Let's Brew Wednesday - Barclay Perkins 1923 XLK

Continuing with our Barclay Perkins theme, today we've got an XLK from the 1920's. What fun.

I'm indebted to Derek Prentice of Fuller's for explaining what XLK stands for. LK = London Keeping. X just means base-level strength. To you and me, it's ordinary Bitter. The pumpclip just said Bitter.

My first sighting of XLK is in 1886. The same year as PA, their Best Bitter appeared. Neither had been around in 1880, so I assume they were introduced sometime in the early 1880's. The first version had an OG of 1053º (compared to PA's 1058º). By 1906, that had dropped to 1050º. It fared better than many other beers during WW I, only dropping to a low of 1040º. Though that was only the draught version. Two weaker, bottled versions were spun off during the war, one of which fell to the depths of 1028º.

As you'll see below, in the 1920's it returned to almost its pre-war strength. Which is quite an achievement. At the outbreak of WW II, it was, at 1046º, pretty much unchanged. XLK didn't fare quite so well in this war, ending it at 1035º.



Er, that's about All I have to say. So over to Kristen . . . .

Barclay Perkins - 1923 - XLK
General info: Delicious and wholesome light ale. Doesn't really sound right. This beer is very much like a lot of the AK's we have done. This one is somewhere between the start of the 'bitter' family of beers and the AK's. Lots of older hops, new malt and dark invert sugars. Made it vast quantities and quite a cheap pint for the time. A very simple and straightforward bitter that gets a lot of its character from the quality of pale malts and dark invert sugars.
Beer Specifics			Recipe by percentages
Gravity (OG)	1.047		39.1% English Pale malt			8.7% Invert No2
Gravity (FG)	1.009		24.8% American 6-row			5.2% Invert No3
ABV	5.01%		9.1% Mild malt			0%
Apparent attenuation	80.69%		13% Flaked maize			0%
Real attenuation	66.10%
IBU	26.3		Mash	120min@153°F		0.81qt/lb
SRM	9			120min@67.2°C		1.69L/kg
EBC	17.2
			Boil	2.25 hours
	Homebrew @ 70%				Craft @ 80%
Grist	5gal		19L		10bbl		10hl
English Pale malt	3.47	lb	1.580	kg	188.32	lb	72.76	kg
American 6-row	2.20	lb	1.001	kg	119.27	lb	46.08	kg
Mild malt	0.81	lb	0.369	kg	43.94	lb	16.98	kg
Flaked maize	1.16	lb	0.527	kg	62.77	lb	24.25	kg
Invert No2	0.77	lb	0.351	kg	41.85	lb	16.17	kg
Invert No3	0.46	lb	0.211	kg	25.11	lb	9.70	kg
					481.26
Hops
Goldings 4.5% 120min	1.10	oz	31.3	g	68.42	oz	1.653	kg
Goldings 4.5% 15min	0.54	oz	15.4	g	33.71	oz	0.814	kg
Goldings 4.5% dry hop	0.34	oz	9.6	g	21.09	oz	0.510	kg
Fermentation	65°F /18.3°C
Yeast	Nottingham ale yeast
	1028 London Ale Yeast  - WLP013 London Ale Yeast
Tasting Notes: Pomme fruit with a biscuity fruit tart character on the end. Herbaceous, resinous hops in the nose. Corn flakes and green tea in the middle. Lots of biting tannins as there was a vast quantity of old hops chucked in. The finish is very drying and very minerally making this end fresh and crisp.

Can you help?

I'm looking for figures on British beer exports to India in the 19th century. I've been having trouble finding many. Anyone know a good place to look?

Fermentation at Bass in the 1880's

Bored of Bass yet? Naaah. How could you be? Today we're going to take a look at Bass's system of fermentation.

You're probably thinking "I know how Bass fermented. They used unions." As always, the truth is slightly more complicated. But take my word for it. Listen to the words of someone who went around the brewery in the 1880's: Alfred Barnard.

"Thither we went, and found ourselves in a lofty and light chamber of similar dimensions to the cooling department, called the fermenting square room. It contains 117 square wooden vessels, each holding forty-five barrels, and all as clean as a new pin. In the middle of each is placed a tall mixing tunner or spreader, the shape of a doctor's stethescope, through which the added liquor is allowed to flow, so as to mix it well with the liquor which has first been run in. Here it is that the yeast is added, and the wonderful change of wort into beer takes place. This is a delicate process, as there are certain leading features to be distinguished by the watchful brewer, for, although he may have been successful in all the preceding stages, yet. should he fail in this, the advantage obtained will be of little avail. At the corner of this room, as usual, there is a capital office for the use of the Excise Officers, for it is here that their duties, as described in our first article, commence.

On returning to the staircase, we noticed on either side of the fermenting room a gas engine, which our guide informed us was used for hoisting yeast the union room below, and, on descending a few stairs we came to an intermediate low-pitched chamber, the floor of which is covered with asphalte and possesses side drains to run off the water that falls through the upper floor when the fermenting vessels placed therein are cleaned. In the centre, is the large receiving vessel, which acts as an intermediary between the fermenting squares and the union vessels, and the remainder of the floor is used for cleansing pipes and sundry other purposes. As there was nothing else that claimed our attention here, we proceeded to the floor below, which is another spacious and lofty apartment containing 640 union casks, each union holding 160 gallons, in which the fermentation of the liquor, now "beer," is completed. The ale from the fermenting squares is conducted to the union room through a series of pipes which discharge it into a long trough over the union casks, passing it from thence into the casks, by what are called union pipes ; and, fixed in the top of each cask is another pipe, called the swan neck, through which the barm passes or works itself from the cask to the top of the barm trough.

This, the process of cleansing, occupies from three to four days. Off this room, is the wing of the Old Brewery, before referred to, whose old walls are in some places nearly two feet thick. It is not quite so large a place as the room we had just left, nevertheless, it contains as many as 450 unions. The ground floor, underneath both union rooms, is appropriated to the racking department and contains some very large racking-squares with the usual running-off apparatus. It is here that the barrels are filled, hopped down, and then rolled into the railway trucks."
"Noted breweries of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. I" by Alfred Barnard, 1889, pages 66-68.

If you could be arsed to read that, you'll note that the fermentation began in open squares, not unions. The unions weren't used so much for fermentation as for cleansing. The final phase, when the yeast was removed. Brewers were obsessed with cleansing and had many different ways of achieving it. Like the dropping system used at Fullers. Or the pontoes used in many London breweries.

I've always had a rather romantic view of unions. These wonderful, if expensive, devices for producing authentic Burton Pale Ale. Until John Bexon, head brewer of Greene King, who formerly worked at Bass in Burton, put me right. "They were impossible to clean properly," he said "and were a constant risk of infection." Makes it easier to understand why breweries ditched them for more conventional methods. The surprise is that Bass kept them for so long, until the 1980's.

The next man

Colour isn't everything

Burton Pale Ale set a fashion for making beers as pale as possible. A fashion that didn't always have the best of results. As observed by Southby:

"So long as brilliancy and paleness of colour are preferred to the more sterling qualities, so long will the finest brewing value in hops be frequently neglected. The overweening desire to follow in the footsteps of those who brew the most fashionable beers, sometimes continues after the first leaders of the mode have seen reason to hold back from the extremes to which others may erroneously attribute perfection. This is emphatically the case with regard to pale ale. Granted that pale ale was fashionable, and is still regarded as the highest class of this description of beer, something more is requisite than the quality of paleness. The most admired pale beers of Burton were for many years noticeable as containing less colour than other beers. In the spirit of competition, the palest malt and hops have been run after until the pale ales of Burton are transcended in this particular by the paler ales of other localities. The highest quality of ale is rarely attainable by the use of such materials as malt and hops when unduly free from colour, and economy must be altogether disregarded, when it is attempted to use thin, weak, but light and brilliant hops, which, though commanding the best prices, contain so little condition that every full brewing quality is sacrificed to colour."
"A systematic handbook of practical brewing" by E.R. Southby, 1885, pages 232-233.

Pale does not necessarily mean higher-quality. I think that's a lesson we should all try to remember. Concentrating on a single characteristic of beer only leads to heartache. Something hop-heads should consider.

This obsession with pale colour could explain some peculiarities of late 19th-century Pale Ale grists. Such as the heavy use of sugar. Sugar often made up more than 20% of Pale Ale grists. More than in Porter and Stout. And, less expectedly, more than in Mild.

Then there's crystal malt. Used in pretty much every Bitter today. When did Barclay Perkins first use it in a Pale Ale? 1942. Whitbread were a bit earlier in their use of crystal: 1928. Lees? 1946.

I managed to spin that out quite nicely. And even threw in the odd scrap of meaty fact. Must be getting the hang of this lark. Finally.

Colouring competition update

We've had a very strong entry in the year-end colouring contest. It may be the only entry, but it is a good one.

It's from Craig Gravina and is entitled "WAR: On paisley with a skateboard - 2/50."

Think you can do better? Then prove it. You can find the rules and the image to colour in here.

Memel oak vs. American oak

Like zooming in on a fractal picture, I keep finding ever more levels of detail. This is about the wood used to contract casks.

Pale Ale casks were usually made from Memel oak. (Memel used to be part of East Prussia, but is now in Lithuania.):

"Crown Memel timber grown in and around Memel, shipped at that port, has been handed down from age to age, in the brewing world, as the oak from which casks for pale ale should be made. In the trade we have Quebec or American oak, and Memel or Baltic oak. Let me deal with the Quebec or American class first."
"Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 12", 1906, page 689.

For some purposed, American oak was considered more suitable:

"American staves, while they will not do for pale ale casks, are universally used by Irish porter brewers, and by the leading firms in the porter trade only American staves are used. 'Tis said that the tannin in the American staves lends to the Dublin porter a flavour that nothing else will. Be that as it may, American staves possess a tannin which makes them in every sense adapted for porter; yet, that very tannin debars their use for pale ale. Many brewers, particularly so country brewers, know this to their loss. One of the largest firms in the trade, a firm whom you all know, recently experimented with Memel or pale ale casks for stout, and that on a very elaborate scale; some thousands of casks were made from Memel staves, put into the trade, and examined periodically and systematically. The objects it was desired to ascertain were :— First, how Memel compared with American white oak as regards durability; second, whether the Memel heads of casks would be freer of shivers than American oak heads; third, whether the porter was affected in flavour. The initial cost, of course, was known to be much greater in Memel than American casks.

From the results it was incontestably shown that Memel oak casks were much more liable to injury than American oak. The heads shivered much more, and both sides and heads were frequently cracked across with any rough usage, such as is often unfortunately administered to casks in Ireland. The cost of repairs, consequently, was greatly in excess of the cost of repairing American oak casks.

Finally, no difference whatever could be discovered in the flavour of the contents of the cask between Memel and American oak. This latter was one of the most important things they wished to discover, and if it had been established that porter stored sweeter in Memel than in American oak, the firm to which I refer would have at once adopted Memel, more particularly in their firkin trade, as for family trade purposes this size of cask is largely used, and accordingly the porter is stored longer than in hogsheads and barrels. As, however, no difference could be found, and as all the other advantages were distinctly with American oak, the experiments ended in satisfying them that Memel was much less suitable for their trade, apart altogether from the expense, and I understand, if they were faced with the alternative, they would pay a higher price for American oak than Memel.

What surprises me, is that Scotch and English brewers who have a fair trade in stout, do not follow the example of the famed Irish porter brewers and use American white oak, or, as they are called, Quebec casks for porter. Till very recently they were considerably cheaper, and I understand are still soma what so, and it is surprising that any brewer exports stout in anything else but Quebec casks, although the fact is that the largest exporters of stout do so. I have met the objection repeatedly to the use of Memel casks for ale and Quebec casks for porter, the difficulty of distinguishing the one from the other, but that can be overcome by simply having the ale casks painted white and the porter red."
"Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 12", 1906, pages 691-692.

Interesting that. How Dublin brewers used American oak. And that it supposedly contributed to the Dublin Porter flavour. I think it's safe to assume that they're talking about Guinness. At that time not only the largest brewery in Ireland, nor even the largest brewery in the United Kingdom, but the largest brewery in the world.

Though the author then goes on to point out that there was no appreciable difference in the flavour of Porter stored in American as opposed to Memel oak. But that American oak was less prone to damage.

I've included a final quote, because of what it reveals about lining barrels with pitch:

"Two classes of oak have recently been tried and are, I understand, used on the Continent to-day, even varied lots of casks so made have been imported to London. I refer to Hungarian and St. Petersburg oak. To those who pitch or resin their casks no objection may be taken to timber of that class, but for ordinary use as pale ale casks they will never do. In the manufacture of these casks the steaming process brings out simply "stink," which, if any brewer ever felt he would not allow within any reasonable distance of his brewery. It behoves you, therefore, to see that in ordering casks you insist upon having them made from Crown Memel Oak. It is only fair to add that the coopers in Scotland have not gone into this class of oak. I would feign express the hope they never will.
"Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 12", 1906, page 695.

It seems clear that the reason casks made of Hungarian or St.Petersburg oak are unsuitable for Pale Ale is the flavour it imparts to the beer, if you don't pitch-line your casks. Ergo Pale Ale casks weren't usually lined with pitch. And nor were those at Guinness.

I've been looking for information about whether British casks were lined in the 19th century for a while. It's been surprisingly difficult. And much of the evidence, like that in this article, is a matter of inference. But it all points in one direction. That British casks weren't lined.

A picture for Alan

Alan likes photos of beer in the snow. I wonder if this one would do?

I never thought I'd get the chance to take a snap like this so early in December. Not in Amsterdam. bloody global warming.

How to bottle Bass

When I get my time machine working and travel back to the 19th century to become a bottler, these tips should come in really handy. Not likely, you reckon? Well, you never know. You never know.

The practice of sending out barrels of beer to third parties for bottling was quite common in the 19th century. And it wasn't just the obvious candidates like Bass and Guinness who were up to it. I've seen Barclay Perkins labels that indicate bottling in Scotland. Third-party bottling continued in the 20th century, though it mostly withered away as brewers took up bottling themselves. Guinness still do it, I think.

Letting other brewers bottle their beer was one of the ways Guinness and Bass got their beer into pubs tied to others. By bottling, the other brewer would be getting some of the profit from the beers. And there was the added advantage of Guinness and Bass advertising their products for them. You can see why it benefitted everyone.

"According to Wright, ale for bottling should be allowed to go through all its cask changes, spontaneous brilliancy (unaided by finings) at the end of them being the simplest criterion of ripeness for bottling.

The temperature of the bottling cellar should not exceed 55° F. (10° R.), and may well be lower, and a fair amount of ventilation, if it can be managed, with a uniform temperature is desirable. When bottled, however, a higher temperature is required to insure, proper condition, say from 58° to 6o° F. (11.5° to 12.5° R.) ; but note that too speedy maturity is not to be wished for. pointing, as il does, to faulty brewing or incomplete secondary fermentation.

Messrs. Bass & Co. used to issue the following instructions to their agents:

'The proper season for bottling pale ale commences in November and ends in June.

Pale ale should not be bottled during the summer months, nor after hot weather has set in, even though the temperature should afterward become cool.

The ale should be placed bung upward in a cool, ventilated store, about 50° to 55° F. temperature.

If the ale should get into a brisk state of fermentation, a porous cane or porous oak spile should he inserted in the hung until the excessive fermentation has subsided, when a tight, close peg should be substituted.

Ale should never be allowed to become flat.

It should be bright and sparkling when bottled, but not fermenting. The bottles to lie corked directly they are filled.

In bottling, a tap with a tube reaching toward the bottom of the bottles should be used.

When corked, the bottles to be piled standing upright and not lying on their sides.

When the ale becomes ripe, a sediment will be deposited in the bottles. In uncorking be careful not to disturb it, but empty the contents of the bottle into a jug, keeping back the sediment.'"

"American handy-book of the brewing, malting and auxiliary trades" by Robert Wahl and Max Henius, 1902, pages 811 - 812.

I love the idea of bottling, just like football or cricket, having a season.

Lazy Sunday afternoon

Market Porter 12:01

Great to be part of the change-jangling crowd leaning on the doors before opening time. Takes me back to Sundays in Bromley-by-Bow. Back in the dark times when the pubs only opened for two hours on Sunday afternoons.

Happy days . . . . . no, miserable days. Miserable, black, black days.

Coverdale St. George's Stout

I'm reading an article about Lemmy in the Independent on Sunday. For some reason it gives me an irresistible urge to order a double whisky. So I do. Not that I would have resisted even if had been a resistible urge.

The Stout is OK. Bit thin and burnt, but OK.

Yorkshire Dales Brewery Birk Dale Bock.

A 4.4% ABV Bock. Interesting concept. But, had they been brewing Bock in Britain in 1914 at German strength, 4.4% ABV is probably about where it would have been today.

Quite a nice beer but, apart from the colour, nothing about it's very Bock-like. More like a hoppy Dark Mild, brewed to 1920's strength.



Arriving at Hanger Lane tube station, I discovered there's a tube strike tomorrow. Bugger, bugger, flip. How the hell will I get to the archives?* They're effing miles away. Perhaps a change of plan will be in order. John Keeling did say that I could turn up anytime I wanted tomorrow. And have a rummage in their drawers**. So to speak. Make a whotsit out of a thingy. Maybe get a look at the first brew of ESB. Or the Hock I drank in 1979.

The strike is going to drastically limit my attempt to get the full set of Whitbread's Porter records. I only did 25 years yesterday. I was feeling a bit shit. A bit hungover, I think. No idea why. I did have a pint of Harvey's Imperial Stout at 11 am. Followed by two more Imperial Stouts and a number I can't remember of beers at Meantime. Never drink with a brewer. Not if you have any pity for your liver.

A 12-hour drinking session, kick-started with three pints odf 10% ABV beer. That shouldn't give you a hangover, should it? I must be getting old.

Forgot to mention. I'm on Park Street. yes the Park Street (or Deadman's Lane as it used to be colourfully called). Home of Barclay Perkins (obligatory reference there).

Is there something wrong with the heating? Most customers - including notoriously sweaty bastard me - are still wearing their coats. Time for another double whisky. Any excuse.

Should I drop by the Anchor?*** My only photo of it is rubbish, taken when the light had almost gone.

Peggoty's Porter.

I shouldn't have relied on just looking at the pump clips. There's another set of handpumps hiding around the corner. I only noticed they had a Porter on when I went to the bog. Thank you bladder. 4.1% ABV. When is that right for? A few weeks in 1917. Or some years in the 1920's. Mmm . . . . I've done that one already, haven't I? There's a touch of smoke. But, hadn't I known it was a Porter, I could have mistaken it for a Dark Mild. NTTS. I can't use that phrase. My arse would drop out of my kecks if I did.




* I didn't.
** I didn't.
*** I did.