1939 William Younger XX

I hope you’re not getting bored of William Younger recipes. Because there are going to be quite a few more.

Including that rarest of beasts, a post-WW I Scottish Mild Ale. Which is what I’ve got for you here. A real Mild, too, not just a watery Pale Ale coloured up. Though I suspect this was coloured darker than it was brewed, the base recipe isn’t a Pale Ale. Rather it’s a very watered down version of No. 1 Ale.

If you’ve viewed the pale malt and grits recipes with increasing apathy, this recipe will knock you for six. Because it has a whole six ingredients in the grist. Exciting or what? Including Younger’s special super secret ingredient: lactose.

Younger’s XXX is the equivalent of an English 4d Ale. And that’s probably what it cost in the pub: 4d a pint. Most London brewers made one, though the quantities were often quite small. That wasn’t a big deal, as they could parti-gyle with standard Mild, X Ale.

I just checked the Whitbread Gravity Book analyses and found something called Light Ale that looks like it could be this beer. The gravity is about the same – it’s 1031º - and it’s dark brown in colour. Though it cost 6d a pint, which is expensive for a beer this weak. Weird for a beer that’s dark to be billed as a Light Ale, isn’t it? But remember the analysis was performed by Whitbread. And their watery Dark Mild was called Light Ale.

This question pops into my mind: why did a Scottish brewer make a beer of this type? I think I might know the answer. It’s because they already owned pubs in London. And Mild was still incredibly popular in the capital, probably accounting for 50% of sales in most pubs. Come to think of it, the London trade might also explain No. 3, a beer without an equivalent at other Scottish brewers I’ve researched. No.3 was similar to a London Burton Ale.

What I give as mild malt was probably something else. But I can’t think of another malt beginning with the letter “M”, which is how it’s described in the brewing log. Given the small quantity, it might have been some sort of diastatic malt or even malt extract.

Liquorice is another off ingredient in anything but a Stout. Combine it with lactose and an extremely low level of hopping and you must have got something quite distinctive. And pretty sweet.

All in all. One of Younger’s most interesting recipes.

1939 William Younger XX
pale malt	5.00 lb	68.97%
crystal malt 60L	0.50 lb	6.90%
mild malt	0.13 lb	1.72%
grits	1.25 lb	17.24%
invert sugar	0.13 lb	1.72%
lactose	0.25 lb	3.45%
liquorice	0.25 oz
Fuggles 90 min	0.50 oz
Fuggles 30 min	0.25 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1032
FG	1011.5
ABV	2.71
Apparent attenuation	64.06%
IBU	11
SRM	6
Mash at	154º F
Sparge at	160º F
Boil time	105 minutes
pitching temp	62.5º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale