Wednesday 7 February 2024

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1975 Elgood Lager

We have here a really good example of the pseudo-Lagers brewed by smaller UK breweries in the 1960s and 1970s. Not having the equipment to brew a proper Lager, they simply brewed a very pale top-fermenting beer.

Which is exactly what we have here. The recipe is very simple: lager malt, flaked rice and a tiny bit of malt extract. I assume that rice has been chosen as the adjunct in order to keep the colour as pale as possible. There’s really not a lot more to say about the grist.

In reality, this is a Golden Ale, just artificially carbonated, stuck into kegs and served cold.

A typical underlet mashing process was employed. Nothing even vaguely resembling a decoction mash. Though much the same as the scheme used for their other beers.

There was a single type of English hop from the 1973 harvest. 

1975 Elgood Lager
lager malt 6.50 lb 87.60%
flaked rice 0.67 lb 9.03%
malt extract 0.25 lb 3.37%
Fuggles 95 min 0.50 oz
Fuggles 60 min 0.50 oz
Fuggles 30 min 0.50 oz
OG 1034
FG 1008
ABV 3.44
Apparent attenuation 76.47%
IBU 20
SRM 2.5
Mash at 151º F
Sparge at 170º F
Boil time 95 minutes
pitching temp 59º F
Yeast WLP007 Dry English Ale

action barrels strike heat initial heat mins stood
mash 16 147º F 144º F 20
underlet 3 200º F 151º F 100
sparge 1 20 170º F    
sparge 2 15 160º F    

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fascinating that golden ale was created in the 1970’s out of desperation by small and medium sized breweries in Britain.
Oscar

John said...

Do the brewing records indicate if it was kept at the pitching temp, or was it allowed to rise during fermenting?

Matt said...

I hadn't really thought of it in those terms. You tend to think of golden ales, at least the cask ones, as beginning in the late eighties with Summer Lightning, although of course there were very pale bitters, especially in Manchester, and beers advertised as being a golden ale long before that.

Anonymous said...

Golden ale as such had always been brewed , it just was not called this. Ales have long been available in all different hues , Boddington's for example was very pale.
Pale Ale is so called because it is brewed using Pale Malt , not because of the beer colour. Black Pale Ale was brewed in the 1870s.

Anonymous said...

The old Smithwick’s golden coloured bitter of yore as well.

Oscar