Tetley Porter grists 1858 - 1896

Here we are again with the second part of my look at Tetley's Porter in the second half of the 19th century. This time it's the grists under the microscope.

I've a whole series planned about Tetley's beers in the second half of the 19th century. I would have started with the Milds, but I've not decided who to attack them yet. There are too many of them to really fit into this two-part format. I need to think of a better method. Thus far, I'm still thinking.

Once again laziness has triumphed. I started with Porter because that was the simplest. I hope you're not too disappointed in me.

I'm still regularly surprised when looking at brewing records. Tetley's served one up with their Porter grists. The ones from 1858, 1868 and 1878 are what I had expected: just pale malt and about 5% black malt. The type of simple grist adopted by provincial Porter brewers in the middle of the 19th century. So far so good.

Look at what they did in 1896: all complicated up the grist with all these different types of malt. The crystal and MA (mild ale) malt aren't such a surprise. It's the brown malt. It seems odd that they should have brought back brown malt at such a late stage. It's a shame I don't have an example from the 1880's. There's been a big change in the recipe in the years between 1878 and 1896.

Whitbread used a classic London Porter grist of pale, brown and black malt. You can see though that, while the malts remained constant, their proportions did not. The general trend was a reduction in the brown malt content and in increase in the black malt content.

That's about all I have to say. I'll just leave you with the tables:

Tetley Porter grists 1858 - 1896
Year	Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	pale malt	brown malt	black malt	crystal malt	MA malt	caramel
1858	X1P	Porter	1055.7	1018.3	4.95	67.16%	93.38%		6.62%
1868	X1 P	Porter	1053.7	1027.7	3.44	48.45%	94.88%		5.12%
1878	P	Porter	1052.6	1022.2	4.03	57.89%	94.55%		5.45%
1878	P	Porter	1053.2	1022.2	4.10	58.33%	94.55%		5.45%
1878	P	Porter	1048.2	1016.6	4.18	65.52%	94.47%		5.53%
1878	P	Porter	1052.1	1018.3	4.47	64.89%	94.47%		5.53%
1896	P	Porter	1052.1	1016.6	4.69	68.09%	26.26%		6.62%	17.51%	35.02%	14.59%
1896	P	Porter	1047.1	1011.9	4.65	74.71%	8.81%	11.32%	3.99%	14.97%	52.83%	8.08%
Sources:
Tetley brewing records held at the West Yorkshire Archive Service document numbers WYL756/11/ACC1903, WYL756/16/ACC1903, WYL756/25/ACC1903 and WYL756/49/ACC1903.

Whitbread Porter grists 1858 - 1896
Year	Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	pale malt	brown malt	black malt	crystal malt	other sugar
1858	P	Porter	1055.7	1018.8	4.87	66.17%	76.78%	19.35%	3.87%
1868	P	Porter	1051.5	1016.3	4.65	68.28%	74.28%	9.36%	4.68%		11.69%
1878	P	Porter	1054.8	1017.2	4.98	68.69%	80.79%	13.79%	5.42%
1888	P	Porter	1058.4				79.93%	4.08%	7.35%	8.64%
1896	P	Porter	1061.5	1015.0	6.15	75.61%	86.40%	6.40%	7.20%
Sources:
Whitbread brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives document numbers LMA/4453/D/09/052, LMA/4453/D/09/062, LMA/4453/D/09/073, LMA/4453/D/09/082 and LMA/4453/D/09/091.