Burton Ale, first draft

[NordeastBrewer77]

i'm planning to brew a 19th century Burton style ale for one of my next brews and began putting together my recipe this afternoon. since there's not many commercial examples or recipes of this style, i've been doing all the research i can. i've been reading 'Shut Up About Barclay Perkins' like a madman, reading what i can from brewing mags and drinking Schell's Stag Series #4, along with some english barley wines and winter warmers.
i've gathered that using modern malts and process, i can replicate the sweet, caramel-y malt flavors by using 'mild' malt as a base and various medium to dark caramel malt, along with some brown sugar. for hops i'll stick with the traditional fuggle. yeast will be 1882, due to the flavor profile, dark fruit esters. the fact that that strain originated from a 'now defunct' English brewery it also appealing.

the first draft of my recipe is as follows, though i'm sure i'll make a few tweaks before brew day. if anyone has experience brewing this style, feel free to chime in, i'd love some experienced input.

batch size: 2.25 gal in the fermenter.

5.25# Optic malt
.5# caramel 120
.5# british caramel 50-60
.25# brown sugar

.7 oz challenger 7.2%aa @ 60
.7 oz fuggle 5%aa @ 15
.7 oz fuggle 5%aa @ 5
i'll probably dry hop for several days before bottling with a little bit of fuggle too.

wyeast 1882
ferment @ ~65

OG- 1.079
FG- 1.018
IBU 58 (rager)


my BrewPal brings it right into the style of 'old ale', with the IBU being on the high end for the style. which i think is pretty much what i'm going for, a big, caramel-y, malty brew with a solid hops bitterness.
the two things i'm a bit undecided on is the late hopping, i may want to beef it up a bit. and the possible use of a very small amount of pale chocolate malt, </= 1% of the grist. i do that a lot in my ESBs, and the teeny bit of roast it adds is quite nice.
either way, i'm pretty excited for this brew.

 

[bierhaus15]

Why not just use a real 'historical' Burton ale recipe and go from there?

Crystal malt would not have been used in the 1800's and it would give it the wrong flavor anyways. The sweetness would have come from the the low attenuating yeast. These were big, sticky beers. Most recipes were just really simple affairs, pale malt (maybe some lightly roasted malt) and tons of hops.

Edit: Here is the grand-daddy recipe of them all. I'll be brewing this one in a few months.

http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2012/01/lets-brew-wednesday-1879-william.html

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

Why not just use a real 'historical' Burton ale recipe and go from there?

Crystal malt would not have been used in the 1800's and it would give it the wrong flavor anyways. The sweetness would have come from the the low attenuating yeast. These were big, sticky beers. Most recipes were just really simple affairs, pale malt (maybe some lightly roasted malt) and tons of hops.

Edit: Here is the grand-daddy recipe of them all. I'll be brewing this one in a few months.

http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2012/01/lets-brew-wednesday-1879-william.html

thanks for the link, i remember skimming over that a few weeks ago and kind of dismissing it since in seemed much more like a 'scotch' ale, but after reading more on that blog, it seems they were one in the same in the middle/late 19th century. i'm glad i re-read that, it seems the tight be a really good start. my thinking of caramel malts in the grist came more from the few beers that fit the 'style' that i've had, than from recipes. although, the Jan/Feb issue of Zymurgy has a recipe that uses caramel and chocolate, i believe. the Burton's i've had, which include things that may be in the same vein, like winter brews and barley wines, seem to be darker and have some noticeable caramel flavor. but i'd rather be historically accurate on this one, part of what makes it so fun for me. i s'pose the high mash temps and extended rest time would help with the sweetness, as well as color, and the long boil would definitely aid in the caramelization of the wort. the hopping in that recipe is insane, but it makes sense in such a big brew. i like the EKG dry hop, much better that the fuggle. i also have some 1318 on hand, not sure why i didn't think of that when considering my yeast options...... i think i'm gonna head back to the Barclay Perkins blog with my software in hand and see what i come up with. thanks for the perspective.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

ok, after re-reading everything remotely about Burton and Scotch ales that i could find on .......Barclay Perkins, and looking at Martyn Cornel's Zythophile blog and his recipe in last Jan/Feb's Zymurgy, i've decided that the extremely simple grain bill is the way to go. the Younger's No. 1 recipe looked great, but i'm not sure i want a beer with such a high FG (~1.04), although the recipe looks amazing and i may brew a gallon of it to see what the Burton and Scotch ales of the 19th century were truly like. i've decided to up my recipe to 3.25 gal, so i can bulk age the batch in a 3 gal carboy. here's what i have so far......

OG-1.086
FG-1.021
IBU-180!!!!
color-14*L

10# Optic
.3 british chocolate

mash in at 150 (Zymurgy recipe, i may mash at 152-154), mash out at 169 (doing BIAB, i'll dunk sparge at 169). 90 min boil.

5.8 oz EKG 5%aa @ 90 min

Wy 1318 London III (definitely a good sized starter, it's 2nd gen from a low gravity bitter)

i'll ferment between 63-65, allowing it to reach 68 by the end of fermentation. i'll hold it there until the beer drops bright and rack to secondary for bulk aging. MC recommends 12-18 months, but i doubt i'll go quite that long.... who knows. for the last ~2 weeks of bulk aging i'll dry hop with ~1.5 oz of whole cone EKG, then bottle. i'm leaning towards 6-9 months of bulk aging, then most likely 6-8 weeks in bottles before it's really carbed up and ready, maybe longer. seems like enough aging, but if someone with experience thinks longer would be better, do chime in.
if a recipe and process like this doesn't bring ya back to the KISS method of brewing, i dunno what will!!

 

[ghpeel]

Beers like (English Old Ales) this from that time period were probably all infected with Brett from the wood casks. Are you going to go that route and add some bugs? That would be the most 'authentic' flavor, but not necessarily what would drink best, depending on one's taste.

Also, I'd recommend you add "Amber, Black & Gold" to your reading list. I'm about 25% done with it and its great!!

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

Beers like (English Old Ales) this from that time period were probably all infected with Brett from the wood casks. Are you going to go that route and add some bugs? That would be the most 'authentic' flavor, but not necessarily what would drink best, depending on one's taste.

Also, I'd recommend you add "Amber, Black & Gold" to your reading list. I'm about 25% done with it and its great!!

nope, no bugs. i'm sure many aged beers of the era did have some level of infection from wild yeasts, but i'm not gonna go that route.
"A, B & G" is Martyn Cornell's book, right? i definitely plan on giving that a read soon, as i love the history and brewing of English ales more than most things.

 

[kingwood-kid]

Pour Decisions is but ten minutes away. Maybe you can imbibe a few and get tips from Kristen himself? (I say maybe because I don't like to volunteer the time and assistance of people I've never met. The best thing 10 minutes from my house is Walmart, so imbibing a few while learning nothing still sounds like a grand idea).

My only recommendation is that if you're going to wait a year, you should make an extra gallon and age it with brett as ghpeel suggested.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

My only recommendation is that if you're going to wait a year, you should make an extra gallon and age it with brett as ghpeel suggested.

I've had this brew in secondary for just under two months now, and trust me I've toyed with this idea. No doubt that many a Burton of old had some level of wild yeast infection, and I definitely want to give something like that a try..... in the future. Here's my reasoning, I've never used a wild yeast, or in any other way intentionally contaminated one of my brews. Really, I haven't had any of my beers get infected at all, so my experience with that is nil, at best. I'm planning my first 'wild' and 'infected' brew for later this summer, a blackberry lambic using berries from our fruit garden. See, I'm one of those guys who really likes to know what to expect, so I tend to do things one step at a time. So, while I totally will brew a Burton with a Brett infection in the future, I wanna get the Burton part down first. When I have a solid Burton recipe to build on, playing around with wild yeast will definitely be on my list.
For now, this guy's gonna sit in secondary for a few more months, or until I can't take it anymore, and then onto bottles. If the beer gods are on my side with this one, I'll be enjoying it later this year when it's cold and frosty outside.

 

[bierhaus15]

For now, this guy's gonna sit in secondary for a few more months, or until I can't take it anymore, and then onto bottles. If the beer gods are on my side with this one, I'll be enjoying it later this year when it's cold and frosty outside.

Not to thread rez, but any word on how this came out or is coming along? I never did make the No.1 Younger, but I'd like to make something like it here soon. Especially wondering if you were able to get the yeast to under-attenuate to a proper level.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

It's actually coming along quite well. I bottled it on 8/23 with a shot of s-04 and light brown sugar. I ended up with an FG of ~1.022, so I either got the yeast to do the right thing, or I got enough kettle caramelization to get in the ball park that I was shooting for. I think it's a combo, but that's based on what I've read. I've only had two bottles of this beer so far, and both have tasted young to me. It's very good, but I want to drink it when it's more mature because I only have five 6 packs. I haven't had one in several weeks maybe a month though, and since I'm planning on entering it in a club competition in Dec., I will chill a bottle soon and post back here.