Tetley Ale malt specifications (part five)

Now for some stuff about the barley itself.

I had to look this one up to see what it was.

3.5. Abraded malt is permitted at proportions of up to 100% of the total malt grist at all breweries.
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 2.

I'll let the scientists do the explaining again.

It has recently been shown that mechanical abrasion of barley grains, by a process which removed only very small quantities of husk, permitted exogeneous gibberellic acid to reach a larger number of aleurone cells, thus increasing the production of enzymes and modification of the endosperm.

Abrasion of the grain was achieved by a mechanical hand-mill which consistently rendered the pericarp layer at the nonembryo (distal) end of the grain permeable to gibberellic acid without damaging the embryo or the overlying husk. Micro-scale malting trials using gibberellic acid revealed that malts produced from abraded grain were visually identical with control malts but gave higher hot water extracts.

The present results describe the performance, in pilot malting and brewing plants, of comparatively large quantities of abraded barley.
Malting and Brewing with Abraded Barley, Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Vol. 76, 1970, By G.H. Palmer, J. Barrett and B.H. Kirsop, page 65.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/j.2050-0416.1970.tb03263.x

That sounds fairly harmless.

Now the permitted vatieties of barley.

3.4. Permitted varieties.
3.4.1. Proctor
3.4.2. Maris Otter*
3.4.3. Mazurka
3.4.4. Golden Promise
3.4.5. Midas
3.4.6. Ark Royal
3.4.7. Triumph*
3.4.8. Keg
3.4.9. Tipper*
3.4.10 Halcyon
* Permitted for Castlemaine XXXX
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 2.

It may come as a surpprise that Maris Otter, the classic Ale barley variety, was only only allowed in Castlemaine XXXX, a Lager. Halcyon was added later, as it's just written in pencil.

I don't think I'll bore you with the lager malt specifications. Unless someone insists on it. Otherwise I'll be heading straight onto cask Tetley Bitter.

Tetley Ale malt specifications (part four)

Still more types of nitrogen to plough through. I never realised there were so many different types of the stuff in malt. I bet you'll be glad when I get to Tetley's beers.

Righto, then. Here we go with FAN (free amino nitrogen).

FAN compounds are formed naturally during malting and mashing by the action of protein degradation enzymes on hordein, a protein found in the grain. The level of amino acids available in the wort relies on several variables including grain variety, as well as malting and mashing conditions, but the overall types of amino acids available will be similar among all whole malt worts.

Together with ammonia, FAN/PAN makes up what is known as Yeast Assimilable Nitrogen or YAN.
Brewers Journal, Free Amino Nitrogen, January 24, 2017.
https://www.brewersjournal.info/free-amino-nitrogen/

OK, that's how the FAN thingies are formed. Let's take a look at what it does.

Free amino nitrogen (FAN)
FAN is the weight per unit weight of amino nitrogen available from the malt. FAN is principally amino acids which as stated above are vital for yeast nutrition. While it might seem that having high FAN can only be a good thing if there is too much breakdown of the nitrogenous materials in the grain it is detrimental to the foam stability of the beer because the longer chained polypeptides and proteins which stabilize the bubbles in the head of beer are broken down into smaller molecules as FAN is produced. It is also thought that more extensively modified proteins in the grain detract from the body of the beer as some of the mouthfeel is conferred by polypeptides and proteins. The amount and degree of modification of protein in the malt is one of the many compromises in the process that you need to manage as a brewer.
The Craft Brewing Handbook by Stewart Howe, 2020, chapter 1.

FAN helps yeast nutrition. So, obviously useful for promoting a healthy fermentation. A characterictic which is pretty handy in malt. But too much buggers up head formation. How much is the right amount? How much is too little? The next source spells that out:

There has been much debate regarding the minimal FAN required to achieve satisfactory yeast growth and fermentation performance in normal gravity (10–12 °P) wort, and it is generally agreed to be around 130 mg FAN/L, with the minimum varying between 100 mg FAN/L and 140 mg FAN/L. This is consistent across both brewing and wine fermentations. Below 100 mg FAN/L, yeast growth is nitrogen-dependent, and sub-optimal concentrations of available nitrogen are associated with lagging, incomplete fermentation and sulfide evolution. In the stationary phase of yeast development, only low levels are required as a fermentation stimulant of the yeast, while higher levels are required during the growth phase.

Optimum FAN levels differ from fermentation to fermentation and also with yeast strain, wort sugar levels and type. For wine fermentation, the optimal nitrogen concentration in the must is 190 mg FAN/L, with similar levels (200–250 mg FAN/L) regarded as optimal for standard gravity brewery fermentations. There are differences between lager and ale yeast strains with respect to wort-assimilable nitrogen uptake characteristics. However, with all brewing strains, the amount of wort FAN content required by yeast under normal brewery fermentation is directly proportional to yeast growth.
Hill, Annie E., and Graham G. Stewart. 2019. "Free Amino Nitrogen in Brewing" Fermentation 5, no. 1: 22. https://doi.org/10.3390/fermentation5010022
https://www.mdpi.com/2311-5637/5/1/22

That's pretty clear: 200-250 mg/l is optimal for standard-strength beer; minimum amount for a healthy fermentation 130 mg/l. Which means that the standard for the Leeds brewery was about the minimum, given that the tolerance of +-20 would permit malt with just 130 mg/l.

Why is the figure for Castlemaine 4X higher? Probably because it was fermented with Lager yeast and a dry finished beer was required.

Almost done now. We can rattle through the rest of these. Arsenic and lead. I think it's pretty obvious why you wouldn't want either in any great quantity in what was, essentially, a food product.

Dust and offal. The former might be a little irritating, but the latter sounds positively scary. Depending on what they exactly mean by offal. For me, it's the innards of animals. Was 2% of unidentified animal bits really acceptable?

Finally, another type of nitrogen, NDMA (N-Nitroso-dimethylamine), is next. This sounds quite scary.

NDMA (n-nitrosodimethylamine) in Malt/Beer
During the malting process, barley is forced to germinate, after which the grain is dried in kilns. This process freezes the sugar and flavour compounds for the brewing process. During the kiln drying process, nitrosamines may be formed in the grain, which could remain within the extract and still be present in the final brewed product. Many recently used techniques, minimise the formation of nitrosamines. However, low levels of these carcinogenic compounds still remain.
The Analytical Scientist, NDMA in Malt and Beer by Ellutia, published 11/13/2017.
https://theanalyticalscientist.com/app-notes/ndma-in-malt-and-beer

Right, the stuff is carcinogenic. No shock, then, that the permitted amount was tiny.

Barley varieties next time. A topic you may find more amusing. 

Tetley Ale malt specifications
1.1 Extract	282 brl°/336 lb (on dry)
	301 l°/kg (on dry)
1.2 Fine coarse difference	2-7 brl°/226 lb.
1.3 Moisture	not more than 3.5%
1.4 Colour	5.5 ± 1.5° EBC
	6.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Leeds)
	4.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Castlemaine 4X)
1.5 Total N	1.60 ± 0.1% average
	not more than 1.90% on individual samples
1.6 TSN (total soluble nitrogen)	0.60 ± 0.04% (Burton, Warrington)
	0.58 ± 0.04% (Leeds, Romford) -
	not more than 0.70% on individual samples.
	0.65 ± 0.5% (Castlemaine 4X)
1.7 SNR (specific nitrification rate)	38 ± 2 (Burton, Warrington)
	36 ± 2 (Leeds, Romford)
	41 ± 2 (Castlemaine 4X)
1.8 FAN (free amino nitrogen)	180 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G
	200 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G (Castlemaine 4X)
	150 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 OG (Leeds)
1.9 Arsenic	not more than 0.5 mg/kg.
1.10 Lead	not more than 1.0 mg/kg.
1.11 Dust and Offal	not more than 2.0% (2.2 mm screen)
1.12 NDMA (N-Nitroso-dimethylamine)	not more than 5 μg/k
Source:
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 1.

Perspective (part two)

Being older has some upsides. Like getting into priority lanes in South America. And added perspectives.

At the start of my drinking career, the 1930s were the distant past. A time almost beyond human memory.

When I'm perspectiving, I like to use my own experience. For example, for drinkers on the cusp of WW I, what was their idea of beer prices. When, for oldies like me, there might have been no increases in their lifetime.

My first pub pints were fifty years ago. And a bit more. For someone my age, back in 1973, Their first beers would have been in the early 1920s. When the shrapnel from WW I had barely stopped flying. Drinkers I shared pubs with would have experienced very different pints from me. In terms of strength, taste and price.

I wish I'd been aware enough as a spotty twat to ask them.

You youngsters won't have to ask me. I have this blog to bore you with my perspective. Until you twig.

Tetley Ale malt specifications (part three)

This going really well. This is my third post based on Tetley's specification manuals. And I haven't even got off the first page yet.

Lots of technical stuff today, that I don't fully understand. Let's be honest, that I don't understand at all. So excuse me if I make lots of stupid mistakes.

I've repeated the table again at the bottom so you have something to refer to on this page. 

The next nitrogen figure now. SNR, Soluble Nitrogen Ratio. I'll let the real scienticians explain it.

2.3.3. Soluble Nitrogen Ratio (Kolbach Index)
Soluble nitrogen ratio of the malts was based on the concentration of soluble protein present in the malt and concentration of total protein in the malt and calculated according to the formula below:

SNR = S/T * 100%

S — concentration of the soluble protein in the malt (% w/w, dry mass)
T — concentration of total protein in the malt (% w/w, dry mass)

Błazewicz, J.; Kawa-Rygielska, J.; Leszczynska, D.; Grabinski, J.; Gasinski, A. Influence of Variety and Nitrogen Fertilization on the Technological Parameters of Special Malts Prepared from Naked and Hulled Oat Varieties. Agronomy 2021, 11, 2566. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11122566, pages 5 - 6.

The next bit explains what the significance of the SNR is:

Proteins present in the malt are broken down by proteolytic enzymes during the mashing process to forms, such as, for example, free amino acids, that can be used by yeast; therefore, the use of raw material that is too low in protein may adversely affect the fermentation process of the wort. In addition, too low protein content in the wort may contribute to the deterioration of the stability and quality of the foam of the produced beer. Excessive content of protein enzymatic hydrolysis products, especially high-molecular ones, deteriorates the clarity of beer and facilitates the formation of various types of turbidity.
Błazewicz, J.; Kawa-Rygielska, J.; Leszczynska, D.; Grabinski, J.; Gasinski, A. Influence of Variety and Nitrogen Fertilization on the Technological Parameters of Special Malts Prepared from Naked and Hulled Oat Varieties. Agronomy 2021, 11, 2566. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11122566, page 10.

Is that clear? Too little, and there might be problems with the fermentation and head retention. Too much, and your beer would be cloudy. It makes sense that you'd want to have the right level.

How much was too much and how much was too little? I'll leave the explanation to the scientists again:

The parameter that describes the ratio of the soluble protein content to the total protein content is the Kolbach index, which indicates the percentage of proteins that have undergone enzymatic hydrolysis during the malting and mashing process and may be dissolved in the wort. Too low Kolbach index usually indicates insufficient activity of proteolytic enzymes present in the produced malt. The brewing technology usually uses malts with Kolbach index above 35% and below 45%. Malt with a Kolbach number above 41% is described in malting terminology as having “very good proteolytic relaxation” and is well seen in the brewing industry.
Błazewicz, J.; Kawa-Rygielska, J.; Leszczynska, D.; Grabinski, J.; Gasinski, A. Influence of Variety and Nitrogen Fertilization on the Technological Parameters of Special Malts Prepared from Naked and Hulled Oat Varieties. Agronomy 2021, 11, 2566. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11122566, page 10.

I'm really glad that they give specific values. 35% to 45% was what you were looking for. Which means that the Leeds and Romford malts were right at the bottom end of good., While Castlemaine 4X was up towards the top end. That's quite a large variation. I suppose that there must have been some point to it.

I think that's about enough for today. Still lots more to come. Probably more entertaining when I get onto the beers. Don't worry. They'll be along soon.

Tetley Ale malt specifications
1.1 Extract	282 brl°/336 lb (on dry)
	301 l°/kg (on dry)
1.2 Fine coarse difference	2-7 brl°/226 lb.
1.3 Moisture	not more than 3.5%
1.4 Colour	5.5 ± 1.5° EBC
	6.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Leeds)
	4.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Castlemaine 4X)
1.5 Total N	1.60 ± 0.1% average
	not more than 1.90% on individual samples
1.6 TSN (total soluble nitrogen)	0.60 ± 0.04% (Burton, Warrington)
	0.58 ± 0.04% (Leeds, Romford) -
	not more than 0.70% on individual samples.
	0.65 ± 0.5% (Castlemaine 4X)
1.7 SNR (specific nitrification rate)	38 ± 2 (Burton, Warrington)
	36 ± 2 (Leeds, Romford)
	41 ± 2 (Castlemaine 4X)
1.8 FAN (free amino nitrogen)	180 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G
	200 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G (Castlemaine 4X)
	150 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 OG (Leeds)
1.9 Arsenic	not more than 0.5 mg/kg.
1.10 Lead	not more than 1.0 mg/kg.
1.11 Dust and Offal	not more than 2.0% (2.2 mm screen)
1.12 NDMA (N-Nitroso-dimethylamine)	not more than 5 μg/k
Source:
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 1.

Cover competition

My massive book on WW II, "Blitzkrieg!", has been pretty much finished for longer than I care to think about. One of the reasons I haven't published it yet: lack of a cover.

Or rather, two covers, as it's too long to fit into a single book, weighing in at over 1,000 pages. I've had to split it into volumes: one with the history stuff, the other with the recipes. All 551 of them.

Unfortunately, my cover artist (Alexei) is currently otherwise occupied in South Korea for the next four months. Not being particularly artistic myself, I have to look elsewhere for an artist. That's where you come in.

Feel free to be as imaginative as you like. But I would like some sort of thematic consistency between the two covers.

What do you get out of it? Well, Kilderkin, my publishing arm, isn't drowning in cash. So I'll be paying in kind: 100 euros worth of my books. And, of course, credit as the illustrator.

Use the "GET IN TOUCH" gadget to the left to send in your submissions. 

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

Let's Brew - 1885 Thomas Usher IPA

Think you know what IPA is? Well, this beer might be a bit of a challenge for you. Because of the four Pale Ales Truman brewed, this was the weakest. That goes completely against the modern concept of the relationship between IPA and Pale Ale.

As I’ve said many time before the modern conviction that IPA is stronger and hoppier than Pale Ale just doesn’t necessarily hold true in the past. For example, at Usher, where IPA was the weakest and least heavily hopped of their Pale Ales. Ironically, Usher did brew a beer that looks like a Stock IPA, but that wasn’t what they called it. Instead, it was named Export Pale Ale.

In a radical change from most beers brewed north of the border, the base malt was mostly made from Scottish barley, 29 of the 35 quarters. The remainder were Smyrna, from modern day Turkey.

Not quite the same with the hops, which were all foreign: Californian from the 1883 harvest and Alsace from 1884. At the rather modest rate of just 8 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt. About the same rate as a London X Ale.

1885 Thomas Usher IPA
pale malt	10.75 lb	100.00%
Cluster 90 min	2.50 oz
Strisselspalt 30 min	2.50 oz
Goldings dry hops	1.00 oz
OG	1046
FG	1012
ABV	4.50
Apparent attenuation	73.91%
IBU	71.2
SRM	4.3
Mash at	155º F
Sparge at	165º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	58º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

Tetley Ale malt specifications (part two)

I'm going to try and explain what the hell those Ale malt specifications mean. Not an easy job, given my level of technical understanding is pretty limited.

Of course, I was aware of the significance of the nitrogen content of malt. It's only when I started looking at what all these terms in the analysis meant that I got an inkling of just how complex it is. I still don't really understand it all. Or even much. Those of you lucky enough to have studied brewing properly will have to bear with me.

I'm going to repeat the table so you don't have to keep flicking backwards and forwards from one post to another.

It's wonderful getting hold of documents like this. If any of you have something similar from another brewery, I would love to see it. They go a couple of levels deeper than brewing records.

Enough of my waffle. Here's that lovely table again.

Tetley Ale malt specifications
1.1 Extract	282 brl°/336 lb (on dry)
	301 l°/kg (on dry)
1.2 Fine coarse difference	2-7 brl°/226 lb.
1.3 Moisture	not more than 3.5%
1.4 Colour	5.5 ± 1.5° EBC
	6.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Leeds)
	4.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Castlemaine 4X)
1.5 Total N	1.60 ± 0.1% average
	not more than 1.90% on individual samples
1.6 TSN (total soluble nitrogen)	0.60 ± 0.04% (Burton, Warrington)
	0.58 ± 0.04% (Leeds, Romford) -
	not more than 0.70% on individual samples.
	0.65 ± 0.5% (Castlemaine 4X)
1.7 SNR (specific nitrification rate)	38 ± 2 (Burton, Warrington)
	36 ± 2 (Leeds, Romford)
	41 ± 2 (Castlemaine 4X)
1.8 FAN (free amino nitrogen)	180 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G
	200 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G (Castlemaine 4X)
	150 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 OG (Leeds)
1.9 Arsenic	not more than 0.5 mg/kg.
1.10 Lead	not more than 1.0 mg/kg.
1.11 Dust and Offal	not more than 2.0% (2.2 mm screen)
1.12 NDMA (N-Nitroso-dimethylamine)	not more than 5 μg/k
Source:
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 1.

Let's start at the beginning, with extract. Note that it's given per 336 lbs, that is, per quarter. I couldn't help but covert that into lbs per barrel. Which is 101.4 lbs per quarter. I'm pretty sure that this is the theoretical extract under lab conditions, not what could be achieved in the mash tun. Around 90 lbs or a little more per quarter was the highest actually achievable.

I'll skip over 1.2 and 1.3. The first, because I'm not quite sure what it means. And moisture, well, that's pretty obvious.

It's interesting that the colour specifications vary. It's fairly obvious why the malt for Castlemaine 4X, a Lager, would need to be paler. Less clear is why the Tetley brewery in Leeds allowed slightly darker malt that all Allied's other sites. Including the Tetley brewery in Warrington.

Now we get all the different types of nitrogen. Starting with TSN.

"Soluble nitrogen (% TSN): The amount of nitrogen in soluble form, expressed as a percentage of malt weight. The TSN parameters are used to calculate the soluble nitrogen ratio."
https://www.geterbrewed.com/blog/2017/08/23/how-to-read-malt-analysis/

That's quite simple. Though it's not clear to me why a higher value was permitted in Castlemaine 4X.

I think that's enough for today. There's lots of technical stuff coming in the next post. Won't that be fun?

Tetley Ale malt specifications

The first post in a series based on the Tetley Beer & Malt Specifications document. A treasure trove of technical information. Especially this stuff on malt. 

Though looking more closely, the malt standards aren't Tetley's. They're Allied Breweries'. As you will see below, the standards weren't the same for all the breweries. Oddly, the standards don't seem to be grouped by the three constituent parts. Burton and Warrington have the same standard, while the former was Ind Coope and the latter Tetley.

Also interesting is how Castlemaine 4X, a Lager, has different standards for its Ale malt. As there are also Lager malt specs, it appears that 4X was brewed from a mixture of Ale and Lager malt.

I'll be honest, I had no idea what some of these things were. Which shows how little I understand about malting and brewing chemistry. I had to look a lot of them up. It was very educational. Even if nitrogen in malt and beer is incredibly complicated.

I'll be imperfectly relaying what I've learnt next time.

Tetley Ale malt specifications
1.1 Extract	282 brl°/336 lb (on dry)
	301 l°/kg (on dry)
1.2 Fine coarse difference	2-7 brl°/226 lb.
1.3 Moisture	not more than 3.5%
1.4 Colour	5.5 ± 1.5° EBC
	6.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Leeds)
	4.5 ± 1.5° EBC (Castlemaine 4X)
1.5 Total N	1.60 ± 0.1% average
	not more than 1.90% on individual samples
1.6 TSN (total soluble nitrogen)	0.60 ± 0.04% (Burton, Warrington)
	0.58 ± 0.04% (Leeds, Romford) -
	not more than 0.70% on individual samples.
	0.65 ± 0.5% (Castlemaine 4X)
1.7 SNR (specific nitrification rate)	38 ± 2 (Burton, Warrington)
	36 ± 2 (Leeds, Romford)
	41 ± 2 (Castlemaine 4X)
1.8 FAN (free amino nitrogen)	180 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G
	200 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 0G (Castlemaine 4X)
	150 ± 20mg/1 at 1048 OG (Leeds)
1.9 Arsenic	not more than 0.5 mg/kg.
1.10 Lead	not more than 1.0 mg/kg.
1.11 Dust and Offal	not more than 2.0% (2.2 mm screen)
1.12 NDMA (N-Nitroso-dimethylamine)	not more than 5 μg/k
Source:
Tetley Beer and Malt Specifications, 1985, malt page 1.

 

 

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1881 William Younger XXP

As requested, I'm kicking off a series of IPAs, starting with a Scottish IPA. From Younger’s Holyrood Brewery, which specialised in brewing Pale Ales. And the occasional Pilsener. But that’s another story.

The style police may be reaching for their guns when I explain that Scottish IPA definitely was a thing. And this is an example of it. An IPA brewed in Edinburgh, with a particularly Scottish twist. Because it has lots of Scottish ingredients? Er, not really.

Of the three types of base malt, slightly less than a third was made from Scottish barley. The rest is described as “Oder”. Which I assume means it comes from Central Europe.

It’s a very international beer when it come to ingredients. The hops came from three different countries: England (East Kent Goldings), Bohemia and America. All from the 1880 harvest, except for half of the Americans.

On the subject of hopping, it is fairly heavy, at over 100 (calculated) IBU. But nothing out of the ordinary for an IPA of the day.

This looks very much like a Stock IPA to me. So, a year or so in trade casks. (I know it was racked into mostly hogsheads and barrels, as well as a few kilderkins.) Along with our old mate Brettanomyces. 

1881 William Younger XXP
pale malt	14.75 lb	100.00%
Cluster 140 min	4.00 oz
Saaz 60 min	2.50 oz
Goldings 30 min	1.25 oz
Goldings dry hops	2.25 oz
OG	1060
FG	1012
ABV	6.35
Apparent attenuation	80.00%
IBU	118
SRM	5.1
Mash at	157º F
Sparge at	163º F
Boil time	140 minutes
pitching temp	59º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

Getting ready for Rio

I'm off to Brazil quite soon. For another round of beer judging. I only do it for the social aspect. And the weather. Not forgetting dossing around in Rio for a couple of days.

In preparation I've spent a big part of the day scanning the Tetley Beer & Malt Specifications. That may seem an odd way to prepare for a trip to South America. I suppose it is. My fault, really. As I insist on posting every day. Which means that when I travel, I need to have a couple of weeks of posts scheduled.

Over the next week I need to write at least eleven extra posts. The easiest way to do that is to have some sort of theme. One worthy of multiple posts. I don't think I can get away with many more posts of DDR labels. Something else is needed.

That's where the Tetley document comes in. It has very detailed specifications of all their Leeds-brewed beers. Ingredients, process and loads more. What's best is that it's dated October 1985. Just after I stopped drinking Tetley Mild by the gallon.

Expect lots about Tetley's beers in March. And maybe some DDR labels, if I get lazy.

Being slow

Did I mention that I found four Truman Stout brewing books from the 1880s that I hadn't processed? It made me feel rather dozy. Why hadn't I done anything with them? 

It was sort of understandable. Because these were the records that I'd photographed the most recently. I had been working my way through their records. My first sweep was every 10 years - 1820, 1830, 1840, etc. Then 1835, 1845, etc. The final sweep - which remains incomplete - was to fill in the remaining years. Starting with the 1880s. It's these years that I'd left untouched.

No biggie. I hadn't really needed those years until now.More annoying was my discovery yesterday of another untouched set. Covering the years 1814 to 1817. Just about the most crucial years in the development of Porter and Stout. How on earth had I ignored these?

It's not as if I'd photographed them recently. The images are dated 3rd October 2009. More than twelve years I've had these things.

These records are different to later Truman's ones. These cover two pages, the second page including notes.

Like these:

That's part of a brewing record for a Stout on 2nd January 1815.

Transcribing these this morning, after a bit of a struggle with the handwriting and water damage, I noticed something very significant. Which has turned something I believed right on its head. See if you can spot it.

We intended this to have been a Runner, so ordered the 6th Sqr ready, but as we are going to make 3 Stouts this week should have been obliged to cleanse them in Rounds, if we had not brew'd Stout to day, which being the Case, want 5 Square after cleansing which was not until the 1st Wort was 50 Dgrs - 2nd Wort 59 - Last Do. 66 Dgrs --

Average of raw worts was not strong enough so are too weaker last wort less than expected - Vat 2 being poor and unlined - inclined to must, will be stacked upon this in No. 1. Cleansed at 83 12 o'clock, Table 64, had it filld up 1.5 hour after cleansing and every 2 [illegible] this tank Friday morning all out by 3 o' clock [illegible].

{No Drawings off}

Did you spot it? This is the phrase: "Vat 2 being poor and unlined". That implies that the vats were generally lined. Which is not what I believed. I thought UK barrels and vats weren't usually lined.

I need to do more digging. After I've finished transcribing these records.

I got that totally wrong. It all makes much more sense now Cristoph Riedel has pointed out it says "inclined to must". That is, likely to get mouldy. Which makes sense it it's an old vat. Panic over.

Guinness mystery

When I was nosing around the website of Dirk van den Broek* for my recent trendy post, I noticed something rather odd about Guinness.

And it wasn't just annoyance at seeing Guinness Special Export on their website, when my local one doesn't stock it. Which is really irritating when they do sell the stupid "draught" version. Which is sort of what I'm coming around to.

This is how canned "Draught" Guinness is listed at Dirk's. See if you can spot anything odd:

 

You probably couldn't spot it. I know I didn't the first few times I looked at it. "Guinness Pilsener stout draught". What? Guinness is a Pilsener?

When I stopped laughing, I started to wonder: how could this have happened? What was the person thinking who wrote this?

All I can come up with is: they think Pilsener is synonymous with beer; or that all draught beer is Pilsener.

Do you have a better theory? Let me know.

 

* A Dutch supermarket chain. Most similar UK equivalent is Morrisons. 

Let's Brew - 1883 Truman (Burton) P1 Export

Rather surprisingly, Burton IPA was given the nod in my Twitter poll. My money had been on Scottish IPA or Irish IPA.

A top-class Burton Pale Ale, it was directly competing with the Likes of Bass Pale Ale and Allsopp IPA. Though Truman, as Bass, didn’t specifically call it a Pale Ale. Don’t blame me for past brewers’ inconsistencies.

Slimmed down well describes the grist, which is nothing more than a single type of pale malt. I can’t tell you anything more about it as the description is a mere scribble. The handwriting of the brewers in Truman's Burton brewery was appalling. At least they wrote the numbers fairly clearly.

Thankfully, the Burton brewery didn’t use any weird codes when recording mashing details. Unlike at the London plant. Two mashes 153º and 158º F, followed by a sparge. For which they couldn’t be arsed to record the temperature of the water.

I’m a bit surprised that the (calculated) bitterness didn’t work out higher. It’s still a hefty amount of four different types of hops: Bavarian, American, Bohemian and something that looks like Vacha. It’s hard to tell with the terrible wring. I’m just glad the other three are legible. I guessed it was another Bohemian hop.

The bitterness would have had plenty of time to fade, with 12 months or so in trade casks before setting off for distant shores. As a Stock Pale Ale, Brettanomyces would have been its maturation chum. 

1883 Truman (Burton) P1 Export
pale malt	16.00 lb	100.00%
Cluster 180 mins	2.50 oz
Hallertau 90 mins	2.50 oz
Saaz 60 mins	2.50 oz
Saaz 30 mins	2.50 oz
Goldings dry hops	1.50 oz
OG	1069
FG	1008
ABV	8.07
Apparent attenuation	88.41%
IBU	123
SRM	5.5
Mash at	153º F
Sparge at	165º F
Boil time	180 minutes
pitching temp	54º F
Yeast	WLP013 London Ale (Worthington White Shield)

Truman's weird parti-gyling

I bang quite a lot about parti-gyling. How it wasn't one wort per beer. No, the worts were blended together post-boil, with some of each wort going into each beer, just in different proportions.

That's how everyone parti-gyled. Except for Truman, at times. When they blended both pre- and post-fermentation. I'll be upfront: I have no idea what the point of this process was in the 19th century. Something similar was done during WW I, but then there was a point. Some beer was fermented at a higher gravity for yeast production, then blended with weaker beer after fermentation. Here, though, I really can't see the point.

 
Let's get on with it, then. This was a Stout parti-gyle from 1st March 1886. Four worts came out of the coppers, with these gravities:

41 lbs per barrel (1113.6º)
33.8 lbs per barrel (1093.6º)
16 lbs per barrel (1044.3º)
9 lbs per barrel (1024.9º)

What happened to these is where the weirdness starts. Because 6 barrels of the strongest wort were siphoned off "to C.R.", presumably that means Country Runner, one of Truman's Porter variants.

The four worts were blended up to create three beers:

162 barrels @ 34 lbs per barrel (1094.2º)
158 barrels @ 28 lbs per barrel (1077.6º)
305 barrels @ 25.5 lbs per barrel (1070.6º)

These were left to ferment away. At racking time, though, there was a second blending, leaving:

Imperial Stout 82 barrels @ 34.1 lbs per barrel (1094.5º)
Double Stout 244 barrels @ 28.8 lbs per barrel (1079.8º)
Single Stout 315 barrels @ 27 lbs per barrel (1074.8º)

80 barrels of Imperial Stout have been blended with Double Stout and Single Stout, bumping up the gravity of Double Stout by 2.2º and Single Stout by 4.2º. I really can't see what the point of the messing around was.

Next the log gives the quantities of each beer racked:

Imperial Stout 82 barrels
Double Stout 246 barrels
Single Stout 297 barrels

Before you say anything, I know the numbers don't quite add up.

This wasn't some weird one-off. Truman always brewed their domestic Stouts this way, right up until 1909 at least. (That's the last Stout brewing book I have).

I really can't see a point to this fiddling. Only thing I can think of, is it's connected to the new taxation system introduced in 1880. But that still dooesn't explain the reasoning behind it.

Trends

Being trendy is not something I've often been accused of. Having determinedly kept my finger as far away from the pulse as physically possible for five decades. I'm just glad that I still have a pulse.

Not living under a rock and occasionally venturing out, I do sometimes notice things. For example, while Andrew is loading up with this week's special offer Pils, I often run my eyes over Dirk's* beer selection. 

IPA started turning up a few years back. But relatively mainstream ones, in the form of Brand or 't Ij. More recently, crafty stuff has been appearing. OK, Oedipus, now owned by Heineken, isn't true craft any more. Some of the others are more worthy of the description. (If you think that it still means something.)

Great you might say. Not so much for me. Because they no longer sell any Trappist beers. As elsewhere in Holland, the range of Belgian beers available is being trimmed back. There's still Leffe Gulden Draak, Kasteel, La Chouffe, Duvel and Tripel Karmeliet on offer. Even Duvel Tripel Hop. But that's about it for Belgium.

When I was first in Holland, "special beer", as it was called, was all about Belgium. Even if the beer didn't come from there, it was inspired by it. T Ij, and the handful of other small Ducth breweries, mostly brewed Dubbels, Tripels and the like. Though there are still quite a few Belgian beers hanging around, newer Dutch brewers seek their inspiration elsewhere. Mostly the other side of the Atlantic. (Like everywhere else in the world.)

In the last couple of years there's been a big change in the draught offerings from pubs. Once about all you could expect was Pils, Witbier, De Koninck and maybe La Chouffe or an Ij beer. De Koninck, once the most widely available draught beer after Pils, has become a rarity. La Chouffe, which used to be all over the place, is becoming scarcer, too.

What's the current situation? Pils still reigns supreme,, obviously. That's far from displaced as Holland's favourite. But Witbier is increasingly being replaced by Hefeweizen. Usually either Paulaner (owned by Heineken), Augustiner Franziskaner (AB-Inbev) or Grolsch (Asahi).

Popping up everywhere is IPA. Like to guess which one is most common? It's not local favourite 't Ij IPA (now with a non-sexist label). No. Obviously, it's Lagunitas. Belonging to the Heineken stable helps. What with them having so many pubs tied to them.

That sums up what's happening in mainstream pubs, that is, non-specialist craft places. It's very different from the oceans of Pils and few bottles of Trappist on offer when I first arrived here. Craft places. Well, the few times I pop my around their doors, it's all the usual international stuff: Loads of IPAs of varying degrees of sludginess.

One thing hasn't changed, though. Most of the pub trade is still in the hands of big brewers. They've just, wisely in my opinion, broadened their focus. Why do you think people like Heineken have been buying up craft brewers? They need their products for their pubs. And they don't want to have to buy them from someone else. That would be stupid.



* Dirk van den Broek, a fairly cheap supermarket chain.

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1914 Thomas Usher 80/- MA

I'm guessing that you may assume that this is like a modern 80/-. It isn't. It's a totally different type of beer. It's an 80 Shilling, but a Mild Ale 80/-. While the modern beer of that name is a Pale Ale. 80/- is merely an indication of a beer's price and strength. Not what style it is.

At the outbreak of WW I Thomas Usher still brewed a decent range of Mild Ales.  44/-, 50/-, 60/-, 80/- and 100/-, varying in gravity from 1032º to 1065º. The war would put paid to that. In the 1920’s User brewed just a single Mild.

In London, there were no Mild Ales as weak as this before WW II. But out in the English provinces, there were Milds of 1040º, or even less. In 1914, for example, Adnams had an X Ale at 1033º and XX Ale at 1042º. London X Ales were a minimum of 1050º.

The recipe doesn’t look that dissimilar to an English Mild of the same period. Pale and crystal malt, flaked maize and sugar. The original doesn’t include No. 3 invert, but a dark proprietary sugar called DL. At least I think it’s dark, based on the type of beers it’s used in and the fact that the first letter of its name is a “D”.

The hopping, unsurprisingly, is fairly modest. I’ve guessed English hops. It could just as easily have a mixture of North American, English and even continental hops. Use any combination of those, if you’re so inclined. 

1914 Thomas Usher 80/- MA
pale malt	7.00 lb	73.68%
crystal malt	0.50 lb	5.26%
flaked maize	0.50 lb	5.26%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.75 lb	7.89%
cane sugar	0.75 lb	7.89%
Fuggles 120 min	0.75 oz
Fuggles 60 min	0.50 oz
Fuggles 30 min	0.50 oz
OG	1046
FG	1016.5
ABV	3.90
Apparent attenuation	64.13%
IBU	22
SRM	10
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	170º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	60º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

Alaska here I come?

I've fancied visiting Alaska for a while. You can blame all those reality TV programmes.

Let's face it, I have a limited number of good travelling years ahead of me. Best get in as much as I can while I can still walk .

My plans are in their very early stages. I've pencilled in the first half of August. Well, I wouldn't want to visit in winter. 6th – 16th July are the provisional dates.

Juneau and Anchorage are the towns I plan to visit. Any brewers there fancy hosting a brewing historian? Get in touch.