London bottled Pale Ale on the eve of WW II

Bottled Pale Ales fell into similar classes, except the same strength of beer cost 1d per pint more.

By far the most popular price class was the 7d per pint one, the equivalent of a 6d per point draught beer. Note that there’s only a single beer in the most expensive 9d class. Which is significant because the equivalent draught beer class was one of the more popular ones, at least in London.

One of the lasting effects of WW I was to make bottled Pale Ales generally weaker than draught versions. The big exception being the classic Burton beers, such as Bass Pale Ale which remained stronger than draught versions.

The rate of attenuation is generally pretty high, with only one example under 75% and around half are above 80%. Not so surprising, given that they would have been conditioned in the brewery for a while before bottling.

The war would swing production away from bottled to draught beer. For a couple of reasons. First was a shortage of glass and bottles. The second was simple economy: draught beer required less energy and labour to produce.

London bottled Pale Ale 1936 - 1938
Year	Brewer	Beer	Price per pint (d)	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	colour
1938	Charrington	Golden Dinner Ale	6	1033.8	1006.3	3.57	81.36%	22
1938	Truman	Sparkling Ale	6	1029.6	1007.3	2.89	75.34%	27
1938	Truman	Eagle Ale	6	1036.6	1005.4	4.06	85.25%	20
1936	Beasley	PA	6	1036.6	1007.4	3.79	79.78%
1938	Barclay Perkins	Pale Ale	7	1038.3	1008.7	3.84	77.28%
1937	Fullers	Pale Ale	7	1039.8	1009.9	3.88	75.13%
1938	Ind Coope	Sparkling Ale	7	1040.4	1008	4.21	80.20%	20
1938	Lovibond	Yeoman Ale	7	1043.9	1005.4	5.03	87.70%	20
1938	Mann	Bitter Ale	7	1037.5	1006.6	4.02	82.40%	21
1938	Meux	Pale Ale	7	1037.6	1006.5	4.05	82.71%	23
1938	Taylor Walker	Pale Ale	7	1034.6	1010.6	3.11	69.36%	19
1937	Wenlock	Pale Ale	7	1042.2	1007.6	4.50	81.99%
1936	Friary Holroyd	Friary Ale	7	1038	1008.1	3.88	78.68%
1936	Lion Brewery	Dinner Ale	7	1039.9	1006.7	4.32	83.21%
1936	Watney	Watney's Pale Ale	7	1041	1009	4.16	78.05%
1938	Charrington	Toby Ale	8	1045.5	1011.1	4.47	75.60%	25
1938	Mann	Rustic Ale	9	1051.3	1008.03	5.65	84.35%
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001.

Scottish Mild Ales in the mid 19th century

Specially for Mild month, here's an extract from my amazing book, Scotland! vol. II, about Scottish Mild.


Differentiating Shilling Ales and Mild Ales is, in many, totally arbitrary. But I’m going to do it anyway. If only because Scottish brewers liberally sprinkled the X’s I associate with the style around their brewing records.

Putting on my serious hat, there was one defining difference between the two beers types. Both were sold young. But Shilling Ales were shipped out to retail outlets in hogsheads for bottling while Mild Ales were filled into barrels and kilderkins for sale on draught. Though they may have been born of the same mash, the method of conditioning differentiated them. Just like Mild Ale and Brown Ale in the 20th century.

Younger Mild Ales 1851 - 1854
Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
1851	X	1075	1036	5.16	52.00%	1.94	1.82
1851	XX	1081	1037	5.82	54.32%	4.97	2.37
1851	XX	1082	1035	6.22	57.32%	9.16	2.42
1851	XXX	1095	1037	7.67	61.05%	17.94	5.50
1852	X	1071	1034	4.89	52.11%	8.00	2.73
1853	X	1062	1029	4.37	53.23%	7.52	2.19
1853	X	1068	1032	4.76	52.94%	8.00	2.97
1853	X	1070	1031	5.16	55.71%	7.73	2.83
1853	XX	1076	1030	6.09	60.53%	8.00	3.08
1853	XXX	1088	1038	6.61	56.82%	8.00	3.69
1854	X	1053	1017	4.76	67.92%	10.00	2.50
Source:
William Younger brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number WY/6/1/2/5.

At mostly around 8 lbs of hops per quarter of malt, the hopping rate is very similar to London Mild Ales. Whitbread’s Ales of the same period look very similar to those of William Younger:

Whitbread Ales in 1851
Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
X	1074.8	1025.2	6.56	66.30%	9.07	3.21
XX	1088.6	1030.2	7.73	65.94%	9.07	3.81
XXX	1099.2	1041.6	7.62	58.10%	9.23	4.46
Source:
Whitbread brewing record held at the London Metropolitan Archives document number LMA/4453/D/01/16.

On average, Whitbread’s Ales were a little more heavily hopped, but not by a significant amount. The big difference is in the rate of attenuation, which is very low in the Younger Milds. Poor attenuation is a fairly constant feature of Scottish brewing. And may account for why Scottish beers were often perceived as sweeter than their English counterparts.

Moving forward a couple of decades, Younger’s Milds have dropped considerably in gravity:

William Younger Mild Ales in 1868
Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
1868	X	1053	1023	3.97	56.60%	6.30	1.36
1868	XX	1057	1024	4.37	57.89%	9.58	2.25
1868	XXX	1068	1028	5.29	58.82%	8.00	2.55
Source:
William Younger brewing record held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number WY/6/1/2/21

X has fallen from 1075º to 1053º, XX from 1082º to 1057º and XXX from 1095º to 1068º. Though the hopping rate, averaging around 8 lbs per quarter of malt has remained pretty constant.

Similar changes had taken place at Whitbread:

Whitbread Mild Ales in 1868
Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
1868	X	1056.8	1014.4	5.61	74.63%	7.41	1.93
1868	XL	1066.2	1019.7	6.16	70.29%	10.34	3.28
1868	XX	1080.9	1027.1	7.11	66.44%	9.61	3.54
Source:
Whitbread brewing record held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/01/034.

The strongest Mild, XXX had been discontinued and a new beer, XL, introduced with a gravity between X and XX. The fall in the gravity of Whitbread X, from 1075º to 1057º wasn’t quite as large as at Younger, but still considerable. XX, on the other hand, only had a small reduction in gravity from 1087º to 1081.º. The hopping of the two sets, averaging around 8 lbs per quarter of malt, remained roughly similar.

Between 1851 and 1868 the strength of William Younger’s Milds diverged considerably from Whitbread’s. Though they continued to be hopped at a similar rate.



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Adnams grists in 1946

The recipes Adnams employed changed little more than their gravities. They’re easily the brewery where the war had the least impact. At least amongst the breweries whose records I’ve seen.

The only really significant change was the appearance of an adjunct – in the form of flaked barley – in PA and XX. The quantities of coloured malts used in XX and DS remained much the same at around 5% of each. And PA started to use medium malt for about half of the base malt.

The addition of flaked barley didn’t lead to a reduction in the proportion of malt being used. Instead, it mostly seems to have been used as a substitute for sugar.

The sugar content of XX and PA fell from 12-13% to 7-8%. Only in DS, which didn’t include flaked barley, did the proportion of sugar remain roughly the same.

The hops for both the 1939 and 1946 versions of the beers were all English. Which is about everything I know about them. The records aren’t very revealing on this point, not even listing the year of harvest.

Adnams malts in 1946
Date	Beer	Style	OG	pale malt	amber malt	choc. Malt	crystal malt	medium malt	flaked barley
1st Jan	PA	Pale Ale	1036	41.38%				46.55%	5.17%
2nd Jan	XX	Mild Ale	1027		5.17%		5.17%	72.41%	10.34%
10th Jan	DS	Stout	1039		5.17%	5.17%	5.17%	77.59%
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 33 held at the brewery.

Adnams sugars in 1946
Date	Beer	Style	OG	no. 1 sugar	no. 3 sugar	Tintose	total sugar
1st Jan	PA	Pale Ale	1036	6.90%			6.90%
2nd Jan	XX	Mild Ale	1027		6.90%	1.11%	8.00%
10th Jan	DS	Stout	1039		6.90%	2.62%	9.51%
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 33 held at the brewery.

Let's Brew - 1915 Noakes X

Noakes was a small South London brewery, located close to London Bridge station. Brewing ceased in 1920, with all beer being produced in the company’s other brewery in Windsor. When they were acquired by Courage in 1930, Noakes owned 120 tied houses.

The early effects of WW I are clear in the gravity, which is lower than the 1050º which was standard before 1914 for London Mild.

The grist is odd in a couple of ways. Specifically in the tiny amount of flaked maize. I really can’t see what the point was, unless they were just using up the stock they had. Later in the war maize would disappear entirely from UK beers as the war situation made its importation impossible.

There’s an awful lot of sugar in this beer, mostly in the form of No. 3 invert. They was a small amount of a proprietary sugar called CDM. I’ve just bumped up the No. 3 quantity to include that.

Once again, the colour comes principally from sugar: No. 3 invert and caramel. The amount of black malt is so small that it doesn’t influence the final shade much.

1915 Noakes X Ale
pale malt	6.50 lb	69.00%
crystal malt 120 L	0.50 lb	5.31%
black malt	0.07 lb	0.74%
flaked maize	0.05 lb	0.53%
No. 3 invert sugar	2.25 lb	23.89%
caramel 2000 SRM	0.05 lb	0.53%
Cluster 90 mins	0.50 oz
Cluster 30 mins	0.50 oz
OG	1045
FG	1010.5
ABV	4.56
Apparent attenuation	76.67%
IBU	18
SRM	23
Mash at	142º F
After underlet	150º F
Sparge at	165º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1099 Whitbread Ale

This is one of the dozens of recipes in my book Mild! plus. Which is avaiable in both paperback:

 

and hardback formats:

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Adnams beers in 1946

Having their beers start the war pretty weak had one advantage for Adnams: they were very little affected by it, at least in terms of strength. In many ways, Adnams beers in 1939 already looked like post-war versions.

PA and DS both dropped 3º during the war, X just 2º. But the latter, kicking off the war already at a meagre 1029º really didn’t have very far to go in terms of gravity reduction. Because of the way the tax system worked – a minimum rate, the equivalent of that for a beer of 1027º, was charged whatever the strength of a beer. Making a beer weaker than 1027º very financially unattractive.

The table below shows the percentage change in OG and hopping rate.

Falls in gravity of just 7% were very much below the average. Fullers gravities, for example, fell between 9.5% and 42% between 1939 and 1945. Those numbers are much more typical of the changes to strength wrought by the war.

There’s a similarly small change in the hopping rates. Despite breweries being compelled by the government in June 1941 brewers to reduce their hopping rates by 20%.  I’m not sure how Adnams were able to effect such a small reduction in the amount of hops they used.

In a way, this is a good demonstration of the evening out of local strength differences during the war. Adnams beers were considerably weaker than those brewed in London in 1939. By 1946 they were roughly similar.

Adnams beers in 1946
Date	Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
1st Jan	PA	Pale Ale	1036	1008.9	3.59	75.38%	7.20	1.02
2nd Jan	XX	Mild Ale	1027	1005.5	2.84	79.48%	4.63	0.50
10th Jan	DS	Stout	1039	1012.7	3.47	67.33%	5.78	0.92
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 33 held at the brewery.

Adnams beers 1939 - 1946
Beer	Style	OG in 1939	OG in 1946	% fall	lbs hops/ qtr in 1939	lbs hops/ qtr in 1946	% fall
PA	Pale Ale	1039	1036	7.69%	8.00	7.20	10.00%
XX	Mild Ale	1029	1027	6.90%	4.93	4.63	6.14%
DS	Stout	1042	1039	7.14%	5.78	5.78	-0.04%
Sources:
Adnams brewing records Book 26 and 33 held at the brewery.

Adnams grists in 1939

Adnams grists are notable for a couple of reasons. First, they contain no adjuncts, only malt and sugar. This was highly unusual. Pretty much everyone included maize – usually in flaked form, but occasionally as grits – in their recipes.

Only PA contained pale malt. The other beers all used something called medium malt as a base. I’m assuming that it was something along the lines of mild malt, but I could be wrong. It’s use in darker beers suggests that it’s less fancy base malt.

The grists of XX, XXXX and DS are all very similar, except the latter includes chocolate malt as well as amber and crystal. At thus point it was unusual to find amber malt in anything other than Porter and Stout.

The grist of PA is incredibly simple, containing just pale malt and No. 1 invert sugar. That’s about as stripped down as Bitter recipes come.

The sugar content, at around 15% of the grist is quite. But as Adnams used no adjuncts, the malt percentage is about the same, or even a little higher, than was the norm.

There are no proprietary sugars, just No. 1 and No. 3 invert. Which, by this time, was pretty old-school.  Many brewers used all sorts of specialised sugar products, often designed for a particular type of beer. No. 3 is exactly what you would expect to find in dark beers like XX and XXXX.

Adnams malts in 1939
Date	Beer	Style	OG	pale malt	amber malt	choc. Malt	crystal malt	medium malt
22nd May	XX	Mild Ale	1029		4.79%		4.79%	76.62%
24th May	XXXX	Old Ale	1055		4.81%		4.81%	76.91%
23rd May	PA	Pale Ale	1039	87.10%
8th Jun	DS	Stout	1042		5.96%	5.96%	5.96%	71.57%
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 26 held at the brewery.

Adnams malts in 1939
Date	Beer	Style	OG	no. 1 sugar	no. 3 sugar	Tintose	total
22nd May	XX	Mild Ale	1029		12.77%	1.03%	13.80%
24th May	XXXX	Old Ale	1055		12.82%	0.66%	13.48%
23rd May	PA	Pale Ale	1039	12.90%			12.90%
8th Jun	DS	Stout	1042		7.95%	2.59%	10.54%
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 26 held at the brewery.

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Let's Brew Wednesday - 1934 Kidd X

Yet another Mild recipe in the run up to May. A fairly puny one this time.

Based in Dartford, Kent, Kidd was quite a small brewery, owning just 65 tied houses. They were bought by Courage in 1937 and closed immediately.

As was often the case with Dark Mild Ales, there’s no malt darker than crystal. Though there is quite a lot of that. The bulk of the colour, however, comes from the caramel. “M” to be specific, which was a proprietary caramel from manufacturer Hay. Whitbread also used it in their Mild.

The interwar period was when brewers started to use malt extract in their beers. The quantities are pretty small so I’m assuming is was to add extra enzymes rather than for flavour. In this case, it was DME – Diastatic Malt Extract.

The hops were all Est Kent Fuggles, half from the 1932 harvest, the remainder from 1933 and 1934.

1934 Kidd X
mild malt	4.25 lb	65.03%
pale malt	0.50 lb	7.65%
crystal malt 120 L	1.00 lb	15.30%
flaked maize	0.50 lb	7.65%
malt extract	0.125 lb	1.91%
raw cane sugar	0.08 lb	1.22%
caramel 2000 SRM	0.08 lb	1.22%
Fuggles 105 mins	0.75 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	0.75 oz
OG	1032
FG	1005
ABV	3.57
Apparent attenuation	84.38%
IBU	19
SRM	23
Mash at	146.5º F
After underlet	152º F
Sparge at	160º F
Boil time	105 minutes
pitching temp	60º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1099 Whitbread Ale

This is one of the dozens of recipes in my book Mild! plus. Which is avaiable in both paperback:

 

and hardback formats:

Adnams beers in 1939

As a relatively small, rural brewery, Adnams served a very different market to large urban breweries. Their range of beers was pretty small – just five in all – and they were considerably weaker than equivalent London beers.

Only their XXXX Old Ale and DS Stout were above average OG, which in 1939 was 1041º.  . As they didn’t brew very large quantities of either, the average OG of what they brewed must have been well below the national average.

It’s a bit of a cheek calling a beer with an OG below 1030º XX. I doubt it fooled anyone, as it must have drunk very light. Mild ales of this strength did exist in London – where they were call 4d Ales – but they were brewed in tiny quantities. Most Mild Ales from the capital were either around 1037º or 1043º.

Adnam’s PA is equally watery for the style. It’s clearly been brewed as a 6d per pint beer, while in London draught Bitter almost always came in the 7d (1048º) or 8d (1043º) classes. I assume this is the result of people being less well off in rural districts.

Similarly DS is about as weak as Stout got before WW II. Whitbread’s and Barclay Perkins’ draught London Stout, for example, both had an OG of about 1046º. I doubt the Adnams beer was ever sold on draught. By this point draught Stout was pretty rare outside London.

The only beer with a decent OG by the standards of the time is XXXX. It’s a typical Southern-style Old Ale, meaning it’s basically just like a pre-WW I Mild. Though in this case it isn’t just a souped-up version of XX Mild. The grists were identical, but XXXX was hopped considerably more heavily and was dry-hopped, unlike XX.

Missing from the table above is Adnams Barley Wine, Tally Ho. It was only brewed very occasionally and I missed it in the 1939 records.

The hopping rates are reasonable, with PA hopped at a similar rate to London Bitters. XX is more lightly hopped than London equivalents, but is fairly normal for provincial Milds.

Adnams beers in 1939
Date	Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
22nd May	XX	Mild Ale	1029	1006.1	3.03	78.99%	4.93	0.58
24th May	XXXX	Old Ale	1055	1017.7	4.93	67.77%	6.94	1.53
23rd May	PA	Pale Ale	1039	1010.0	3.84	74.43%	8.00	1.27
8th Jun	DS	Stout	1042	1013.3	3.80	68.34%	5.78	1.01
Source:
Adnams brewing record Book 26 held at the brewery.