Time to have a look at the grists of the Stouts we looked at the other day.
The malt percentage is fairly high, averaging 85%. Every example contains at least too malts, most three. All have a pale malt base, other than Elgood’s, which has a combination of pale and mild.
There’s a fair amount of diversity in the malts employed. Though three – Fremlin, Whitbread and Boddington – have a backbone of pale, brown and chocolate malt. Which is much like a classic London Stout blend, except that the black malt has been replaced by chocolate malt.
I’m surprised that three brewers were including brown malt, and only one black. Chocolate malt was also pretty popular, turning up in the Stouts of four breweries. While crystal malt was favoured by three brewers.
The percentage of coloured malts varied considerably. Around 24% at Adnams, 15% at Fremlin, Whitbread and Boddington, but just 9.4% at Truman. Though we’ll see why that figure was so low when we get to the adjuncts.
| UK Stout malts 1969 - 1973 | |||||||||
| Year | Brewer | Beer | pale malt | brown malt | black malt | choc. Malt | crystal malt | mild malt | total malt |
| 1969 | Fremlin | Special Stout | 68.66% | 8.17% | 8.17% | 85.01% | |||
| 1970 | Adnams | Double Stout | 64.86% | 8.11% | 16.22% | 89.19% | |||
| 1973 | Whitbread | Mackeson | 70.18% | 4.70% | 8.40% | 3.71% | 86.99% | ||
| 1973 | Whitbread | Extra Stout | 70.18% | 4.70% | 8.40% | 3.71% | 86.99% | ||
| 1971 | Boddington | WSS | 65.96% | 7.61% | 7.61% | 81.18% | |||
| 1969 | Truman | Stout | 64.15% | 9.43% | 73.58% | ||||
| 1969 | Elgood | Stout | 38.10% | 4.76% | 38.10% | 80.95% | |||
| Average | 83.41% | ||||||||
| Sources: | |||||||||
| Fremlin brewing record held at the Kent Archives, document number U3555/2/F/Bx2/1/93. | |||||||||
| Adnams brewing record held at the brewery. | |||||||||
| Whitbread brewing record held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/09/141. | |||||||||
| Boddington brewing record held at Manchester Central Library, document number M693/405/134. | |||||||||
| Truman Ale book held by Derek Prentice. | |||||||||
| Elgood brewing record held at the brewery. | |||||||||
Looking forward to it, Ron. Do you think it will be out by Christmas? I always like to have something decent to read over the festive season.
ReplyDeleteDo they indicate what type of chocolate malt? The difference between varieties on the market now is pretty broad, but I don't know if that was true then.
ReplyDeleteMatt,
ReplyDeleteprobably not. I want top take my time with it. I plan doing more interviews.
Anonymous Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteI think with coloured malts in general there's a lot of variation between maltsters. It was certainly the case with brown and amber malt in the past.