19th-century Scottish Stock Ale

As in England these were essentially aged versions of Mild Ale. One of the unusual features of Scottish brewing is the large number of very strong beers which were sold young. A much lower percentage of strong Scottish beers were aged.

Being expected to last for years, Stock Ales were hopped more heavily than the equivalent Shilling Ale. S and XS were the Stock equivalents of 100/- and 120/-, respectively, the main difference being that they contained double the amount of hops.

There’s some overlap between the higher value Shilling Ales and Stock Ales. Half of the batch of 1868 XXS below, for example, was packaged as 140/-. As these stronger Shilling Ales were already heavily hopped, there was no real difference with the Stock Ale recipe. Presumably the only difference was how quickly the beer was sold.

The hopping rate declined over time, though, admittedly, it did start at a ridiculously high level. Even in 1868, with 3 lbs or more per barrel, they weren’t lightly hopped beers.

William Younger Stock Ales in 1849
Date	Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
7th Apr	1849	S	1097	1031	8.73	68.04%	12.00	4.92
13th Nov	1849	S	1095	1028	8.86	70.53%	10.31	4.85
12th Nov	1849	XS	1108	1036	9.53	66.67%	11.50	6.73
Source:
William Younger brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number WY/6/1/2/3.

William Younger Stock Ales 1851 - 1868
Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
1851	S	1098	1027	9.39	72.45%	12.90	6.35
1851	XS	1109	1036	9.66	66.97%	11.61	9.00
1851	XXS	1126	1052	9.79	58.73%	12.00	9.00
1858	XS	1102	1032	9.26	68.63%	10.00	6.27
1858	XXS	1113	1036	10.19	68.14%	9.76	6.25
1859	XXXS	1128	1053	9.92	58.59%	9.78	7.26
1869	XXXX	1089	1021	9.00	76.40%	11.67	5.76
1868	S	1077	1032	5.95	58.44%	6.86	2.79
1868	XS Export	1092	1033	7.81	64.13%	6.82	3.70
1868	XXS	1102	1045	7.54	55.88%	4.91	3.25
1868	XXXS	1129	1066	8.33	48.84%	7.60	6.33
Sources:
William Younger brewing records held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document numbers WY/6/1/2/5, WY/6/1/2/14 and WY/6/1/2/21.

The above is an excerpt from my excellent book on Scottish brewing:

Which is also available in Kindle form:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Q8XHBL2