Wednesday, 2 September 2026

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1909 Maclay PI 60/-

A Maclay's Export Ale label featuring a drawing of a thistle.
We’ve now arrived at Maclay’s top-of-the-range Pale Ale, 60/-. How ironic that this was the only one of Maclay’s Pale Ales to survive WW I and WW II. And end up being the most watery beer they produced.

For a brewery’s most expensive Pale Ale, it’s not all that strong. In London, the strongest Pale Ales were around 1060º. This is more like the strength of a second-string London Pale Ale. Interesting, that. A not particularly great rate of attenuation leaves this not much over 4.5% ABV. Which isn’t much more than a post-WW II Best Bitter.

There’s not much to say about the recipe, this being parti-gyled with the PI 54/- we’ve already looked at. The grist consisting just of pale and amber malt, grits and Greenock sugar. It’s quite an untypical recipe for Scotland, where just pale malt, flaked maize and sugar was more usual.

As always with Maclay, there were loads of hops. . Hallertau from the 1905, Hallertau and 1907 seasons; Californian from 1907, Farnham from 1908 and Worcester from 1905.

I doubt that this was aged more than a couple of weeks.

1909 Maclay PI 60/-
pale malt 7.00 lb 63.64%
amber malt 0.25 lb 2.27%
grits 2.50 lb 22.73%
No. 2 invert sugar 1.25 lb 11.36%
Cluster 120 min 0.75 oz
Hallertau 60 min 0.75 oz
Fuggles 30 min 1.50 oz
Goldings dry hops 0.50 oz
OG 1051
FG 1016
ABV 4.63
Apparent attenuation 68.63%
IBU 38
SRM 7
Mash at 147º F
after underlet 152º F
Sparge at 170º F
Boil time 120 minutes
pitching temp 63.5º F
Yeast WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

 

 

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