Fremlin beers in 1897

One of the larger breweries in Kent, Fremlin produced an impressive range of beers. Fourteen of them in all, mostly Pale Ales.

There were eight of them in total, plus an IPA. With gravities from 1040º to 1069º. Which is a pretty decent spread. Though, rather oddly, three different beers were 1048º. You can see why they described themselves as a Pale Ale brewery in their advertisements. 

Weakest of the set was the rather enigmatically named H. Which looks like some sort of Light Bitter. There’s a bit of a jump then to BB at 1048º. Which came in two variations, BB and BB L. The latter, presumably, being a version for the London market, which was significantly more heavily hopped.

Next was BA at 1052º. Which came in three variations. BA C (I’m guessing country) at the lower gravity of 1048º and looks very much like BB. And BA L (London) with a higher gravity of 1055º, along with heavier hopping.

Next, we come to PA at 1058º. Which also had a London variant at 1061º. And, finally, there’s IPA at 1069º, which is very much at the top end of strength for the style.

There’s just a single Mild Ale, X, with a fairly typical gravity of 1051º. Which mainly differs from the Pale Ales in having a lower hopping rate of just over 6 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt. Compared to 7.5 to 10 lbs for the Pale Ales.

A whole three Black Beers were produced: Porter, Cooper and Double Stout. It’s odd to see Cooper being brewed. It was usually just a blend of Porter and Stout. It’s particularly odd, given it’s only 1º higher in gravity than the Porter.

We now come to the oddest beer of the bunch: Pilsener. In the 1890s, Lager was usually only brewed by specialists, with a special brewhouse dedicated to it. Fremlin was well ahead of the game and had already started brewing their Pilsener in the 1880s. 

Fremlin beers in 1897
Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
X	Mild	1051	1014.4	4.84	71.76%	6.32	1.45
H	Pale Ale	1040	1006.6	4.41	83.38%	7.57	1.26
BA	Pale Ale	1052	1013.3	5.12	74.43%	7.75	1.69
BA C	Pale Ale	1048	1009.4	5.10	80.38%	7.37	1.51
BA L	Pale Ale	1055	1015.5	5.22	71.80%	10.00	2.47
BB	Pale Ale	1048	1010.8	4.92	77.49%	7.26	1.52
BB L	Pale Ale	1048	1010.5	4.96	78.07%	9.33	2.09
PA	Pale Ale	1058	1015.5	5.62	73.26%	7.89	1.97
PA L	Pale Ale	1061	1016.9	5.83	72.30%	9.89	2.73
IPA	IPA	1069	1018.3	6.71	73.50%	8.00	3.49
Pilsener	Pilsener	1047				6.00	1.30
P	Porter	1052	1015.0	4.90	71.23%	6.45	1.37
Cooper	Porter	1053	1017.7	4.67	66.55%	5.41	1.36
DS	Stout	1071	1017.7	7.05	75.03%	7.48	2.76
Source:
Fremlin brewing record held at the Kent Archives, document number U3555/2/F/Bx2/1/22.