG would have been lower as I’m sure this beer underwent a long secondary fermentation.

Almost forgot to mention that it’s very heavily hopped. The hops were all pretty fresh so I saw no reason to knock down the hopping rate. Though the maturation period that I’m sure this beer underwent would have reduced bitterness levels by the time the beer was consumed.

1921 Barclay Perkins BS Exp
mild malt	7.25 lb	46.40%
pale malt	1.25 lb	8.00%
brown malt	1.25 lb	8.00%
black malt	1.25 lb	8.00%
amber malt	2.00 lb	12.80%
oats	0.125 lb	0.80%
No. 3 invert sugar	2.50 lb	16.00%
Cluster 120 mins	1.50 oz
Saaz 120 mins	1.50 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	3.00 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	3.00 oz
Fuggles dry hops	1.00 oz
OG	1072
FG	1025
ABV	6.22
Apparent attenuation	65.28%
IBU	105
SRM	44
Mash at	148º F
Sparge at	172º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	59º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1099 Whitbread Ale