Courage Strong Ales 1920 - 1928 (part one)

It's taken rather longer than planned to get to the final instalment of this little series. I had to look and check if I'd done Courage's Strong Ales yet. I hadn't.

Courage were unusual in that they appear to have had not only a Burton, but a stronger KKK as well. I'm not sure whether it was a draught or bottled beer. I'd be inclined to pick the latter, given its strength. Though Barclay Perkin's KKKK was a draught beer, sold only in the winter. With a gravity of 1078º, it was a little stronger than Courage's KKK.

Hang on a minute. I've a label of KKK so it must have been bottled at some time in its life.

Fuller's Old Burton Extra was about exactly the same strength as Courage KKK and that, too, was a draught beer. Though one which was only made in tiny quantities - often just three or four barrels. I've included a table of these London Strong Ales for comparison purposes.

Fullers, just like Courage parti-gyled their Strong Ales with their Milds. Barclay Perkins didn't, making all three of their K Ales single gyle. It was probably a practical decision. They could brew small quatities single gyle because they had more than one brewhouse. In addition to their main plant churning out hundreds of barrels of Mild and Bitter they had a much smaller one, used for small-batch and experimental beers. Sometimes they brewed batches of only 20-odd barrels, a tiny quantity for a brewery of their size.

Getting back to Courage, their SA/XXX was a typical London Burton. A gravity in the mid-1050's and a bit over 5% ABV.  Though it was more lightly hopped than the Barclay Perkins version. Not sure why they called their Burton XXX and not KK like most other London brewers. They had brewed something called KK up until 1917, a beer wjhich was discontinued in the later stages of the war.

While we're on hopping, you can see that the later versions of Courage KKK were relatively lightly hopped at around 7 lbs per quarter, compared to 11 lbs for Barclay Perkins stronger K Ales.

You can see that the boild times were a little shorter at Courage, but not by a huge amount

Courage Strong Ales 1920 - 1928
Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl	boil time (hours)	boil time (hours)	boil time (hours)	Pitch temp	dry hops (oz / barrel)
1920	SA	1054.6	1015.5	5.17	71.57%	6.66	1.45	1.75	1.75	1	61º	6.76
1921	SA	1053.5	1014.4	5.17	73.06%	5.25	1.21	1.5	1.5	1	62º	5.03
1921	SA	1053.5	1014.7	5.13	72.54%	5.77	1.33	1.5	1.5	1	63º	5.17
1922	XXX	1054.3	1014.4	5.28	73.47%	5.43	1.30	1.5	1.5	1	62º	4.87
1923	XXX	1053.5	1011.9	5.50	77.72%	6.94	1.50	1.5	1.5	1	61º	5.28
1926	XXX	1053.5				6.84	1.44	2	1.5	1	61.5º	0.75
1927	XXX	1053.5				7.12	1.52	2	1.5	1	63.5º	0.00
1928	XXX	1053.5				6.79	1.51	1.5	1.5	1	61º	0.00
1922	KKK	1073.4	1024.9	6.41	66.04%	11.02	3.39	2	2	1.5	58º	7.65
1923	KKK	1073.4	1025.5	6.34	65.28%	11.00	3.28	2.5	2.5	2.5	60º	7.68
1926	KKK	1073.4				5.91	2.09	2	1.5	1	58.25º	8.32
1926	KKK	1073.4				6.92	1.97	2	1.5	1	59.5º	7.84
1927	KKK	1073.4				7.12	2.09	2	1.5	1	59º	9.82
1928	KKK	1073.4				7.48	2.26	2	1.5	1	60º	9.68
Source:
Courage brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document numbers ACC/2305/08/251, ACC/2305/08/253, ACC/2305/08/255 and ACC/2305/08/256.

Other London Strong Ales
Year	Brewer	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl	boil time (hours)	boil time (hours)	Pitch temp
1928	Barclay Perkins	KKKK	1078.4	1025.5	7.00	67.49%	11.00	3.58	2.5		58º
1928	Barclay Perkins	KK bottling	1069.5	1020.0	6.55	71.21%	11.00	2.97	2.5	2	58.5º
1926	Barclay Perkins	KK	1055.5	1015.0	5.35	72.96%	9.00	1.91	1.75	1.5	58º
1925	Fullers	BO	1061.5	1018.8	5.65	69.40%	7.308	1.83	1.5	1.5	60º
1925	Fullers	OBE	1072.2	1021.1	6.77	70.85%	7.214	2.15	1.5	1.5	62.5º
Sources:
Barclay Perkins brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document numbers ACC/2305/01/611 and ACC/2305/01/614.
Fullers brewing records held at the brewery.

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