Quiz solution

I'm quite surprised that no-one really got this. I wasn't after anything complicated.

Take a look again:

What does it tell us? The proportion of Bitter to Mild that Boddington's brewed. To be very specific, the proportion of Bitter to Mild in November 1985. Though there was no way for you to have known the date.

1031º is the Mild. And 1034º the Bitter. All the other entries are, as Barm said, primings. Upon which tax obviously had to be paid. The column on the right gives the quantities in standard hectolitres (a hectolitre of beer at 1055º - that's why the numbers aren't just the number of litres divided by 100, Gary).

I'm slightly surprised at how little Mild they brewed. According to Statistical Handbook of the British Beer & Pub Association 2005, p. 17, 6.4% of beer sold in the UK in 1985 was Mild.So they were above the national average. But that includes the large swathes of the South where Mild was already a rarity. I would have expected more like 20% Mild.

Here are the numbers in tidy table form:

	litres	barrels	%
mild	256,889	1,570	9.04%
bitter	2,586,227	15,803	90.96%
total	2,843,116	17,373	100.00%
Source:
Boddingtons brewing records held at the Museum of Science and Industry, Manchester.

The previous page also gives totals for materials used. Which I can use to calculate average hopping rates. So that's what I've done:

barrels brewed	18,694
malt	2,258
hops	13,020
hops lbs/barrel	0.70
hops lbs/qtr	5.77
Source:
Boddingtons brewing records held at the Museum of Science and Industry, Manchester.

In case you're wondering, the difference in barrelage is due to losses during the brewing process. The number in the first table is excise barrels, in the second barrels brewed.

Did Boddingtons only brew two beers? In this period, yes. They aren't the most exciting brewing records I've seen.

Let's Brew - 1977 Boddington IP

While I’m on the topic of Boddington Bitter, I thought I’d throw out a few more recipes. Just for extra context.

I’ve picked 1977 because it’s a year of transition, when several ingredients were dropped, namely enzymic malt, wheat malt and flaked maize. The first did make a comeback the next year, however.

It was also the second year of glucose and the last year of another sugar, Flavex. The latter had featured in Boddington Bitter since before WW II. A search on the web has thrown up bugger all results for it. Most are for a modern artificial sweetener. The only useful hit was an advert in the 1952 Brewing Trade Review, I think from EDME.

Great, I though. I’ve got a run of Brewing Trade Review from the 1940s and 1950s. Frustratingly, my collection ends at 1951. If you happen to own the 1952 volume, take a look at page 64 and let me know exactly what it says. In this recipe, I’ve substituted No. 2 invert.

Not knowing anything about the hops, other than that they were from the 1976 harvest and English, I’ve produced two versions of the recipe. One using older varieties and one using more modern ones. I’ve plumped for Northern Brewer and Bramling Cross in the latter case, as they were varieties that I know Boddington used in the 1980s.

The choice of hop has quite an impact on the (calculated) IBUs: 20 for the older varieties, 31 for the newer ones.

1977 Boddington IP
pale malt	4.50 lb	62.07%
lager malt	1.25 lb	17.24%
malt extract	0.25 lb	3.45%
glucose	0.25 lb	3.45%
No. 2 invert sugar	1.00 lb	13.79%
Fuggles 85 min	0.75 oz
Goldings 30 min	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1034.5
FG	1006.5
ABV	3.70
Apparent attenuation	81.16%
IBU	21
SRM	4.5
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	162º F
Boil time	85 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

1977 Boddington IP alternate hops
pale malt	4.50 lb	62.07%
lager malt	1.25 lb	17.24%
malt extract	0.25 lb	3.45%
glucose	0.25 lb	3.45%
No. 2 invert sugar	1.00 lb	13.79%
Northern Brewer 85 min	0.75 oz
Bramling Cross 30 min	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1034.5
FG	1006.5
ABV	3.70
Apparent attenuation	81.16%
IBU	31
SRM	4.5
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	162º F
Boil time	85 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

 

 

 

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1939 Boddington CC

There’s a story behind this recipe. One with a happy ending.

When I was in Manchester a few years back I went to photograph some Boddingtons records. I was really disappointed that all they had were a couple of books from the 1980’s. Then Boak and Bailey posted something about the difference between Boddie’s Bitter in the 1960’s and the 1980’s. I immediately emailed them asking where they’d found the 1960’s brewing log.

It turns out there are a lot more Boddington’s brewing books. A full set from 1900, in fact. Which is brilliant news. It turns out they were in the process of moving when I visited the archive and not everything was available. I’m already penciling in a trip to Manchester.

Boddington had weird beer names before WW I. A was Pale Ale, BB was Mild Ale and CC was their Strong Ale. I can’t really detect any logic there. It’s been suggested that their CC might be the origin of “C” Ale, a strong beer exclusively brewed in the Manchester area. Could be true. I haven’t got a better explanation.

This is probably the quickest I’ve gone from getting hold of a record to publishing a recipe. I haven’t had my hands on it a week yet. I was so excited I had to rush it out.

The only unusual feature of the grist is the presence of wheat malt. In this period they put it every one of their beers. Could be a head retention thing. In their Stout it made up 12% of the grist. Which is quite a lot. Don’t think I’ve ever seen that much in a British beer.

Otherwise it’s a typical 20th-century Strong Ale or Mild: pale malt base, a touch of crystal malt, flaked maize and sugar. If you’d shown me just the recipe I would have said it was a London-brewed Burton.

I’m not sure if there was a draught version at this date. It’s possible that it was only available in bottled format.

That’s me done, time for the recipe.

1939 Boddington CC
pale malt	7.75	62.63%
crystal malt	1.50 lb	12.12%
flaked maize	1.50 lb	12.12%
wheat malt	0.75 lb	6.06%
caramel	0.125 lb	1.01%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.75 lb	6.06%
Cluster 90 mins	0.75 oz
Fuggles 90 mins	0.75 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	1.50 oz
Goldings 30 mins	1.50 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.50 oz
OG	1056
FG	1015.5
ABV	5.36
Apparent attenuation	72.32%
IBU	62
SRM	37
Mash at	149º F
Sparge at	162º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	62º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

Where are all the effing firkins?

I was glancing through my Boddingtons records yesterday and spotted something. One of the handy totals you sometimes find at year or month end.

It's of their stock of bee in casks at the end of 1984:

H = 54 gallon hogshead
B -= 36 gallon barrel
K = 18 gallon kilderkin
F = 9 gallon firkin

The fact that they only had a single firkin in stock says everything about the change in barrel size over the last 30 years.

Almost half of the stock of Bitter was in hogsheads. I have heard rumours that Holts still use them, though I haven't had that confirmed. I doubt very much if anyone else still bothers with them. I'm sure there are still regional breweries using barrels. I'd put money on Sam Smiths. But the vast majority of casl beer now comes in kilderkins and firkins.

Boddie's pubs must have still been shifting Mild quite quickly, given the majority of it was in full barrels. I doubt anyone fills anything larger than kilderkins with Mild any more.

One last point pops into my mind. How long would that stock have been intended to last?  If it were a week's stock, that would mean Boddingtons were only brewing around 35,000 barrels a year. But I'm pretty sure that they brewed at least 200,000. Divide 200,000 by 700 and you get 285. It looks like they didn't have much more than a day's supply of draught beer in stock.

1914 Boddington Stout

This is going to be a real treat. A Boddington beer with several types of malt. You must be so excited.

In 1903, Boddington still produced two Stouts: SS (Single Stout) and DS (Double Stout) at 1052º and 1069º, respectively. It looks like they dropped the latter and renamed SS simply Stout.

There’s no way that you could have called a beer with a gravity of just 1054º a Stout in 1914. Whitbread’s Porter, for example, was 1052º in 1914. Which has got me thinking more about Porter and its fate. It’s looking more and more as if, rather than disappearing, Porters were just relabelled as Stouts.

Let’s crack on with the grist, which is pretty exciting but also includes a big problem. The percentage of base pale malt is pretty low, only a third of the grist. Two other malts make up most of the rest: amber and high-dried. The percentage of amber malt is very high, making me wonder if this might be a diastatic form. Then there’s the high-dried.

I really don’t know what the best substitute for this malt is. I’m tempted to go with a dark Munich malt, but I’m really not sure how close that is. If you have a better idea, let me know.

The sugar in this beer is something described as “UI”. At least UI think that’s what it says. The handwriting is pretty bad. I’ve replaced it with No. 3 invert. Though it might have been something closer to No. 4 invert.

As with all Boddingtons records, the logs only tell me that the hops were English and Californian.

1914 Boddington Stout
pale malt	4.25 lb	34.55%
black malt	0.05 lb	0.41%
amber malt	3.50 lb	28.46%
high dried malt	3.50 lb	28.46%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.75 lb	6.10%
caramel 2000 SRM	0.25 lb	2.03%
Cluster 185 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 90 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	0.50 oz
OG	1054
FG	1018
ABV	4.76
Apparent attenuation	66.67%
IBU	29
SRM	36
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	168º F
Boil time	135 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1980 Boddington IP

The Boddies Bitter fun never ends. Or maybe it just seems that way. Whatever, this recipe documents a transitionary phase of the beer, which was only around for a few years, between 1976 and 1982 or 1983.

The most obvious feature is how simple the recipe has become: just four elements to the grist: pale malt, enzymic malt, glucose and malt extract. (The small quantity of enzymic malt I’ve just rolled into the pale malt base.) Even without out, this version is paler. A very Lager-like 3.4 SRM.

The dropping of Flavex (which appears as No. 2 invert in the 1977 recipe) and a reduction in the quantity of glucose has more than halved the sugar content and increased the malt content from 86% to 90%. On the face of it, an improvement in the recipe. Yet this exactly the period when, according to oral accounts, when the quality of Boddington Bitter nosedived. It’s a bit of a riddle.

Three types of hops in this example, all English, two from the 1978 harvest and one from 1979. For the sake of fairness, I’ve again provided recipes with two different sets of hops. The older varieties of Fuggles and Goldings set against the newer types of Northern Brewer and Bramling Cross. There’s a pretty big difference in bitterness levels between the two: 20 IBU for the old, 32 IBU for the new varieties. Both value calculated, obviously.

1980 Boddington IP
pale malt	6.75 lb	90.00%
malt extract	0.50 lb	6.67%
glucose	0.25 lb	3.33%
Fuggles 120 min	0.75 oz
Goldings 30 min	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1034
FG	1007
ABV	3.57
Apparent attenuation	79.41%
IBU	20
SRM	3.5
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	158º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

 

1980 Boddington IP alternate hops
pale malt	6.75 lb	90.00%
malt extract	0.50 lb	6.67%
glucose	0.25 lb	3.33%
Northern Brewer 120 min	0.75 oz
Bramling Cross 30 min	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1034
FG	1007
ABV	3.57
Apparent attenuation	79.41%
IBU	32
SRM	3.5
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	158º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

 

 

Harvey's Best Bitter

Harvey's Best Bitter.

Had a pint last night that was so good. Late on, after many good beers. Exactly what a pint of Bitter should be. Spot, spot on. Characterful, satisfying and demanding you drink more.

Time was, there were dozens of Bitters like that. Barnsley Bitter. Wethereds. Draught Bass. Boddingtons. Shipstones. Home. Camerons. Several bits of Whitbread. A few bits of Courage.

Don't get me started on Milds. The carnage amongst the good ones is even worse. Shiptones, Ansells, Davenports, M & B, Yorkshire Clubs, Darleys, Wem, Plymouth Heavy, Matthew Brown (yes, that could be really good), Hull.

Tetleys. Sorry, they aren't quite dead yet. My favourite of all. Black Dog, Cross Green, Thursday night, eight pints, best, best best, beer ever.

(Well, apart from Russian Stout.)

Tetley's Mild. Cross Black, Green Dog, best pints, ever, ever Mild. As I spoke after the eight pints.

Tetley's Mild. Best ever beer beer ever (apart from Courage Russian Stout).


Talking of Boddingtons, I've tricked the family into visiting Liverpool. And a day in Manchester. I hope Dolores doesn't notice the theme. After last year's trip to Glasgow.

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1947 Boddington XX

One last watery Mild before the end of May. This time, one from the late 1940s. Probably one of the most depressing times to be a beer drinker in Britain.

I can remember Boddie’s Mild quite well. It was one of the semi-dark kind. Though compared to their straw-coloured Bitter, it looked pretty dark. I assume that the version I drank was the direct successor to this beer.

With an OG of just 1028º, it’s not exactly high-gravity. Though thanks to a high degree of attenuation, it is just about 3% ABV. So just about intoxicating.

The grist is fairly simple: pale malt, crystal malt, flaked barley and sugar. Three different types of sugar: DMS, Fla. and invert. I’ve substituted No. 3 invert for them. Hopefully it’s somewhere close to what was in the original.

The hops were English (1945), Styrian (1945), Czech (1945) and 3 lbs hopulon. I’ve bumped up the hops by 21 lbs to account for the latter. The quantity of Styrian hops is so small – 2 lbs out of 105 lbs, I’ve left them out.

What next I wonder, now I'm done with watery Mild? Any suggestions?

1947 Boddington XX
pale malt	4.00 lb	65.31%
crystal malt 80 L	0.50 lb	8.16%
enzymic malt	0.125 lb	2.04%
flaked barley	0.75 lb	12.24%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.75 lb	12.24%
Fuggles 115 mins	0.75 oz
Saaz 30 mins	0.75 oz
OG	1028
FG	1005.5
ABV	2.98
Apparent attenuation	80.36%
IBU	21
SRM	10
Mash at	154º F
Sparge at	162º F
Boil time	115 minutes
pitching temp	62º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

Let's Brew - 1974 Boddington IP

The 1971 recipe above was taken from the start of a brewing book. This is taken from the end of that same book.

And, surprise, surprise, the recipe has changed again. The gravity has fallen again. Back in 1951, the OG was 1040º, in 1966 1038.5º, in 1971 1035.5º and now 1034.5º. There’s a definite trend there.

The percentages of the different elements of the grist have changed a little. There’s a bit less pale malt, a bit more lager malt and sugar. The sugars are still DMS, Fla and BR, 2 cwts of each.

The hopping rate had fallen again. It’s down from almost 7 lbs per quarter of malt in 1947 to just over 5lbs. Making this not a very bitter beer. I know, it’s not what I expected when I started looking at Boddington’s records. The description of the hops is very basic. All I know is that they were English.

1974 Boddington IP
pale malt	4.50 lb	60.00%
lager malt	1.25 lb	16.67%
enzymic malt	0.25 lb	3.33%
wheat	0.25 lb	3.33%
flaked maize	0.25 lb	3.33%
No. 2 invert sugar	1.00 lb	13.33%
Fuggles 90 min	0.75 oz
Goldings 30 min	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1034.5
FG	1004
ABV	4.03
Apparent attenuation	88.41%
IBU	20
SRM	6
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	162º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

Let's Brew - 1923 Boddington CC

WW I doesn’t seem to have treated CC too badly. It came out of the other side only 5º weaker. Not bad at all.

Amazingly, the grist has got even simpler. As the flaked maize has been dropped. A conscious decision by Boddington as all the rest of their beers, with the exception of Stout, did contain maize. Leaving just base malt and sugar. There were however, two types of pale malt, both English.

As Boddington were totally vague about the type of sugar being used – it’s in a column simply headed “Sch’rne” meaning just “sugar” – I’ve had to guess what it might be. No. 3 invert seems the most likely option for a dark beer like CC.

Boddington normally used four or five different copper hops and this beer is no exception. Pacific from the 1921 harvest, English from 1922 and Hannover from 1923. There were so few of the last, just 5 lbs out of a total of a total of 160 lbs, that it’s not worth including them in the recipe.

One of the odd features of Boddington is that they used American hops as dry hops. Which really shocked me as I’ve always read that UK brewers hated the flavour of American hops. In this case the dry hops were Pacific from the 1921 harvest, English from 1921 and Hannover from 1923.

1923 Boddington CC
pale malt	12.00 lb	95.05%
caramel 5000 SRM	0.125 lb	0.99%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.50 lb	3.96%
Cluster 155 mins	1.00 oz
Fuggles 90 mins	0.75 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	0.75 oz
Goldings 30 mins	0.75 oz
Cluster dry hops	0.25 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1057
FG	1018
ABV	5.16
Apparent attenuation	68.42%
IBU	47
SRM	20
Mash at	152º F
Sparge at	168º F
Boil time	155 minutes
pitching temp	62º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

This recipe is in my two new books, Strong! vols. 1 & 2 and Strong! vol.2.

1914 Boddington B

I used to think that low-gravity Milds didn’t exist until WW I. But I’ve now realised that wasn’t true.

My perceptions were distorted by only having looked at large London breweries, whose Milds were untypically strong. Outside London there were sub-1040º Milds well before the war. Boddington B being a good example.

This was Boddington’s weakest Mild. Looking at it just the recipe, I’d struggle to identify which period it was brewed in. It looks very much like a 1930’s Mild in terms of strength. It could even be 1950’s Mild at the strong end of the spectrum.

It must have been a bit of a shock for provincial Mild drinkers if they visited London. An X Ale in the capital was usually over 5% ABV and there was no weaker alternative, if you wanted to drink Mild. X Ale was the only Mild they brewed.

There’s not a great deal to the grist, just pale malt, flaked maize and sugar. As the type of sugar isn’t specified, I’ve hedged my bets and plumped for No. 2 invert. It really could be anything. Though, as it appears they used the same sugar in all their beers, I doubt it was anything very dark.

Most of Boddington’s beers at this time contained Californian hops, but, for some reason, this has Bohemian hops instead. Which I’ve interpreted as Saaz. Some of the dry hops were Californian, but all the rest were English. I’ve guessed Fuggles, but some or all Goldings would be fine, too.

1914 Boddington B
pale malt	6.50 lb	78.79%
flaked maize	1.25 lb	15.15%
No. 2 invert sugar	0.50 lb	6.06%
Fuggles 140 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	0.25 oz
Saaz 30 mins	0.25 oz
Cluster dry hops	0.13 oz
Fuggles dry hops	0.13 oz
OG	1037
FG	1010
ABV	3.57
Apparent attenuation	72.97%
IBU	13
SRM	5
Mash at	153º F
Sparge at	168º F
Boil time	140 minutes
pitching temp	63º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1913 Boddington IP

IP – which presumably stood for India Pale – was a very long-lived beer. Or rather, is, as it was the brewhouse name for Boddington Bitter right up until the brewery’s closure. And, wherever it’s currently brewed, the beer still exists.

By the time Strangeways closed, IP made up the vast majority of the beer it produced, with just a tiny quantity of Mild trickling out. Back before WW I, it accounted for only about 5% of production. The vast majority of production being either Mild or one of the weaker Pale Ales.

For a top of the range Pale Ale, it’s on the weaker side. Those from large London brewers were around 1060º. Though it didn’t fare too badly during WW I, being 1049º in 1923.

There’s not much to the grist. Two types of pale malt – English and foreign – and sugar. Exactly which type of sugar isn’t specified. I’ve guessed at No. 2 invert. But it could just as easily have been No. 1 or something else entirely. It’s impossible to know for certain.

Much more complexity was evident in the hops, with no fewer than five English types from the 1909, 1909, 1911, 1911 and 1912 harvests, along with Californian from 1911. Not exactly the freshest.

1913 Boddington IP
pale malt	10.50 lb	91.30%
No. 2 invert sugar	1.00 lb	8.70%
Cluster 150 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 150 mins	0.25 oz
Fuggles 90 mins	0.75 oz
Goldings 30 mins	0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.67 oz
OG	1052
FG	1015
ABV	4.89
Apparent attenuation	71.15%
IBU	32
SRM	7
Mash at	154º F
Sparge at	168º F
Boil time	150 minutes
pitching temp	62º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)

 

Let's Brew - 1901 Boddington XX

Next up the Mild chain is XX Ale. Though, in terms of strength, it’s about equal to a London X Ale.

Don’t expect anything exciting to report about the recipe. Although Boddington mostly brewed their Mild Ales single-gyle, they may as well have been, given the similarities between them. All consisted of just base malt and sugar. The latter being described simply as “Garton”.

Even assuming that the sugar is No.3 invert, the colour is significantly paler than that of London Mild Ales. Which by this point were clocking in at over 15 SRM. Not really so surprising, if you remember, as I do, Boddington’s Mild from the 1980s. It was dark compared to their Bitter, but only what I would describe as semi-dark, that is, about 10-12 SRM. It’s also confirmation that the darkening of Mild was an uneven process, not occurring everywhere simultaneously.

Once again there are lots of different hops, four English and one Californian, age unknown.

1901 Boddington XX
pale malt	10.75 lb	93.48%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.75 lb	6.52%
Cluster 120 mins	0.50 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	1.00 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	1.00 oz
Fuggles dry hops	0.50 oz
OG	1051.5
FG	1014
ABV	4.96
Apparent attenuation	72.82%
IBU	32
SRM	8
Mash at	154º F
Sparge at	168º F
Boil time	120 minutes
pitching temp	60º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1318 London ale III (Boddingtons)