Boddington's Pub Ale clone without nitro?

[snarf7]

I don't have a nitro setup, nor do I have the money to drop on all that right now. Sister in law is coming to visit in a couple months and is a huge fan of Boddington's Pub Ale so I'm trying to figure out 1)how to nail the taste/color and 2)how to simulate the creaminess and mouthfeel of it? #1 should be easier than #2 but I'm hoping I can fake #2 to a reasonable degree?

 

[anotherbeerplease]

For #2, nitro tap is really just low pressure co2 with a nice nitro head forced out by the nitro gas... so to replicate maybe you could serve at low co2 pressure on a very short co2 line, that will give you lots of head but low carbination and a creamier feel. Just a guess but full disclaimer, I have never tried this.

 

[snarf7]

For #2, nitro tap is really just low pressure co2 with a nice nitro head forced out by the nitro gas... so to replicate maybe you could serve at low co2 pressure on a very short co2 line, that will give you lots of head but low carbination and a creamier feel. Just a guess but full disclaimer, I have never tried this.

Good suggestions, I can try that.

As I understand it, nitro is just nitrogen + CO2 but the bubbles in nitrogen are smaller which gives that creaminess. I'm wondering if there's anything I can add to the grain bill that will. I've read that both oats and lactose will help with this but I haven't a good idea of how much for a recipe like this?

 

[Anyhowe]

If you keg now you are just a nitrotap and a bottle of beer gas (nitro and co2) away from a fun alternative. I use it all the time in stouts, porters and ales. Nice change and profile that can’t be mimicked with co2. Quite amazing how suffered the beers taste when I go back and forth between co2 and beergas. Gl

 

[snarf7]

If you keg now you are just a nitrotap and a bottle of beer gas (nitro and co2) away from a fun alternative. I use it all the time in stouts, porters and ales. Nice change and profile that can’t be mimicked with co2. Quite amazing how suffered the beers taste when I go back and forth between co2 and beergas. Gl

uhhhh

I don't have a nitro setup, nor do I have the money to drop on all that right now. Sister in law is coming to visit in a couple months and is a huge fan of Boddington's Pub Ale so I'm trying to figure out 1)how to nail the taste/color and 2)how to simulate the creaminess and mouthfeel of it? #1 should be easier than #2 but I'm hoping I can fake #2 to a reasonable degree?

 

[ba-brewer]

Can't really help on the recipe, but I recalling @Northern_Brewer saying Boddingtons is basically a smash or at least used to be. If that is still the case then the process and the right yeast seems like they will be important in the flavor profile.

 

[Anyhowe]

uhhhh

Lol. Figured SIL should pop for the $100 as a token of thanks for the two months of rent free accommodation.

 

[Jag75]

To get a cascade and that creaminess you need beer gas . 75 % nitro 25 %co2. It takes a nitro tap or if you have intertap just the nozzle ($15) . The tank is what costs. You cant get that cascade without Nitro. It is pushed out @35psi and agitated through the small holes in the tip. I fear if you do this with co2 you will have a mess. Foam from high psi is different then creamy cascade from Nitro. Think it took me about 200-300 in total for my set up but it's worth it . Especially if your gonna do stouts in the future .

 

[cyberbackpacker]

Cheap and easy solution for your desired Cask/Nitro pour (nitro was designed to mimic cask ale or sparkler cask ale): https://infinitesimalbrewing.wordpress.com/2013/12/01/nitro-pour-trick/

 

[Home_alone1]

Cheap and easy solution for your desired Cask/Nitro pour (nitro was designed to mimic cask ale or sparkler cask ale): https://infinitesimalbrewing.wordpress.com/2013/12/01/nitro-pour-trick/

I’ve heard of this before , one of the podcasts covered it quite a while back don’t remember which one , supposed to work really well

 

[snarf7]

To get a cascade and that creaminess you need beer gas . 75 % nitro 25 %co2. It takes a nitro tap or if you have intertap just the nozzle ($15) . The tank is what costs. You cant get that cascade without Nitro. It is pushed out @35psi and agitated through the small holes in the tip. I fear if you do this with co2 you will have a mess. Foam from high psi is different then creamy cascade from Nitro. Think it took me about 200-300 in total for my set up but it's worth it . Especially if your gonna do stouts in the future .

And I repeat (for the third time now), I CAN'T AFFORD IT RIGHT NOW! I'd love to, trust me. And one day I will bite the bullet, but having dropped about $500 to get this initial keezer setup going, I'm tapped right now, that's the reality and that's what I have to work with. So I'm looking for possible solutions, compromises and workarounds, not to spend another $300.

 

[cyberbackpacker]

@snarf7 see post #9...

 

[snarf7]

@snarf7 see post #9...

Yep, I'm definitely going to try that one, thanks

 

[bobeer]

Found this from this thread.... It's extract but I hope it helps! https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/boddington-pub-ale-clone.17534/

Pub Ale--EXTRACT version

A ProMash Recipe Report

BJCP Style and Style Guidelines
-------------------------------

08-A English Pale Ale, Standard/Ordinary Bitter

Min OG: 1.032 Max OG: 1.040
Min IBU: 25 Max IBU: 35
Min Clr: 4 Max Clr: 14 Color in SRM, Lovibond

Recipe Specifics
----------------

Batch Size (Gal): 5.50 Wort Size (Gal): 5.50
Total Extract (Lbs): 6.50
Anticipated OG: 1.042 Plato: 10.48
Anticipated SRM: 8.1
Anticipated IBU: 32.2
Wort Boil Time: 90 Minutes


Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
46.2 3.00 lbs. Generic DME - Light Generic 1.046 8
15.4 1.00 lbs. Toasted Malt(2-row) America 1.033 6
7.7 0.50 lbs. Brown Sugar Generic 1.046 4
7.7 0.50 lbs. Cara-Pils Dextrine Malt 1.033 2
7.7 0.50 lbs. Crystal 60L America 1.034 60
7.7 0.50 lbs. Flaked Oats America 1.033 2
7.7 0.50 lbs. Flaked Soft White Wheat America 1.034 2

Potential represented as SG per pound per gallon.


Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.50 oz. Goldings - E.K. Whole 4.75 29.0 60 min.
1.00 oz. Goldings - E.K. Whole 4.75 3.2 5 min.


Extras

Amount Name Type Time
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
0.10 Oz Irish Moss Fining 15 Min.(boil)


Yeast
-----

WhiteLabs WLP005 (or equiv)

Notes:

Steep all grains together at around 150° with a little bit of DME.

 

[Jag75]

And I repeat (for the third time now), I CAN'T AFFORD IT RIGHT NOW! I'd love to, trust me. And one day I will bite the bullet, but having dropped about $500 to get this initial keezer setup going, I'm tapped right now, that's the reality and that's what I have to work with. So I'm looking for possible solutions, compromises and workarounds, not to spend another $300.

My main point was you wont get that same cascade and creaminess. I'm not trying to get you to drop 300$ to set up a Nitro. I was trying to explain how the Nitro works and how doing that with Co2 could be messy. Sorry if I came off pushy trying to push you to buy a set up , it wasnt my intent .

 

[bobeer]

I've gotten the cascade effect with just plain ole c02 before. I can usually get it right with stouts because I always add oatmeal or flaked barley. I'd think you'd need one of those to get the creamy mouthfeel with the cascade effect. I have a 5 ft line and usually serve my beer a little less carbonated than most do because I like my beer that way. I do serve at around 10 psi and I think the combo of less carbonation with it being pushed out faster makes for a decent show in the glass. Perhaps if you do the same it might give you the same effect as having a nitro setup.

 

[Jag75]

I tried botteling my choc milk stout on Nitro. Didnt work . I didnt know that it doesnt work that way. How does brewers like Firestone Walker nitro their can beer without the widget? It be cool if there was a Nitro tab you drop in your bottle then cap. I'm gonna put my Nitro tip on my Hefeweizen and see what it get .

 

[Northern_Brewer]

I've read that both oats and lactose will help with this but I haven't a good idea of how much for a recipe like this?

It's a terrible idea.

The whole point of the Manchester style of bitter is that it is pale and hoppy with a dry finish - Boddies is an extreme example but it's closer to a top-fermented pilsner than a Thames Valley bitter. So it shouldn't even be in the same room as lactose. At times in the early 1970s it was finishing at 1.003 and even now it's not much more than that - that dryness is waayyy more important than the creaminess.

Ron Pattinson has published a series of actual Boddies recipes from 1901 to 1987, you'll see that it started off with just US & UK pale malt and 8% sugar, then mid-century it got quite complicated with maize, enzymic malt, wheat and different sugars, then by 1987 it reverted to what was effectively a 1.034 Golding/pale malt SMaSH finishing at 1.006 with 83.6% attenuation. You'll note that even then it was still known as their IPA internally. That's what a true IPA looks like.... (qv Greene King)

The hunt for the One True Boddies Yeast is notorious in UK homebrew circles - all I can say is that the 71-75% quoted attenuation of 1318 London Ale III is way too low for this Manchester beer. Nottingham is probably the least bad homebrew option. There's much talk that they lost their yeast in the 70s/80s, certainly it looks like it had diastaticus in there for a generation after WWII, they were getting >90% attenuation.

Disclaimer - I've no idea what InBev are putting out under the Boddies name Stateside, I've only had the UK versions.

It' kinda nuts that people are worrying so much about recreating the nitro thing, when it's widely regarded as an abomination in the UK. It's an attempt to recreate the head on cask-conditioned beer served with a sparkler as God intended - so I'd forget the gas and either keg-condition or bottle condition, and maybe do the syringe thing as well.

 

[dwoods]

Austin home brew has a kit, https://www.austinhomebrew.com/Boddingtons-Pub-Ale-8B--ALL-GRAIN_p_2869.html

 

[kevin58]

Disclaimer - I've no idea what InBev are putting out under the Boddies name Stateside, I've only had the UK versions.

This is what they sell at my grocery store in the US.
https://www.meijer.com/product/groc...2-10162/t3/t3-1009/t4/t4-2494/76227481393.uts

It' kinda nuts that people are worrying so much about recreating the nitro thing, when it's widely regarded as an abomination in the UK. It's an attempt to recreate the head on cask-conditioned beer served with a sparkler as God intended - so I'd forget the gas and either keg-condition or bottle condition, and maybe do the syringe thing as well.

I'm glad you said it. I chose to ignore that part since he's trying to recreate something for someone else but you are right. I always get a chuckle when Ron Pattinson makes his snarky little remarks over nitro... "Work of the devil, nitro." ... "I do love me my cask. Beer the way it was intended. Unlike that nitro crap." Not to mention that Boddies is made by InBev but that's a whole different can of worms.

 

[Jag75]

It's a good thing we all like different things. Life would be boring if it was all the same and no variety.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

This is what they sell at my grocery store in the US.
https://www.meijer.com/product/groc...2-10162/t3/t3-1009/t4/t4-2494/76227481393.uts

OK, that's interesting that it is imported, I was vaguely under the impression that ABI were brewing it across the pond, like Bass. So the basic beer should be the same, just under a different name (there's no such thing as Pub Ale here) and a slightly different can (473ml vs 440ml) - and they draw a discreet veil over the ABV, whereas in Europe they would have to have the ABV prominently displayed in any marketing.

 

[snarf7]

It's a terrible idea.

The whole point of the Manchester style of bitter is that it is pale and hoppy with a dry finish - Boddies is an extreme example but it's closer to a top-fermented pilsner than a Thames Valley bitter. So it shouldn't even be in the same room as lactose. At times in the early 1970s it was finishing at 1.003 and even now it's not much more than that - that dryness is waayyy more important than the creaminess.

Ron Pattinson has published a series of actual Boddies recipes from 1901 to 1987, you'll see that it started off with just US & UK pale malt and 8% sugar, then mid-century it got quite complicated with maize, enzymic malt, wheat and different sugars, then by 1987 it reverted to what was effectively a 1.034 Golding/pale malt SMaSH finishing at 1.006 with 83.6% attenuation. You'll note that even then it was still known as their IPA internally. That's what a true IPA looks like.... (qv Greene King)

The hunt for the One True Boddies Yeast is notorious in UK homebrew circles - all I can say is that the 71-75% quoted attenuation of 1318 London Ale III is way too low for this Manchester beer. Nottingham is probably the least bad homebrew option. There's much talk that they lost their yeast in the 70s/80s, certainly it looks like it had diastaticus in there for a generation after WWII, they were getting >90% attenuation.

Disclaimer - I've no idea what InBev are putting out under the Boddies name Stateside, I've only had the UK versions.

It' kinda nuts that people are worrying so much about recreating the nitro thing, when it's widely regarded as an abomination in the UK. It's an attempt to recreate the head on cask-conditioned beer served with a sparkler as God intended - so I'd forget the gas and either keg-condition or bottle condition, and maybe do the syringe thing as well.

Wow dude, thanks for the detailed reply, I appreciate your candor.

Let me clarify something first. Is there more than one kind of Boddingtons that you get there in the UK? I've read some posts suggesting that the Pub Ale in the yellow can we get stateside is different than the bitter you'd get in a pub there. Is that true? Or is it the same beer just with the gimmicky nitro thing in it?

Not sure how long you've been enjoying this fine ale, but it sounds like it's changed quite a bit over the years, assuming you've got to experience some of that, were the differences dramatic or subtle in the end product? My sister in law (who this is being crafted for), would have enjoyed this while living in the UK in the early 2000s if that helps me narrow it down a bit.

PS: I'm on board with ditching the 'abomination' of the nitro thing in favor of exploring cask conditioning. That seems way more authentic for these old traditional recipes anyway. Something for me to add to my research list for sure.

thanks for your help

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Is there more than one kind of Boddingtons that you get there in the UK? I've read some posts suggesting that the Pub Ale in the yellow can we get stateside is different than the bitter you'd get in a pub there. Is that true? Or is it the same beer just with the gimmicky nitro thing in it?

There's only ever been one Boddies bitter (historically they did a mild and stout as well), apart from a brief period in the 1990s under Whiitbread when there were three versions available - the standard 3.8% bitter in cask and widget can, Manchester Gold, a 4.8% nitrokeg "hybrid ale" (which suggests it used lager yeast?) and the short-lived Export version in widget bottles, also at 4.8%. I'm not quite certain of the relationships - Gold was not the same as Export, maybe just on the yeast? AIUI Export was the basis of Pub Ale, which has now slipped a few points in ABV and AIUI is somewhat different to the Bitter, it's not just a scaled up recipe, but I've never had it. But in the early 2000s she would have been drinking the 3.8% bitter, most likely in widget cans but possibly in cask or ?nitro?keg.

PS: I'm on board with ditching the 'abomination' of the nitro thing in favor of exploring cask conditioning. That seems way more authentic for these old traditional recipes anyway.

A lot of people really hate the widget cans, but I'm more forgiving, they're kind of a thing to themselves and it's a bit unfair to compare them directly with other formats. The advertising in the Whitbread heyday was based around "the cream of Manchester" - most famously with Mel Sykes, and this take-off of an ice-cream advert. Mel Sykes made a comeback 25 years later with Bradley Wiggins (5-time Olympic gold medalist & Tour de France winner). Compare and contrast with US beer adverts...

 

[seilenos]

Here is the recipe I used last year that was exact on color, close on taste:

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.25 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.25 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.60 gal   
Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.048 SG
Estimated Color: 6.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 25.4 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 81.7 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
112.00 oz             Pale Ale Malt (Bairds) (2.5 SRM)         Grain         1        75.7 %       
16.00 oz              Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)           Grain         2        10.8 %       
8.00 oz               Caramel Malt - 60L (Briess) (60.0 SRM)   Grain         3        5.4 %         
4.00 oz               White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM)               Grain         4        2.7 %         
8.00 oz               Cane (Beet) Sugar (0.0 SRM)              Sugar         5        5.4 %         
1.00 oz               Fuggles [4.40 %] - Boil 60.0 min         Hop           6        14.9 IBUs     
0.50 oz               Fuggles [4.40 %] - Boil 15.0 min         Hop           7        3.7 IBUs     
0.50 oz               Goldings, East Kent [5.80 %] - Boil 15.0 Hop           8        4.9 IBUs     
0.50 oz               Goldings, East Kent [5.80 %] - Boil 5.0  Hop           9        2.0 IBUs     
8.00 oz               Malto-Dextrine (Boil 5.0 mins)           Other         10       -             
1.0 pkg               London Ale Yeast (Wyeast Labs #1028) [12 Yeast         11       -             


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Full Volume, No Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 148.00 oz
----------------------------
Name              Description                             Step Temperat Step Time     
Saccharification  Add 30.59 qt of water at 153.4 F        148.0 F       60 min

My efficiency is usually in the low 80s so I usually finish a little above what the recipe calls for.

It was close but still missing something on the back end; a "sweet muskiness" that I associate with honey, so I am going to add a bit of honey malt (4 oz) when I do it again in a few months.

The sugar is processed into invert sugar before use as explained at https://literatureandlibation.com/2013/08/26/how-to-brew-a-boddingtons-clone/ . You can purchase Lyle's Golden Syrup instead if you want.

 

[snarf7]

Here is the recipe I used last year that was exact on color, close on taste:

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.25 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.25 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.60 gal
Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.048 SG
Estimated Color: 6.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 25.4 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 81.7 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU      
112.00 oz             Pale Ale Malt (Bairds) (2.5 SRM)         Grain         1        75.7 %    
16.00 oz              Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)           Grain         2        10.8 %    
8.00 oz               Caramel Malt - 60L (Briess) (60.0 SRM)   Grain         3        5.4 %      
4.00 oz               White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM)               Grain         4        2.7 %      
8.00 oz               Cane (Beet) Sugar (0.0 SRM)              Sugar         5        5.4 %      
1.00 oz               Fuggles [4.40 %] - Boil 60.0 min         Hop           6        14.9 IBUs  
0.50 oz               Fuggles [4.40 %] - Boil 15.0 min         Hop           7        3.7 IBUs  
0.50 oz               Goldings, East Kent [5.80 %] - Boil 15.0 Hop           8        4.9 IBUs  
0.50 oz               Goldings, East Kent [5.80 %] - Boil 5.0  Hop           9        2.0 IBUs  
8.00 oz               Malto-Dextrine (Boil 5.0 mins)           Other         10       -          
1.0 pkg               London Ale Yeast (Wyeast Labs #1028) [12 Yeast         11       -          


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Full Volume, No Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 148.00 oz
----------------------------
Name              Description                             Step Temperat Step Time  
Saccharification  Add 30.59 qt of water at 153.4 F        148.0 F       60 min

My efficiency is usually in the low 80s so I usually finish a little above what the recipe calls for.

It was close but still missing something on the back end; a "sweet muskiness" that I associate with honey, so I am going to add a bit of honey malt (4 oz) when I do it again in a few months.

The sugar is processed into invert sugar before use as explained at https://literatureandlibation.com/2013/08/26/how-to-brew-a-boddingtons-clone/ . You can purchase Lyle's Golden Syrup instead if you want.

Thanks for sharing your recipe, it's good to have multiple examples to compare and contrast against to see what is common between them. You're has more grain than some recipes I've seen so I'm guessing you'll end up around 5% ABV.

The more I dig into this the further down the rabbit hole I go. Here's another wrinkle:

• Boddingtons Draught Bitter (3.5% ABV)

The nitrogenated and pasteurised variant of the beer available in kegs and cans. It is brewed in Samlesbury. The canned variant, launched in 1991, contains a widget to give the beer a creamy white head. The beer's ABV was reduced from 3.8% to 3.5% in late 2008. On draught in the United Kingdom it is typically served at 5 to 7 degrees Celsius, although an Extra Cold variant served at 3 to 5 degrees Celsius has been available since 2006. Its taste, or perceived lack of it, has been criticised by some, with Andrew Jefford describing it as a "blandly foamy nitrokeg travesty of the original [cask conditioned version]".

• Boddingtons Pub Ale (4.6% ABV)

A higher ABV version of Boddingtons Draught Bitter, brewed since 1993 for export markets. It was available in the United Kingdom from 1995–6 as Boddingtons Export.

So they are indeed different versions of the same beer. The stuff we get in the can abroad is not the same as what you'd get in a pub in the UK. And the bitter is different depending on what era it came from, the Boddington's of today is not what it was 20 years ago, or 30, or 80.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Here is the recipe I used last year that was exact on color, close on taste:

With respect, that's completely back to front. It's like saying a red Toyota is almost a Ferrari because it's "exact on colour" but the performance isn't quite right, it just needs a few tweaks to the suspension setup and engine settings. British brewers always manipulate the colour of their final product using caramel (usually) or black malt (much more rarely), so colour is not much of a guide to recipe.

It was close but still missing something on the back end; a "sweet muskiness" that I associate with honey, so I am going to add a bit of honey malt (4 oz) when I do it again in a few months.

Colin Chapman's approach to car design was "Simplify, then add lightness" and that philosophy of simplicity leading to greatness is one that's generally followed by European brewers. The last actual recipe we have for the ordinary Boddies is from 1987 and is just straight pale malt with just a whisper (0.4%) of sugar for gravity adjustment. Now it's difficult for me to translate that to Pub because I've never had it (although I probably had the odd Export 25 years ago) so I don't know what horrors go into it, but if in doubt, I'd go simple - it was originally invented just 4 years after that recipe (but after Whitbread took over, so it will have been designed to a budget). I'd guess you're just using the wrong supplier for your base malt, they do vary a lot. Fawcetts would be the closest to Strangeways, but I imagine that Whitbread used one of the East Anglian maltsters. They had their own maltings in East Dereham until the late 60s or so, so you could try Crisp who took over the neighbouring F&G Smith maltings somewhat later.

Stuff like honey malt is barely available in the UK, let alone being a regular component of mainstream beers.

Money will also be driving the hop selection - I doubt they're using anything as classic as Goldings and Fuggles, they will be using cheaper options. Maybe second-line British hops like WGV and Yeoman, or perhaps more likely some cheap stuff from Eastern Europe - Celeia, Dana, Junga?

 

[kevin58]

A recent post by historian, Ron Pattinson about Boddington's output in 1939 (he's on a World War and inter-war kick at the moment) shows they made a couple of mild ales... a pale ale... a stout and a strong ale. Other records show they also quite often made an IPA and I even remember seeing a brown ale once.

Here is a bitter derived from the Boddington brewery records in 1971 (that's about a contemporary as Ron gets).
https://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2018/02/lets-brew-wednesday-1971-boddington-ip.html

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

It's a terrible idea.

The whole point of the Manchester style of bitter is that it is pale and hoppy with a dry finish - Boddies is an extreme example but it's closer to a top-fermented pilsner than a Thames Valley bitter. So it shouldn't even be in the same room as lactose. At times in the early 1970s it was finishing at 1.003 and even now it's not much more than that - that dryness is waayyy more important than the creaminess.

Ron Pattinson has published a series of actual Boddies recipes from 1901 to 1987, you'll see that it started off with just US & UK pale malt and 8% sugar, then mid-century it got quite complicated with maize, enzymic malt, wheat and different sugars, then by 1987 it reverted to what was effectively a 1.034 Golding/pale malt SMaSH finishing at 1.006 with 83.6% attenuation. You'll note that even then it was still known as their IPA internally. That's what a true IPA looks like.... (qv Greene King)

The hunt for the One True Boddies Yeast is notorious in UK homebrew circles - all I can say is that the 71-75% quoted attenuation of 1318 London Ale III is way too low for this Manchester beer. Nottingham is probably the least bad homebrew option. There's much talk that they lost their yeast in the 70s/80s, certainly it looks like it had diastaticus in there for a generation after WWII, they were getting >90% attenuation.

Disclaimer - I've no idea what InBev are putting out under the Boddies name Stateside, I've only had the UK versions.

It' kinda nuts that people are worrying so much about recreating the nitro thing, when it's widely regarded as an abomination in the UK. It's an attempt to recreate the head on cask-conditioned beer served with a sparkler as God intended - so I'd forget the gas and either keg-condition or bottle condition, and maybe do the syringe thing as well.

The problem is this: If the US Boddingtons is what she likes, then it makes sense to try to recreate that...no?

I have not had the real deal, but I enjoy the US version...just had a can last weekend. I'm on a mission to go on a UK pub tour....it will happen within the next 12 months.

That being said, there's some great advice in this post. The first thing that popped into my head was to keg condition the beer. I think you get a creamier head that way.

 

[Anyhowe]

Just for the record nitro is not just for the head. The brew tastes remarkably different.

 

[Jag75]

Im gonna have to look for this beer and give it a shot .

 

[Northern_Brewer]

A recent post by historian, Ron Pattinson about Boddington's output in 1939 (he's on a World War and inter-war kick at the moment) shows they made a couple of mild ales... a pale ale... a stout and a strong ale. Other records show they also quite often made an IPA and I even remember seeing a brown ale once.

Here is a bitter derived from the Boddington brewery records in 1971 (that's about a contemporary as Ron gets).
https://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2018/02/lets-brew-wednesday-1971-boddington-ip.html

Err - the 1987 version I posted above came from Ron. And the IPA *is* the standard bitter, it retained the original name within the brewery, even if it was marketed as bitter - qv Greene King IPA, which most people would consider a bitter but is a true IPA, inasmuch as it has its roots dating back to the Empire and is a true reflection of how British beer has altered since that time. Before WWI Boddies was all about mild, the IPA was only 3% or so of production, that grew to around a quarter by WWII and is now 100% of sales in the UK.

The problem is this: If the US Boddingtons is what she likes, then it makes sense to try to recreate that...no?

I have not had the real deal, but I enjoy the US version...just had a can last weekend. I'm on a mission to go on a UK pub tour....it will happen within the next 12 months.

That being said, there's some great advice in this post. The first thing that popped into my head was to keg condition the beer. I think you get a creamier head that way.

It's not the US Boddies that she's after :

My sister in law (who this is being crafted for), would have enjoyed this while living in the UK in the early 2000s if that helps me narrow it down a bit.

Don't expect to find the real deal here - the cask version was outsourced and then abandoned, so you'll only find it on keg, which never suits traditional British styles. Beers like Marble Bitter on cask are more successful interpretions of the Manchester style of bitter - and arguably Track Sonoma is the true inheritor of the mantle, despite being made mostly with Centennial.

If you want a creamy head on draught then you want cask beer with a tight sparkler, failing that nitro keg. CO2 kegs just don't come out right.

 

[pym99]

There around two issues here: the recipe and the conditioning/dispense. Unless your SIL has a very refined palate and tons of experience tasting different British ordinary bitters, the SMaSH recipe below should taste to her a lot like the Boddington's Pub Ale we get in the widget cans here in the US. The key flavors are the English Pale malt and the English hops, in about the right ratio. The cask-conditioning will produce an effect more like Nitro dispense than regular, artificially-carbonated kegged beer.

Recipe. I would brew a super simple SMaSH recipe with a true British Pale Ale malt (like Maris Otter or Golden Promise) and EKG. I would adjust quantities for your system to target an OG of 1038 or so and 25 IBUs, with 2/3 of hops at 60 min and 1/3 at 10 min. Add 3 tsp Irish moss or 1 Whirfloc tablet at 15 minutes. I would go with Wyeast 1098 or another English strain with moderate attenuation. Start fermentation at 65 and ramp up to 68-70 by day 5. No dry hops or hop stand additions, no finings, no filtering.

Conditioning/dispense. I would wait for the beer to reach FG in the primary and then cask-condition in the keg with priming sugar targeting around 1.5-1.8 volumes, i.e. using about 2.5 oz of corn sugar boiled in a pint or so of water. Keep the keg at fermentation temps (65-72) for 2 weeks. Cold crash in fridge for a few days. Just before serving, vent keg to release excess pressure, connect to CO2 at 5 psi, and serve at 50-55 F. (Or, bottle-condition to achieve 2.0 volumes.) When you first tap the keg, you will have a lot of tiny, very dense CO2 bubbles from the cask-conditioning that will take a while to settle. Over the next week or so, as you dispense canned C02 will make its way in and the carbonation will become more coarse and it will settle more quickly, losing its cask-conditioned character. However, by keeping the PSI at 5, you will avoid over-carbonating the beer and are essentially using the minimum possible artificial CO2 to push the beer out and blanketed in CO2. It will still be tasty; it just won't mimic the nitro effect any more.