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Sunday, 2 September 2012

Tennent's Lager 1889 - 1890

Many thanks to Barm for sending me a couple of pictures from some early Tennent's Lager documents. They're what I've based this post on.

They aren't brewing records, but an overview of the quantity of Lager brewed and the materials used. They still contain plenty of useful information such as OG, hopping rate and grist. Plus they give an idea of how much Lager Tennent were brewing.

The records cover 1889-1890 and in the 6 months that they cover, Tennent brewed 2,418 barrels of Lager. Assuming that they brewed a similar amount every month of the year, that comes to an annual output of 4,836 barrels. Or bugger all. Large London brewers had single batches of Mild Ale of more than 1,000 barrels. Though this is before Tennent's shiny new Lager brewery first brewed in 1891. Presumably they upped production a bit then.

Let's move on to the beer itself. Its gravity was around 1056ยบ, about dead on average for the period. And a couple of points below a contemporary London X Ale. It's odd they way they changed the grist a few times: occasionally brewing it all malt, but mostly with about 25% maize. Though there were single brews that used either rice or sugar.


Tennent's Lager 1889 - 1890
Date Year Brewer Beer OG lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl barrels lbs hops total qtrs  qtrs malt flaked maize flaked rice
31st Oct 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1053.0 4.62 1.25 48 60 13 13
7th Nov 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1054.0 4.62 1.18 102 120 26 26
14th Nov 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1057.0 4.50 1.20 100 120 26.67 20 6.67
21st Nov 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1060.0 4.50 1.20 100 120 26.67 20 6.67
28th Nov 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1058.0 4.50 1.13 106 120 26.67 20 6.67
5th Dec 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1057.0 4.50 1.12 107 120 26.67 20 6.67
12th Dec 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.50 1.07 112 120 26.67 20 6.67
19th Dec 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.16 112 130 26.67 20 6.67
4th Jan 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.18 110 130 26.67 20 6.67
8th Jan 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.17 111 130 26.67 20 6.67
16th Jan 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.20 108 130 26.67 20 6.67
22nd Jan 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.13 115 130 26.67 20 6.67
29th Jan 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.14 114 130 26.67 20 6.67
6th Feb 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.13 115 130 26.67 20 6.67
13th Feb 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.14 114 130 26.67 20 6.67
27th Feb 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1054.0 4.87 1.10 118 130 26.67 20 6.67
15th Mar 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.13 115 130 26.67 20 6.67
20th Mar 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1056.0 4.87 1.13 115 130 26.67 20 6.67
28th Mar 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.13 115 130 26.67 20 6.67
3rd Apr 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1054.0 4.91 1.12 116 130 26.5 26.5
10th Apr 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1053.0 4.87 1.10 118 130 26.67 20 6.67
17th Apr 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1053.0 4.87 1.08 120 130 26.67 20 6.67
1st May 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1054.0 4.87 1.06 123 130 26.67 20 6.67
8th May 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1053.0 4.87 1.09 119 130 26.67 20 6.67
15th May 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1054.0 4.91 1.13 115 130 26.5 26.5
29th May 1888 Tennent Lager Beer 1055.0 4.87 1.10 118 130 26.67 20 6.67
Source:
Record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive

The hopping rate is very low, way lower than even for Mild. Here's a table to show how it compares with London beers of the same period:


London beers 1889 - 1891
Date Year Brewer Beer Style OG FG ABV App. Attenuation lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl
7th Oct 1891 Barclay Perkins BS Stout 1077.0 1027.0 6.61 64.94% 8.56 2.98
19th Feb 1891 Barclay Perkins KK Stock Ale 1075.0 1020.2 7.25 73.04% 15.17 4.91
11th Mar 1891 Barclay Perkins KKK Stock Ale 1085.0 1021.6 8.39 74.58% 14.75 5.43
10th Jun 1890 Barclay Perkins X Mild 1058.0 1015.5 5.62 73.26% 7.92 1.98
8th Jan 1890 Whitbread 2KKK Stock Ale 1075.3 1025.0 6.66 66.82% 14.29 4.90
10th Jan 1890 Whitbread 2PA Pale Ale 1054.6 1011.0 5.76 79.84% 10.79 2.78
28th Oct 1889 Whitbread FA Pale Ale 1052.4 1008.0 5.87 84.72% 10.17 2.65
21st Oct 1889 Whitbread KK Stock Ale 1074.5 1020.0 7.21 73.16% 12.12 4.25
1st Nov 1889 Whitbread KKK Stock Ale 1086.4 1028.0 7.73 67.60% 14.00 5.87
23rd Oct 1889 Whitbread PA Pale Ale 1060.4 1012.0 6.40 80.13% 11.05 3.19
11th Oct 1889 Whitbread X Mild 1060.1 1016.0 5.84 73.38% 7.02 1.94
10th Oct 1889 Whitbread XK Mild 1066.8 1018.0 6.45 73.04% 6.99 2.23
12th Feb 1889 Whitbread P Porter 1057.1 1015.0 5.57 73.79% 8.04 2.00
29th Jan 1890 Whitbread SS Stout 1083.1 1025.0 7.69 69.92% 10.63 4.76
29th Jan 1890 Whitbread SSS Stout 1095.6 1037.0 7.75 61.28% 10.63 5.47
Sources:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document number ACC/2305/1/586
Whitbread brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers LMA/4453/D/01/055, LMA/4453/D/09/083, LMA/4453/D/09/084

In multiple 19th-century sources I'd read how much more lightly hopped Lager was than British beers. This confirms that. Tennent's Lager had about half as many hops per barrel as even running beer.

3 comments:

  1. Oblivious2 September 2012 at 13:34

    looks like they took an American approach to lager brewing that a continental ie using flaked maize?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ron Pattinson2 September 2012 at 14:02

    Oblivious, I know - the Germans (other than Bavarians) would have used rice rather than maize.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jeff Renner2 September 2012 at 14:44

    I've done some research on late 19th century American lagers. Rice was the preferred adjunct grain for premium beers until dry milling of maize was perfected around 100 years ago, and the oily (and potentially rancid) germ could be removed. Then maize gained far more acceptance since it was cheaper.

    Normally in the US, grits were used rather than flakes. They were cheaper but required separate cooking.

    After I wrote an article about American lagers of this time, which I called Classic American Pilsner, in Brewing Techniques in 1995, this style has gained popularity among homebrewers around the world.

    http://brewingtechniques.com/library/backissues/issue3.5/renner.html

    Another article by me on the subject in Zymurgy (pdf)

    http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/attachments/0000/1298/SOzym00-Pilsner.pdf

    ReplyDelete