William Younger’s beers in 1939

To say that Younger brewed a baffling range of beers is no overstatement. While most Scottish brewers limited themselves to three or four different strengths of Pale Ale, a Strong Ale and perhaps a Stout.

When war erupted, Younger were brewing seven Pale Ales, three Mild Ales, two Strong/Scotch Ales and a Stout. In total, thirteen. And that’s just in the Abbey brewery

It’s odd that Younger produced three Pale Ales – Pale XXPS, XXPS and LAE – at identical gravities. The only difference being the hopping rate, which went from 3 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt for XXPS, to 4.75 lbs per quarter for LAE.

I’m pretty confident that LAE was an exclusively bottled beer and XXPS exclusively draught. Pale XXPS I’m not sure about but, as the name doesn’t include Btlg, I’m reasonably confident that this was also a bottled beer.

The three gravity levels of the Pale Ales – 1033º, 1040º, 1046º, 1053º - fit nicely into the pre-war strength bands. In London, these would have equated to beers retailing at 5d, 6d, 7d and 8d per pint, respectively. Though, as beer was generally a little more expensive in Scotland, the actual process in Edinburgh were probably 1d per pint more.

Similarly, the three Mild Ales fit into the 4d, 5d and 6d per pint categories. It’s extremely unusual for a Scottish brewery to have been producing three different Mild Ales in the 1930s. Most didn’t produce a single genuine Mild Ale. Though I suspect that a weak Pale Ale coloured with caramel at racking time was often used as a substitute for Mild.

Most Scottish breweries made a Strong/Scotch Ale (what it was called depended on which side of the border you were: Strong Ale in Scotland, Scotch Ale in England) along the lines of Younger’s No. 1.

But No. 3 seems to have been a style of beer exclusive to Younger. Possibly it existed on account of the trade they did in London. Certainly in the 1950s No. 3 took the place of Burton Ale in the pubs supplied by Younger. They brewed a surprisingly large amount of it, as you’ll see in the second table.

This is based on a fairly random selection of photographs of the Abbey Brewery brewing book from late 1939 and early 1940. But I think it gives a reasonable idea of the relative amounts being produced of each different beer. The four most common – No. 3, LAE, XXP Btlg and XXPS – account for around 70% of what was brewed.

William Younger Abbey beers 1939 - 1940
Date	Year	Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
29th Nov	1939	1	Strong Ale	1084	1028.0	7.41	66.67%	4.74	1.60
23rd Nov	1939	3	Strong Ale	1053	1015.0	5.03	71.70%	3.00	0.60
14th Nov	1939	DBS Btlg	Stout	1066	1023.0	5.69	65.15%	6.06	1.59
17th Nov	1939	X	Mild	1029	1012.0	2.25	58.62%	2.50	0.28
23rd Nov	1939	XX	Mild	1032	1012.0	2.65	62.50%	2.67	0.31
4th Dec	1939	XXX	Mild	1037	1012.0	3.31	67.57%	2.50	0.36
1st Apr	1940	XP Btlg	Pale Ale	1033	1010.0	3.04	69.70%	4.71	1.22
22nd Nov	1939	XXP Btlg	Pale Ale	1040	1013.0	3.57	67.50%	4.21	0.63
6th Dec	1939	XXPS Btlg	Pale Ale	1040	1011.0	3.84	72.50%	4.21	0.57
22nd Nov	1939	Pale XXPS	Pale Ale	1046	1014.0	4.23	69.57%	4.13	0.73
4th Dec	1939	LAE	Pale Ale	1046	1012.0	4.50	73.91%	4.78	0.82
28th Nov	1939	XXPS	Pale Ale	1046	1012.0	4.50	73.91%	3.04	0.52
24th Nov	1939	Ext	Pale Ale	1053	1014.0	5.16	73.58%	5.40	1.10
Source:
William Younger brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number WY/6/1/2/76.

William Younger Abbey beers 1939 - 1940
Beer	Style	No. of brews	barrels	%
1	Strong Ale	4	456	2.92%
3	Strong Ale	23	2947	18.90%
DBS Btlg	Stout	6	767	4.92%
Ext	Pale Ale	5	613	3.93%
LAE	Pale Ale	25	3343.5	21.44%
Pale XXPS	Pale Ale	6	804	5.16%
X	Mild	2	126	0.81%
XP Btlg	Mild	2	188.5	1.21%
XX	Pale Ale	8	908.5	5.83%
XXP Btlg	Pale Ale	15	1876.5	12.03%
XXPS	Pale Ale	20	2668.5	17.11%
XXPS Btlg	Pale Ale	1	141.5	0.91%
XXX	Mild	7	755	4.84%
Total			15,595
Source:
William Younger brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number WY/6/1/2/76.