Let's Brew Wednesday - 1909 Whitbread IPA

Time for another genuine English IPA recipe, I think. One that was really brewed in England and marketed as IPA. Rather than what American home brewers think English IPA shoule be like by reverse engineering it from US versions. I'm pretty sure this beer fails to meet any IPA guidelines.

Whitbread first brewed their IPA in 1900. Making this a fairly early iteration of the beer.

Just to confuse modern style Nazis, it was lower in gravity that the Pale Ale that they had been brewing since 1865. That beer had an OG of around 1060º. One thing that does fit in with modern ideas is the hopping rate, which was slightly higher for the IPA.

There’s not much to the recipe. Just pale malt, invert sugar and a load of Goldings. Not as crazy as in some 19th-century beers, but enough to give calculated IBUs in the 60s.

It’s possible at this date that the colour was adjusted with caramel at racking time.

1909 Whitbread IPA
pale malt	8.00 lb	80.00%
no. 1 sugar	2.00 lb	20.00%
Goldings 90 mins	1.75 oz
Goldings 60 mins	1.75 oz
Goldings 30 mins	1.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.50 oz
OG	1049.6
FG	1015
ABV	4.58
Apparent attenuation	69.76%
IBU	68
SRM	6
Mash at	151º F
Sparge at	165º F
Boil time	105 minutes
pitching temp	59º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1099 Whitbread ale

The above is one of the many recipes in my book Let's Brew!

And I've recently created a Kindle version of the book.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08348M2D7