Let's Brew Wednesday - 1868 William Younger DBS

Time for another Scottish recipe. Especially as I forgot to post a recipe last week. Apologies for that. A pure oversight on my part. Though the extra Saturday recipes I threw in mean I’ve still averaged more than one a week so far.

Though Scottish brewers all made Porter and Stout, it was never as important a product as for many of their English colleagues. Especially those in London. William Younger had three: Porter, Bottling Porter and DBS. The first two were both pretty weak, 1041º and 1046º, respectively. All three were brewed in small quantities,  far less than most of their Scottish Ales, Strong Ales and Pale Ales.

I assume this was for a combination of factors. A limited market in Scotland for Stout. But also what they could sell in export markets. Scottish brewers were famous for Strong Ales and Pale Ales and these were what they sold to England and beyond. While in these markets London and Irish brewers controlled the Stout trade.

The grist is very different to a London Stout. There’s no brown malt, something that appeared in every London Porter and Stout from the 18th century to the 1970’s. But there is amber malt, something you mostly only saw in the better quality London Stouts. Whereas Irish Stouts were usually just pale and black malt.

Younger DBS is also weaker than London Stouts of the period. Truman’s weakest Stout, Running Stout, had an OG of 1070º. Whitbread’s, SS, an OG of 1082º. Barclay Perkins BSt 1089º.

But there’s one thing that makes this brew very special. It also appears in the personal brewing book of Carl Jacobsen, son of Carlsberg’s founder. A couple of years later he was brewing his own beer called DBS back in Copenhagen. With an OG of 1077º, his was a bit stronger than Younger’s. And the grist was a little different:

2 pale
9 amber
1 patent
3 brown

Quaint that Jacobsen still listed the grain quantity in Imperial quarters. I was more shocked to see that even in 1932 Carlsberg Porter, the successor to DBS, still contained 21% brown malt. Who would have expected that?

Nothing left but the recipe itself . . .

1868 William Younger DBS
pale malt	12.25 lb	81.67%
amber malt	1.75 lb	11.67%
black malt	1.00 lb	6.67%
Poperinge 90 min	2.75 oz
Goldings 60 min	2.50 oz
Saaz 20 min	2.50 oz
OG	1062
FG	1014
ABV	6.35
Apparent attenuation	77.42%
IBU	85
SRM	31
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	185º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	62º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale