Drybrough's sugars and hops in 1936

Of course, malts and adjuncts weren’t the only ingredients in Maclay’s beers. There were also sugars. If you count malt extract, there were more types of sugar than malt.

The sugars come to about exactly 10% of the total. Which is fairly typical for the UK in general. 70-75% malt, 15-20% adjunct, 10% sugar was pretty standard. Though there was the odd brewery that dispensed with adjuncts. And others, such as William Younger, which used very little sugar.

I’ll be honest: I’ve know next to nothing about Avona. Other than that it was a proprietary sugar and intended to be added in the copper. Fison I at least know refers to the name of the producer. Though its exact nature remains a total mystery.

The sugar called invert is slightly more specific. Though it would be nice to know exactly which type of invert was used. Given that the beers were relatively pale, as brewed, it has to be either No. 1 or No. 2 invert.

In the recipes which follow, I’ve substituted No. 2 invert for all of the sugars. It’s probably about as close as you’re going to get to the original sugars.

From the 193os on, quite a lot of smaller breweries employed both diastatic malt extract (DME) and enzymatic malt in small quantities. Presumably out of fear of insufficient enzymes to fully convert the mash. I’ve never seen the practice at a large brewery. Presumably because they had brewing chemists who knew better.

The hops used were Oregon from the 1934 harvest and English from the 1934 and 1935 harvests. Because of their high alpha-acid content and not much appreciated aroma, American hops were often used when quite old. When the war started, some older US hops continue to appear in the brewing records for a while, but after a year or two it’s 100% English.

Drybrough's sugars in 1936
Date	Year	OG	malt extract	Fison	Avona	invert	total
P 54/-	Pale Ale	1031	0.91%	1.82%	3.65%	3.65%	10.03%
Bottling	Pale Ale	1033	0.91%	1.82%	3.64%	3.64%	10.02%
P 60/-	Pale Ale	1037	0.87%	1.74%	4.65%	3.49%	10.75%
P 80/-	Pale Ale	1050	0.87%	1.74%	4.65%	3.49%	10.75%
Burns	Strong Ale	1084	0.89%	7.10%			7.99%
Source:
Drybrough brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number D/6/1/1/4.