Friday, 23 April 2021

AK 1925 - 1939

I warned you that I had loads more AK stuff. I wasn't joking. 

This time we're looking at the interwar period. Many breweries dropped their AK during WW I. But not Whitbread. They introduced one in 1930. It didn't last long. In all, only 1,012 barrels were brewed. That's a tiny proportion of the 535,271 barrels they brewed that year.

Small batches is a bit of a theme with these interwar AKs. The largest batch of Fullers AK was just nine barrels, the smallest a mere two barrels. Greene King's and Shepherd Neame's were only 70-odd barrels, still far short of their full brew length.

The gravities are all pretty similar, mostly in the 1031º-1034º range. The exception being Whitbread at a tad under 1030º. Most are pretty well-attenuated, the only exception being Greene King. That high degree of attenuation leaves most a good bit over 3% ABV.

It's no surprise that the London examples - Whitbread and Fullers - are more heavily hopped that the beers from more rural districts. London brewers always seem to have been heavier with the hops than most of their provincial rivals.

AK 1925 - 1939
Year Brewer Beer OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl
1925 Fullers AK 1032.3 1007.8 3.24 75.97% 9.8 1.28
1930 Whitbread AK 1029.3 1004.0 3.35 86.36% 13.0 1.54
1931 Fullers AK 1032.3 1006.1 3.46 81.12% 9.9 1.27
1935 Fullers AK 1033.4 1006.4 3.58 80.93% 9.2 1.44
1937 Fullers AK 1033.7 1007.2 3.50 78.62% 9.5 1.25
1937 Greene King AK 1033.8 1011.1 3.00 67.21% 7.0 0.95
1937 Shepherd Neame AK 1031.3 1006.9 3.22 77.88% 6.9 0.64
1939 Fullers AK 1033.4 1006.6 3.53 80.07% 9.2 1.25
  Average   1032.4 1007.0 3.36 78.52% 9.3 1.20
Sources:
Fullers brewing records held at the brewery.
Greene King brewing record held at the brewery, document number AC93/1/12 .
Shepherd Neame brewing record held at the brewery.
Whitbread brewing record held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/01/096.

Next time: interwar AK grists.

2 comments:

Jo Haartd said...

Hi Ron,
sorry to digress but can you enlighten me in something:
is Duch Bokbier a different brew than german counterparts?
I've found Lente and Herfst variations that seems very alike descriptions for Maibock and something between Bock and Doppelbock, respectively

Ron Pattinson said...

Jo Haartd,

it's pretty similar - minimum 16º Plato and dark. At least that's the version in autumn. Meibock is always pale.