Let's Brew Wednesday - 1947 Shepherd Neame SS

I’m continuing my watery late 1940’s Shepherd Neame beer theme. With a Stout. Possibly the least stout Stout ever brewed.

Because you need to remember what Stout originally meant: strong. And that’s one thing you couldn’t accuse this beer of. It’s under 3% ABV. I have seen weaker ones than that. Stuff under 2% ABV. But they were Scottish Sweet Stouts, which at least had an OG over 1040º. Just a rubbish level of attenuation.

There’s only one dark malt in the grist, black malt. This seems to be the biggest difference between London and provincial Stouts. The former had more complex malt bills, which always contained brown malt in addition to black.

I was surprised to see a decent quantity of oats include. In contrast to London “Oatmeal” Stouts which tiny token amounts. Though it doesn’t state it implicitly in the brewing record, I’m sure they were malted oats. Why? Because of the position in the brewing record. Where the malts go, not the adjuncts.

Checking the pre-war records, I see that in 1938 they used R (presumably rolled) oats in their Stout. In rather smaller quantities. I was going to say that moving over to a larger quantity of malted oats was probably as a result of the war. Then I noticed that the practice didn’t start until 1947. I believe they were trying to brew an Oatmeal Stout. Albeit a very weak one.

The sugar was proprietary stuff. No. 3 invert is just my guess at an approximation. It could possibly have been more like No. 4. Use a combination of the two if you feel like it.

1947 Shepherd Neame SS
pale malt	2.75 lb	52.38%
black malt	0.50 lb	9.52%
malted oats	0.50 lb	9.52%
No. 3 invert sugar	1.25 lb	23.81%
malt extract	0.25 lb	4.76%
Fuggles 120 mins	0.50 oz
Goldings 30 mins	0.50 oz
OG	1027.1
FG	1006.1
ABV	2.78
Apparent attenuation	77.49%
IBU	15.4
SRM	22
Mash at	159º F
Sparge at	170º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	62.75º F
Yeast	a Southern English Ale yeast