Warwicks & Richardsons was one of the two large breweries in Newark-on-Trent, the other being Holes. The latter being the first place I worked. And one of the beers I filled into kegs in 1975 was the last Warwicks beer still being brewed: IPA. IPA was Warwicks standard Bitter, the equivalent Holes beer being AK.
Until a few weeks ago I though no brewing records from Newark breweries had survived. Happily, I was wrong. They’ve a few documents from both Holes and Warwicks archived in Nottingham.
British brewers have been pretty inconsistent in their use of the designations Pale Ale and IPA. Much to the annoyance of modern style Nazis. But this really does look like a classic Burton IPA, at least in terms of gravity. The hopping isn’t quite as crazy.
As you would expect from a beer intended to be pretty pale in colour, there are no coloured malts in the grist and a high percentage of non-malt fermentables. It’s one of the ironies of pre-WW I brewing that often the most expensive beers, high-class Pale Ales, contained the smallest percentage of malt. Sugar and flaked maize were used to keep the body and colour as light as possible.
No. 2 invert is my guess. In the record in just specifies it as “Glebe”. It could also be something like No. 1 invert. I just don’t know.
The hops were a mixture of Oregon and English. I don’t know the variety of the English hops. Goldings is just a guess. You could also opt for some, or all, Fuggles. What is noticeable is the totally crazy level of dry hopping. In the original there were 396 lbs of copper hops and 207 lbs of dry hops. That’s a completely insane ratio.
Given the very high level of dry hopping, it wouldn’t surprise me if IPA was still being brewed as a Stock Ale and aged for months before sale.
| 1910 Warwicks IPA | ||
| pale malt | 8.25 lb | 64.71% |
| flaked maize | 3.00 lb | 23.53% |
| No. 2 invert sugar | 1.50 lb | 11.76% |
| Cluster 120 mins | 1.25 oz | |
| Goldings 60 mins | 1.00 oz | |
| Goldings 30 mins | 1.00 oz | |
| Goldings dry hops | 2.00 oz | |
| OG | 1060 | |
| FG | 1018 | |
| ABV | 5.56 | |
| Apparent attenuation | 70.00% | |
| IBU | 48 | |
| SRM | 8 | |
| Mash at | 153º F | |
| Sparge at | 165º F | |
| Boil time | 120 minutes | |
| pitching temp | 61º F | |
| Yeast | Wyeast 1469 West Yorkshire Ale | |
With that much corn, could the pale malt possibly be North American six row to aid in the conversion?
ReplyDeleteWorth Googling "Glebe sugar refining company". From a very quick scan it looks like they might have been a forerunner of Tate and Lyle. Perhaps it was equivalent to refined sugar?
ReplyDeleteOG 1060 - check
ReplyDeleteEnglish and US hops - check
Enormous dry-hopping - check
That's proper 21st century hipster juice you've got there, Ron.
A Brew Rat,
ReplyDeleteno North American malt but some of it was from the Middle East as its described as "Smyrna". British brewers never used all malt from foreign barley.
Smyrna would be Eastern Med rather than Mid East.
ReplyDeleteI believe that Smyrna was from the Balkans , with Ouchak being an Algerian grown barley , with both usually lower in price per quarter eg : a Premium U.K pale malt being 42/- /Qtr and Ouchac / Smyrna at say 39/- per quarter .
ReplyDelete