Saturday 25 July 2020

Let's Brew - 1885 Mew Langton XXXX

Another new recipe from my new book, "Strong! vol. 2". Which will be available soon. The book itself is done, but I can't sell it until I've approved a proof copy. It'll be a few more days.

An island brewery, this one. Located in Newport, Isle of Wight. It’s one which almost survived into my drinking days. It was bought by Strong in 1965, who in turn were gobbled up by Whitbread in 1969. Mew Langton’s plant closed the same year.

This beer is a real throwback, resembling Reid KKKK from three decades earlier. It’s extremely simple: one base malt and Farnham hops. That’s it. Not that Mew Langton were averse to sugar. Their Pale Ales and Stout contained some. But neither their Mild nor this Strong Ale did.

Unsurprisingly, given its strength, XXXX was only rarely brewed. This appears to be the only batch in 1885. And it wasn’t even a full brew: it was a parti-gyle of 54 barrels of XXXX and 84 barrels of 4d Ale, a Mild.

A whole load of hops and pretty fresh ones, too, being from the 1884 harvest. This beer was brewed in March. I’ve opted for Goldings as the nearest equivalent to Farnham that you’re going to be bale to get hold of.

1885 Mew Langton XXXX
pale malt 23.00 lb 100.00%
Goldings 120 mins 4.50 oz
Goldings 60 mins 4.50 oz
Goldings 30 mins 4.50 oz
Goldings dry hops 1.50 oz
OG 1102
FG 1034
ABV 9.00
Apparent attenuation 66.67%
IBU 127
SRM 9
Mash at 150º F
Sparge at 185º F
Boil time 120 minutes
pitching temp 61º F
Yeast Wyeast 1275 Thames Valley ale

6 comments:

eavyumble said...

Malt must be wrong in this one. 1.5 lbs?

Yann said...

15 lbs of malt maybe rather? Or only a 2-pint-batch recipe?

John said...

Hi Ron, I'm assuming that's a typo; is it 11.5lbs?

Ron Pattinson said...

All,

now corrected to 23 lbs.

Edd The Brew said...

Hi Ron ,
The W B New, Langton & Co records are very consistent in that All Parti Gyles of X X X X & X X Mild didn't use sugars.
However the other, Single Gyle brewings of 4d Mild are very consistent in their sugars useage; Viz 4 d No 5 05/10/1884.
Best Regards
Edd

SBF said...

I love the structure of old strong recipes: massive amounts of pale malt, massive amounts of goldings, yeast. Simple and effective.