Whitbread beers in 1972 - including IPA

Wondering how they made those lovely early 1970s beers? Well, here's your chance to find out more. As take a close look at the beers from Whitbread's original Chiswell Street brewery. Just a couple of years before it closed for good.

There are nine beers in all. Which was more than Whitbread brewed for most of the 20th century. Though I'm pretty certain that PA and Trophy are really the same beer. Though the story is a little complicated.

Since the end of WW I, Whitbread had brewed two Pale Ales: IPA and PA. With the latter being the stronger of the two. In 1958, IPA became WPA. Then, around 1969, PA starts being called Tankard in the brewing records and WPA simply PA. Then in 1971 it's suddenly called Trophy. Sometimes. Though I'm pretty sure than the trade names for them had been Trophy and Tankard long before that.

There's not a huge difference in their gravities: just 4º. Both have a pretty high degree of attenuation which leaves them with a higher ABV than you might have expected. The hopping rates of the Pale Ales are pretty low. Barely higher than the Mild.

Both Trophy and Tankard were sold throughout the Whitbread estate. Tankard was always the same beer. While Trophy was different from each one of their breweries. Rather than a single beer, it was just the Ordinary Bitter of the original brewery rebadged. Which was pretty weird. Though it did mean a lot of regional beers were retained.

Dark and pretty watery I think sums up Best Mild. Bit of a joke calling it that, really, given its feeble gravity.

EX - BM is a bit of a mystery. What could the BM stand for? "Belgian Market", perhaps? Because Whitbread did produce a stronger Pale Ale that was sold in Belgium. It's even more highly-attenuated than the other Pale Ales. And considerably paler. Though the hopping rate, at under 3.5 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt, is still very low.

Surprisingly, they were still making two Stouts. The renowned Milk Stout Mackeson and a stronger beer, again specifically for the Belgian market. In a bizarre twist, the Sweet Stout has the highest hopping rate of any of the beers: 4.5 lbs per quarter of malt. If you're wondering why its FG is so low, that's because the lactose was added as primings at racking time.

Final Selection - a name I've always found rather ominous - was a new strong bottled beer introduced in 1968. With its dark colour and high gravity, it recalls the strong Burton Ales of the start of the century. At its introduction, it was the strongest beer Whitbread had brewed for several decades. Compared to most of their other beers, it's more heavily hopped. But still far short of crazy.

A few years later, an even stronger beer started coming out of Chiswell Street: Gold Label. Acquired along with Sheffield's Tennant brewery, it became a key part of Whitbread's beer range. Which is why they started brewing it in London in 1972. I can't tell you how happy I was when I stumbled on the first Gold Label record in the logs. It being a beer with which I'm weirdly obsessed. 

Whitbread beers in 1972
Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl	colour
Best Mild	Mild	1030.9	1007.8	3.06	74.76%	3.22	0.43	115
PA	Pale Ale	1035.8	1007.1	3.80	80.17%	3.43	0.49	23
Trophy	Pale Ale	1035.9	1006.4	3.90	82.17%	3.32	0.36	21
Tankard	Pale Ale	1039.8	1007.7	4.25	80.65%	3.32	0.40	24
EX - BM	Pale Ale	1048.8	1004.7	5.83	90.37%	3.36	0.67	13
Mackeson	Stout	1038.6	1010.8	3.68	72.02%	4.51	0.72	250
Extra Stout	Stout	1055.8	1013.0	5.66	76.70%	3.93	0.90	325
Final Selection	Strong Ale	1079.8	1011.3	9.06	85.84%	4.44	1.50	115
Gold Label	Barley Wine	1101.9	1020.6	10.76	79.78%	3.88	1.74	37
Source:
Whitbread brewing record held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/09/141.

Let's Brew - 1959 Watney Dairy Maid Sweet Stout

A bit of an odd one, this. It’s a Watney beer, but it wasn’t brewed in London. This is a beer that was brewed there, but I have none of those brewing records. Luckily for me, Usher in Trowbridge also brewed some Watney beers. And I have some of their records.

A typical watery postwar Stout, you might say. But, being a Watney beer, it wasn’t as simple as that. 680 barrels were brewed. But then another 108 barrels of various shit were added at raking time. Bottoms, returned beer – all the crap brewers were so keen on not wasting.

In addition, there were also 2.25 gallons per barrel of candy sugar added. The net result being a rise in the effective OG by 3.6º to 1034.º. I’ve added a half pound of candy to account for this.

The base recipe looks normal enough. There’s a mild malt base with black malt for colour. The sugar is split between granules, which I assume is just plain white sugar and CDM (Caramelised Dextro-Maltose). For the latter, I’ve substituted mostly No. 3 invert, along with a little caramel.

Odd is what’s missing: lactose. The names “Dairy Maid” and “Sweet Stout” imply its presence. But I’m pretty sure it contained none, as it’s not mentioned the Whitbread Gravity Book analyses. Which usually made a point of doing so.

Weirdest ingredient is ginger, 26 oz of which were added to the 680 barrels. Which for this size of batch works out to bugger all.

A fairly typical underlet mash process was employed.

action	barrels	strike heat	tap heat
mash	85	154º F	146º F
underlet	10	154º F	149º F
sparge 1		170º F	152º F
sparge 2		160º F	156º F

A single type of East Kent hops from the 1958 harvest was used. 

1959 Watney Dairy Maid Sweet Stout
mild malt	5.00 lb	67.80%
black malt	0.67 lb	9.08%
flaked maize	0.25 lb	3.39%
No. 3 invert sugar	0.50 lb	6.78%
cane sugar	0.33 lb	4.47%
candy sugar	0.50 lb	6.78%
caramel 2000 SRM	0.125 lb	1.69%
ginger	pinch
Goldings 45 mins	0.75 oz
Goldings 15 mins	0.50 oz
OG	1034
FG	1012
ABV	2.91
Apparent attenuation	64.71%
IBU	14
SRM	33
Mash at	150º F
Sparge at	170º F
Boil time	45 minutes
pitching temp	60º F
Yeast	WLP023 Burton Ale

London Bitter in 1972 - IPA?

I'm back with the draught beers from 1972. Yes, I'm going to squeeze the last few drops of blood from these analyses.

Just look at how many Big Six breweries there still were in the capital. Courage, Whitbread, Watney are all represented here. And two others - Charrington and Mann - aren't. Then there's Truman, who weren't quite yest in the big boys club. Only Watney's Mortlake was still in operation in 1990.

All the beers have gravities in a pretty narrow range: 1035.1º to 1039.3º. Together, they average out to almost exactly the national average of 1036.9.* Fairly classic Ordinary Bitters, then. Other than Courage Best Bitter, which is just about strong enough for that classification.

While we're talking of gravities, that of Whitbread Tankard looks too low. In the brewing records, it's more than 2º higher, at 1039.8º. And had been brewed at that strength for a decade or more. So how come it was analysed at 1037.3º? If it were a cask beer, I'd conclude that it had been watered or had weaker slops added to it. But I'm pretty sure it was a keg-only beer. Meaning it couldn't easily be tampered with. Bit of a mystery, that.

Worst value by quite a margin are the two Truman's beers. Though the gravities are so similar, I can't help wondering if they are, in fact, the same beer. They're the two most expensive beers as well. And also the most highly attenuated.

Best value is the surprisingly cheap Courage Best, which is almost 1p per pint cheaper than the average. Yet has the highest gravity and ABV.

I never tried most of these beers. For the simple reason that they were evil keg. The only ones I drank were Young's Ordinary and Courage Best. The latter was a decent enough beer in its London and Bristol incarnations. When you could find it on cask and well looked after. It's only a couple of years since I last drank it. When it was inoffensively bland. Who knows where it was brewed.

IPA? One of these beers was called IPA for more than 50 years. Any guesses?

All will be revealed on Sunday.

London Bitter in 1972
Brewer	Beer	Price per pint (p)	º gravity per p	% ABV per p	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
Truman	Titan	16	2.28	0.25	1036.5	1005.8	4.00	84.11%
Truman	Special	15	2.38	0.26	1035.7	1005.7	3.90	84.03%
Whitbread	Tankard	14.5	2.59	0.27	1037.6	1007.6	3.90	79.79%
Watney	Red	14	2.66	0.26	1037.2	1009.5	3.60	74.46%
Courage	Tavern	14	2.66	0.26	1037.3	1008.8	3.70	76.41%
Whitbread	Trophy	13	2.70	0.28	1035.1	1006.6	3.70	81.20%
Young	Ordinary Bitter	13	2.73	0.27	1035.5	1008.5	3.50	76.06%
Watney	Special	12.5	2.90	0.27	1036.2	1010	3.40	72.38%
Courage	Best Bitter	13	3.02	0.32	1039.3	1007.8	4.10	80.15%
Average		13.9	2.66	0.27	1036.7	1007.8	3.76	78.73%
Source:
Daily Mirror July 10th 1972, page 15.

* Statistical Handbook of the British Beer & Pub Association 2005, p. 7.

Not working

Now I'm an oldie, as I sit flicking rat poison to the pigeons from my park bench. Between surreptitiously supping from that embarrassingly large litre bottle of extremely cheap whisky. I think back to the before times. When I was young rather than everyone else.

Leaving school with impressively mediocre A-levels, my wise choice of a wildly unpopular subject meant I got in anyway. Chinese. At the time, totally fucking useless in the job market. Explaining why they let me in.

Getting back to the theme. I'd best explain what my goals as a furry-faced school leaver were:

1. Not working
2. Becoming a writer.

I know, possibly contradictory aims. (I was going to say, well, writing is never work for me. But it has been. I've written things purely for the money. Might have had a bit of fun.)

While not working as a student, I got to play with writing in the Leeds Student magazine. Purely because my mate Pete was arts editor. Me, Tim and Matt all got to write pretentious reviews.

I had zero idea how to take this writing further.

Not working, however, wasn't just my attempt to be a writer. I saw it as a lifestyle. After a few early setbacks, I'm delighted how well it's succeeded.

In a time of high unemployment, try as I might, work kept coming my way. For a workshy git like me, a total disaster.

Then the jobs stop involving, er, work.

My record for sitting idle on my arse: 21 months. A nightmare really. In pre-internet days. What do you do? I wrote programs that might have been useful, without being asked. Just to make that clock tick a little faster.

So many other contracts with little or nothing to do. I wrote whole applications just to stop going crazy.

Then, to kill the boredom in a job with no work and no internet access, I wrote "Beer Ale and Malt Liquor". My rambling, incomplete manuscript on the history of UK beer 1700-1973. I did publish one chapter in what I think might be the longest post ever. The quarter of a million words. I've been using to remind of all the stuff I've forgotten.

How did my writing progress? A webpage and a blog. Thanks internet! 

And thanks not working. For making me fulfill goal number two: becoming a writer.*

Can I stop now I've achieved all my goals? Maybe I should ask the kids.

 

* If you count one obscure commissioned book and a raft of amateurish, self-published word fests, withe more tables than the first class dining room of the Titanic

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1942 Barclay Perkins Dark Lager

As Barclay’s strongest Lager, it’s no surprise that it’s also suffered the biggest reduction in gravity.

The total number of quarters in the grist remain the same, but there’s more crystal malt and roast. No need to guess why this might have been, as there’s a note in the record explaining it: “N.B. New proportions for coloured malts to make up colour due to gravity reduction.” Which makes sense.

Another change to the grist compared to 1941 is the use of lager malt rather than pale malt as the base.

That all the malt was being added at the start of the mash is confirmed by this record. What could the reason have been for that? Aside from that, the mashing scheme was much the same.

mash in	126º F	30 minutes
raise to	158º F	20 minutes
raise to	170º F
hold at	170º F	38 minutes
Sparge at	175º F

Just two types of hops, Belgian Saaz from the 1939 crop and Goldings from 1941, both cold stored. 

1942 Barclay Perkins Dark Lager
lager malt	8.50 lb	76.71%
crystal malt 80 L	2.25 lb	20.31%
roast barley	0.33 lb	2.98%
Goldings 90 mins	0.75 oz
Saaz 30 mins	0.75 oz
OG	1048.5
FG	1015.5
ABV	4.37
Apparent attenuation	68.04%
IBU	17
SRM	20
Mash at	158º F
Sparge at	175º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	45.5º F
Yeast	Wyeast 2042 Danish lager

This recipe is one of 553 in my recently-released BlitzKrieg!, the definitive book on brewing during WW II.

Get your copy now!

The second volume contains the recipes. But not just that. There are also overviews of some of the breweries covered, showing their beers at the start and the end of the conflict.

Buy one now and be the envy of your friends!

 

IPA in 1972

Draught IPA, to be specific. Though I think I'll return to the bottled IPAs as well.

If there's a beer style that pisses me of, it's English IPA. Because it only has the most tenuous connection to any beers brewed in the UK bearing the name. In reality, it's a recerse-engineerd American IPA, with tweaks to make it English. Basically, reducing the hopping or using English hops. And not based on IPAs brewed in the UK at all.

1.050º to 1.075º, 5% to 7.5% ABV, is what the BJCP guidelines say the strength should be. How many examples do I have that fit those parameters? Not one, either bottled or draught. Though the classic one, Red Triangle/White Shield, is missing. Though, at 1052º, even that only just scrapes in.

What do the three draught beers called IPA have in common? Bugger all.

The one with the longest pedigree is Younger's. They'd been brewing one since at least 1851. Though that version was a good bit stronger at 1068º and 6.5% ABV. Which would fit comfortably in the English IPA guidelines, ironically enough. Especially as it was Scottish. It's the strongest of this set. And also the best value. It's only 0.5p per pint more expensive than Greene King's, but with a gravity 8º higher.

Charrington IPA I've drunk loads of times. The stuff was all over London. Though I don't think I ever tried the London-brewed version. Just the one from Cape Hill. It was an OK Best Bitter, when looked after well. Not a patch on London Pride, mind.

And Greene King IPA is, well, a beer that is now pretty common. I don't know if you got it all in London when I lived there.It was mainly confined to East Anglia. 

Draught IPA in 1972
Brewer	Beer	Price per pint (p)	º gravity per p	% ABV per p	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
Younger, Wm.	IPA	13.5	3.22	0.34	1043.5	1008.2	4.59	81.15%
Charrington	IPA	15.5	2.61	0.25	1040.5	1011.2	3.80	72.35%
Greene King	IPA	13	2.71	0.28	1035.2	1006.7	3.70	80.97%
Average		14	2.85	0.29	1039.7	1008.7	4.03	78.15%
Source:
Daily Mirror July 10th 1972, page 15.

Bottled IPA in 1972
Brewer	Beer	Price per half pint (p)	º gravity per p	% ABV per p	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
Truman	Ben Truman	10	4.37	0.48	1043.7	1006.9	4.80	84.21%
Worthington	E	9.75	4.83	0.42	1047.1	1015.4	4.10	67.30%
Ind Coope	Double Diamond	9	5.27	0.47	1047.4	1015	4.20	68.35%
Courage	John Courage IPA	9	5.29	0.56	1047.6	1009.2	5.00	80.67%
Average		9.4	4.94	0.48	1046.5	1011.6	4.52	75.14%
Source:
Daily Mirror - Tuesday 11 July 1972, page 9

Opening hours in WW II

At the outbreak of war, the opening hours that were in effect had been set by the 1921 Licensing Act. This had embedded in law many of the emergency measures adopted during WW I. One of the most notably being afternoon closing.

Unlike WW I, there were no sweeping restrictions on pub hours. There was no real need, as they were already pretty short.

In London, pubs could open 9 hours a day, starting no earlier than 11:00 AM and finishing no later than 11:00 PM, with a break of at least 2 hours in the afternoon. Outside the capital opening hours were an hour shorter, finishing no later than 10 PM. Though licensing justices could, at their discretion, add an extra half hour and allow pubs to close at 10:30.

The war, however, often made it difficult for pubs to open for those restricted hours. Air raids, for example, which were a common occurrence in the first half of the war.

There was no official policy on pubs closing when air-raid sirens sounded. It was left to the discretion of the individual publican whether or not they closed up and shooed all their customers off to air-raid shelters.

A pub might stay open during an air raid, but only partially, closing more exposed rooms and concentrating in those affording more shelter.

Drinkers modified their behaviour to cope with the possibility of being rained on by bombs while out having a quiet half or two. City-centre pubs were avoided and ones in residential areas, close to home, preferred.

Those adventurous drinkers who did venture into town tended to head home early for fear of getting caught up in a raid.

Licensees in the centre the town, interviewed by the “Observer." all tell similar stories of how the earlier warnings have left them with comparatively empty bars, smokerooms and lounges.

“As black-out time approaches." said the licensee of one hotel, “you hear customers saying not ‘Well, we'll have another.’ but 'Well, we had better be going before the sirens start.’ After 9.30 p.m. the other night, I had only two people in my lounge at closing time.”

This is an excerpt from my recently-released BlitzKrieg!, the definitive book on brewing during WW II.

Get your copy now!

The second volume contains the recipes. But not just that. There are also overviews of some of the breweries covered, showing their beers at the start and the end of the conflict.

Buy one now and be the envy of your friends!

 

Bottled Pale Ale in 1972

When looking at the bottled beers, there was an obvious split between low-gravity Light Ales and stronger Pale Ales. So split them is what I did.

As you may have spotted, one of the beers is called IPA. But it's not the only one that could be assigned that name. Ben Truman has it's origins in P1B, a Burton IPA. Pretty sure Double Diamond and Worthington were originally IPAs, too. So I've pulled them out into their own little table.

The IPAs are surprisingly good value. With two of the top three best-value beers. Odd, because some are the same brands as some of the worst-value keg beers. Does it make any sense to you? It doesn't to me.

It could just be because they are relatively strong.  Other quite strong beers like Abbott and Cook Country Brew also score well. Overall, this set is better value than the lower-gravity Light Ales. Which isn't necessarily what I had expected. Maybe their poor value was another factor in the decline of the style.

There are other unexpected trends. Like the Midlands, North and Scottish beers being the worst value. I wouldn't have predicted that.

It's interesting to see just how many Pale Ales there were up at around the standard continental strength of 12º Plato (1048º). More than I would have expected.

Overall, attenuation averages out to 75%. Or what I would call average attenuation.Weird, or what?

That's ne done with the bottled beers. Sadly, no Stouts were included.

Bottled IPA in 1972
Brewer	Beer	Price per half pint (p)	º gravity per p	% ABV per p	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
Truman	Ben Truman	10	4.37	0.48	1043.7	1006.9	4.80	84.21%
Worthington	E	9.75	4.83	0.42	1047.1	1015.4	4.10	67.30%
Ind Coope	Double Diamond	9	5.27	0.47	1047.4	1015	4.20	68.35%
Courage	John Courage IPA	9	5.29	0.56	1047.6	1009.2	5.00	80.67%
Average		9.4	4.94	0.48	1046.5	1011.6	4.52	75.14%
Source:
Daily Mirror - Tuesday 11 July 1972, page 9

 

Bottled Pale Ale in 1972
Brewer	Beer	Price per half pint (p)	º gravity per p	% ABV per p	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
London
Truman	Ben Truman	10	4.37	0.48	1043.7	1006.9	4.80	84.21%
Courage	John Courage IPA	9	5.29	0.56	1047.6	1009.2	5.00	80.67%
Average		9.5	4.83	0.52	1045.7	1008.1	4.90	82.44%
Midlands, North and Scotland
Wolverhampton & Dudley	Pale Ale	9	4.23	0.34	1038.1	1014.1	3.10	62.99%
Worthington	E	9.75	4.83	0.42	1047.1	1015.4	4.10	67.30%
Greenall Whitley	Festival	9	4.62	0.44	1041.6	1010.8	4.00	74.04%
Vaux	Special Export	9.5	4.66	0.44	1044.3	1011.9	4.20	73.14%
Jennings	Export	9.5	3.93	0.44	1037.3	1005.1	4.20	86.46%
Scottish & Newcastle	Mc Ewans Export	10.5	4.02	0.41	1042.2	1009.1	4.30	78.44%
Average		9.5	4.38	0.42	1041.8	1011.1	3.98	73.73%
South
Greene King	Abbott	9.5	5.09	0.56	1048.4	1007.8	5.30	83.88%
Ind Coope	Double Diamond	9	5.27	0.47	1047.4	1015	4.20	68.35%
Cook	Country Brew	8.5	5.35	0.52	1045.5	1011.6	4.40	74.51%
Devenish	Wessex	10.5	3.57	0.32	1037.5	1011.3	3.40	70.00%
Hall & Woodhouse	Forum	9	4.56	0.43	1041	1010.9	3.90	73.41%
Average		9.3	4.77	0.46	1044.0	1011.3	4.24	74.03%
Overall average		9.4	4.60	0.45	1043.2	1010.7	4.22	75.19%
Source:
Daily Mirror - Tuesday 11 July 1972, page 9