Scottish 80/- help

[Flywheel]

First here's the recipe right now:

6lb 6oz Northern Brewer Pilsen LME
1lb British Crystal 50-60L
Batch size: 5.0 gallons


Original Gravity
1.048
Final Gravity
1.014

Color
9° SRM / 18° EBC

hops
boil 60 mins 1oz East Kent Goldings
Boil: 2.0 avg gallons for 60 minutes


Bitterness
10.1 IBU / 5 HBU
ƒ: Tinseth
BU:GU
0.21

yeast
Wyeast Scottish Ale (1728)



My questions:
I want to make this very traditional, are EKG a good choice? Would WL be a better yeast? How can I kettle caramelize it? Should I boil the wort after I take out the steeping grains for an extra 30m prior to adding LME? Or should I put in some of the LME and boil for 30m before I add the EKG? Should I not worry about the traditional channelization with a extract recipe?

Thanks!

 

[Nateo]

Kettle caramelization would be really easy to approximate with extract. Take maybe a pound of extract, mix with a cup or two of water, enough to dissolve the extract, and boil that separately from the main boil. It will reduce and start caramelizing. Be careful not to burn it. I usually boil it for as long as I can until it gets thick enough it might burn.

 

[Flywheel]

Kettle caramelization would be really easy to approximate with extract. Take maybe a pound of extract, mix with a cup or two of water, enough to dissolve the extract, and boil that separately from the main boil. It will reduce and start caramelizing. Be careful not to burn it. I usually boil it for as long as I can until it gets thick enough it might burn.

excellent.

When do I add it to the rest of the boil? beginning or end?

 

[Nateo]

Don't think it really matters. I usually boil them side-by-side and just add whenever the caramel is ready. It's usually about 20-40 minutes in, but I do 90 minute boils so they're mostly added in the middle. If you're doing a shorter boil and you add at the end I'm sure that'd be fine.

 

[Flywheel]

How do I know its caramelizing? The color?

 

[Nateo]

It'll get slightly darker in color, but it'll get really thick and the temp will rise past boiling. As sugar concentration increases, temp rises. As the temp rises, it will caramelize. But, as the temp rises, you're more likely to scorch the non-sugar part of your extract. Just plain sugar will get very hot without much color change or burning, but extract seems to burn at a much lower temp. IIRC, my caramelized wort usually only gets up to about boiling + 20* and anything over that it gets so thick it wants to scorch.

 

[Flywheel]

Thanks!

Any thoughts on the hops or yeast? Or the recipe in general?

 

[40watt]

Things I learned from Jamils podcast:

EKG is an excellent choice of hop.
The Scottish yeast is fine, bit Jamil prefers Cal Ale because it's so clean. You want some sweetness, so you don't want full attenuation, so don't make a starter and keep your temp below 70 degrees.
He also said the butterscotch flavor of carmelization can be mistaken for diacytl. So he uses specialty grains for his carmelization flavor.
He also was adamant that peat and smoked malt has no place in a "traditional" Scottish ale.

So, that is Jamil's opinion on the matter.

 

[Nateo]

I wouldn't worry too much about recipes. I think homebrewers put way too much importance on recipes. Pretty much any combination of "mostly base malt with some specialty grain" will make good beer. The difference between good beer and great beer, from my experience, is all about how you handle the yeast. Viability, health, fermentation temp are all critical to make great beer, but those are usually completely ignored by beginning brewers.

 

[Flywheel]

I wouldn't worry too much about recipes. I think homebrewers put way too much importance on recipes. Pretty much any combination of "mostly base malt with some specialty grain" will make good beer. The difference between good beer and great beer, from my experience, is all about how you handle the yeast. Viability, health, fermentation temp are all critical to make great beer, but those are usually completely ignored by beginning brewers.

True. And I have been brewing for a while, and do understand the importance of temp and yeast health. But I think the recipe does matter, alot.

If I used:
7# of Amber DME
.5# Choc Rye
.5# Caramel wheat
.5# Crystal 60L
2oz of Cascade @ 60m
1oz Simcoe @ 20m
1oz Warrior @ flameout
WL scottish ale yeast

That wouldn't be an 80/-, would it? I agree, it would be beer, but not an 80/-. I am trying to create a traditional (as close as I can get with extract) 80/-, not just a beer.

 

[Nateo]

From when does your "traditional" 80 shilling come? 19th century Scottish ales used only pale malt, which was 3-4 SRM, and a very small amount of roasted barley. English-brewed Scottish styles from that time added a small portion of black patent malt to darken them.

Modern Scottish breweries don't use 3-4 SRM pale malt, and use a small amount of roast barley and kettle caramelization to get standard 2 SRM pale to be dark enough.

Most historic Scottish brewers did their own malting. Now most buy malt from a maltster. So if you want a "traditional" 80 shilling from the 19th century, you need to malt and roast your own barley. The "traditional" recipe from that time was only pale malt and roasted barley.

Modern Scottish breweries have much more complex recipes. Some use only pale malt with caramel coloring, some use pale and crystal, or pale and black, or pale, black and crystal, or pale, black and chocolate, or pale and roast barley, or pale, roast barley and crystal.

Traditionally malts were roasted over coke or charcoal, but during the world wars peat was used. So some Scottish malts made during the early 20th century had a peat-smoked quality.

Those are all the types and variations of "traditional" Scottish ales I can think of.

AHA guidelines for an 80 shilling are
OG: 1.040-50
IBU: 15-25
BU:GU ratio 0.3-0.5
Color: 10-19
Alc: 4-4.5%

 

[Flywheel]

I didn't mean to come off as rude - sorry if I did.

I did state that I am trying to get as close as I can with extract, so I can't malt my own.

I just thought that the recipe does matter more than just "mostly base malts and some specialty grains."

 

[Nateo]

You should pick up a copy of Daniel's Designing Great Beers. It's a really good read, and has a lot of historic info on beer styles.

What I meant by "mostly base malt and some specialty grains" is that most of the best beer I've had has been from a very simple grist. Take pale malt, ferment it, you've got a bitter/pale ale. Take pale, add some crystal, and that could be an IPA. Pale and some roast barley is a stout.

Of all the variables that go into brewing, the grain bill one of the least important. There a dozen different ways to make a good "traditional" 80 shilling.

 

[Flywheel]

Just picked it up a few weeks ago and am about 10 pages in.

 

[mtbiker278]

I think the easiest way would be to get some Pale or pilsen extract and use roasted Barley as steeping grains for color and flavor. Since you're doing a partial boil I would steep the grain first for 30mins, but add all the extract in at the beginning of the boil. By doing so you'll get the caramelization you're looking for. You also might want to back off the amount of roasted barley a tad since you'll be darkening the wort with the caramelization. Other than that the yeast is going to be the key to make it as close to a Scottish 80/-.

Hope this helps!

 

[Flywheel]

edited the recipe a bit:

6# NB pilsen LME
1# British Crystal 55L
2oz Honey Malt
4oz Biscuit

1oz EKG @ 60m

WY scottish ale

 

[BeerEagle]

Just got home from my local pub. Caledonian Brewery from Edinburgh, Scotland on hand pump. Delicious.

 

[BeerEagle]

Oops. Caledonian 80 shilling that is.

 

[Flywheel]

Just got home from my local pub. Caledonian Brewery from Edinburgh, Scotland on hand pump. Delicious.

That's sounds wonderful.