Wednesday 13 April 2016

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


9 comments:

Oblivious said...

Ron are you planing on releasing the 1932 Carlsberg Porter as a lets Brew Wednesday ?

Ron Pattinson said...

Oblivious,

not at the moment. Busy with other things.

StuartP said...

9 Amber in Carlsberg's recipe?
I guess this means that Amber malt was rather different in those days.

Rob Sterowski said...

Is the Jacobsen grist correct? 9 quarters of amber and only 2 of pale?

Alistair Reece said...

If Poperinge hops are not available, any suggestions for a substitute, Strisselspalt?

Oblivious said...

No worries :)

J. Karanka said...

That looks absolutely up my street. Great strength (strong enough, but not so strong as to stop you having a couple of pints). Bitter as to be thirst quenching. Makes great use of a big bag of Amber malt and another of Patent I have at sitting at home and most beers just don't use fast enough.

Ron Pattinson said...

Yep, definitely that much amber.

There are some Younger recipes with silly amounts of amber, too.

A Brew Rat said...

I don't believe there is a hop variety called Poperinge. I think it refers to the area in Belgium where the hops are grown.