It is, and you are right it’s a great beer.
English Ales - What's your favorite recipe?
- Thread starter Puddlethumper
- Start date
-
- Tags
- recipe
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
Of course, a Mild brewed by a British Commercial brewer and made in large volume would be pitched at their standard pitching temperature and allowed to free rise before being attenuated by cooler water passed through pipes in the FV should the temperature rise above their predetermined rate and upper limit. Hot alcohols are usually created in the earlier stages of fermentation, so are therefore less likely to be created in less alcoholic beers, unless one were to be reckless. 18C is a typical pitching temperature, which can rapidly rise in a large volume, but maybe not as quickly in home brew volumes and equipment, though it may not be wise to cast all controls to the wind.
DuncB
Well-Known Member
I used brewers gold and pilgrim in my last dark mild. All bittering at 20 ibu total not sure really that noticeable.
I didn't want it to be.
Brewing it again this weekend will use up my last 10.4 g of brewers gold.
Then it will be pilgrim and something else next time.
I didn't want it to be.
Brewing it again this weekend will use up my last 10.4 g of brewers gold.
Then it will be pilgrim and something else next time.
Colindo
Well-Known Member
I think you meant "attemperated", but apart from that I agree wholeheartedly with you statement.
Northern_Brewer
British - apparently some US company stole my name
As a heads up, Steve Dunkley of Beer Nouveau fame is organising an Historic Brewing Conference in Manchester 5-6 August with the likes of Gary Gillman, Lars Marius and Christina Wade coming over. There's three speakers not announced yet, who I assume will include Ron and Martyn Cornell.
https://bsky.app/profile/historicbrewcon.bsky.social/post/3kkwbxwbeef2s
The Great British Beer Festival is normally that week but unfortunately they have problems with the venue so it's been cancelled this year. Still, Manchester is one of the greatest beer cities in the world, so you won't be short of great beer, and with Steve being involved I'm sure he will get some of his mates to produce specials for the conference.
And if you want a taster, Matt Curtis has recently written a book about the Manchester beer scene :
https://shop1.camra.org.uk/product/manchesters-best-beer-pubs-and-bars/
https://bsky.app/profile/historicbrewcon.bsky.social/post/3kkwbxwbeef2s
The Great British Beer Festival is normally that week but unfortunately they have problems with the venue so it's been cancelled this year. Still, Manchester is one of the greatest beer cities in the world, so you won't be short of great beer, and with Steve being involved I'm sure he will get some of his mates to produce specials for the conference.
And if you want a taster, Matt Curtis has recently written a book about the Manchester beer scene :
https://shop1.camra.org.uk/product/manchesters-best-beer-pubs-and-bars/
McMullan
wort maker
- Joined
- Dec 22, 2015
- Messages
- 2,566
- Reaction score
- 3,440
Lars Marius? Not a serious conference then. Unless he’s going to talk about spud washes and distilling in rural Norway over the last 200 years.
Colindo
Well-Known Member
Sounds good and looks good! Especially if the GBBF is not happening this year, I might find time to go there.
McMullan
wort maker
- Joined
- Dec 22, 2015
- Messages
- 2,566
- Reaction score
- 3,440
Come off it. The inaugural ‘Historic Brewing Convention’ to be held in England, in Europe - undeniably the historical beer region of the modern world - with a richly documented brewing heritage (culture!) going back centuries, and delegates will get a talk spinning beery yarns about the obscurity of kveik?
Colindo
Well-Known Member
I have no idea what beef you have with the Norwegian fellow, but I know he has published or co-published peer-reviewed articles, so why should I consider your hyperbolic statements in this thread more than seeing him in person?
I missed him last year at the German homebrew convention, otherwise I would be able to judge him myself.
McMullan
wort maker
- Joined
- Dec 22, 2015
- Messages
- 2,566
- Reaction score
- 3,440
I must have missed the ‘peer-reviewed’ articles. Not hypothetical phylogenies. I hope. I’m pretty familiar with Norway and its history, though. I highly recommend people at least try do their own research. They might even start to understand why, for example, kveik behave like distiller’s yeast. But I appreciate some people believe something just because it’s been published on a blog or elsewhere, without ever considering the validity of the claims presented. As a scientist, I’ve never considered lack of evidence to mean anything, but that’s me. I can’t admit to ever being a fan of con artistry or BS generally. I’ll gladly leave that to the hoodwinked who refuse to listen or need to believe in fantasies.
Maybe we can all just let people like what they like and try not to yuck anyone's yum?
Ooooh, taking sides?
Well, as the person receiving the "Yuck" is also very good at dishing out the "Yuck" (to me! Without even knowing who I was or understanding what I was saying), so I know which side I'll take!
No-one seemed to leap to my defence back then. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/english-ales-whats-your-favorite-recipe.472464/post-10315467 (he doesn't even spell my username correctly).
Colindo
Well-Known Member
Sorry about that. Can't edit the post anymore, unfortunately.
I just re-read the post and would like to state that my criticism, while not entirely objective, was at least backed by sources (in some cases sources we both used).
My apologies for the subjective part of the old post. I imagine it is not nice being told that one's posts are difficult to read. Please feel free to correct the assessments in my old post. I'm happy to listen.
I take it as applying to everyone. Heck even me when I was about to try to say something similar but far less nicely.
We've got a fantastic forum with fantastic people who know a lot of things. We typically have great discussions. Let's keep it that way and not get frustrated and start to make things personal. Or seem that way even when they aren't intended as such.
We're getting off topic. Let's move on.
Apology accepted.
My inaugural post on this forum was #5,311, but I never really went into "invert sugar" much. I did update the original thread on "Jims" UK forum including a brief summary (I never got around to a full one) which I can reproduce here. For convenience I was only referencing "Wikipedia" (a source which does attract some criticism at times):
...and...... At the beginning of this very thread, I'm carefully caramelising Golden Syrup (dreaming up shortcuts to the process) to "recreate" historic Brewers' Invert Sugar.
Fortunately (hardly that!) an earlier bang-on-the-head lead me to doubt what I was doing and try and find evidence for it. I was in for a surprise! Even by mid-19th C. sugar refining was pretty primitive. A pound of white sugar was the reserve of the rich*. Some of whom actually owned the sugar plantations, and "owned" the slaves that toiled to keep them going. This was the environment from which came "Brewers' Invert Sugar". It was all about to change: The collapse (not "end"!) of slave labour and advancements in sugar refining beyond the primitive refining methods of old. Soon (late 19th, early 20th C.) it was to become feasible (financially) to look at "caramelisation" to provide a myriad of propriety brewing sugars.
But not before then! (The doubts in my head are obviously receding ... give me a few more months and I'll be as bigoted as the worst of my distractors).
I guess I need to assemble a (historical) summary of what I'm supporting so more are clear of what I claim? But that may be in to the New Year. Meanwhile, even Wikipedia can assemble some good guidance: Sugar Cane Mill (Wikipedia), Sugar refinery (Wikipedia), Jaggery (Wikipedia), and also Norbert Rillieux (American Chemical Society)
One thing you really need to note: The "Molasses" approach to "Brewers' Invert Sugar" if not massively different to the "caramelisation" approach, just the similarities are "incidental" and greatly more subtle with molasses. Even "Maillard reactions" will be occurring in "Molasses", but again, "incidentally", which is a good thing because "Maillard reactions" weren't described until early 20th C. (Maillard Reactions (Wikipedia). Alkaline conditions? Look out for the use of Lime (and heat) to clarify sugar cane juice.
[EDIT: *That's a bit of a deceptive statement: "White" sugar, in the form of large "loaves" were around in the 18th C. but wouldn't have been economical enough to use in place of barley malt in beer. The Victorian period saw granular sugar appear more widely. But again, was too expensive to chuck in beer. Brewers' Invert Sugar came from various stages of that 19 C. refining process (which was increasingly carried out on home soil), avoiding some of the later expensive refining steps, not least of which would be the drying <sic: That's not really the correct term, crytalising?> (invert syrups made more sense).
By the 20th C. advancements in (continuous) refining methods made white, highly refined, sugar the cheaper option and "brown" (less refined, "muscovado", etc.) the more expensive "exceptions". The old refining methods were no longer available for "Brewers' Invert Sugar", but it limped on as "emulations" for a while until the 1960s when most breweries had switched to using sucrose syrups and left just one manufacturer - Ragus - producing the small quantities of "emulated" Brewers' Invert Sugar that some breweries still used.]
FOOTNOTE (to my previous post):
And I haven't covered any slur to my "brown malt" ramblings! That's to come! Later. Perhaps as new thread as it (possibly) won't fit with the "what's your favorite recipe" title of this thread?
And I haven't covered any slur to my "brown malt" ramblings! That's to come! Later. Perhaps as new thread as it (possibly) won't fit with the "what's your favorite recipe" title of this thread?
I think we moved on from the "favourite recipe" part years ago...
This is now a "Brittish sugar and fermentation practises" thread, with the odd discussion about recipes and general authentic brewing practises/guidelines sprinkled in...
This is now a "Brittish sugar and fermentation practises" thread, with the odd discussion about recipes and general authentic brewing practises/guidelines sprinkled in...
RDWHHB.
It's just beer.
It's just beer.
Bah! I hate it when people use initials of the words to spell new words (that I do not understand). I have to Google them (though it always amazes me when it comes back with an answer) ...
RELAX! I'm running out of home-brew, and I haven't got the replacements organised yet. And I haven't got me partner's Valentine card sorted yet. It is 14th Feb isn't it? And I've got all these other things to do before the World ends ...
Wait 'til I get this stuff on "Brown Malt" I've promised together. Even I think that's a bit wappy. Let's see how "relaxed" you are then!
I. Do. Not. Like. Brown. Malt.
schmurf
Well-Known Member
IDNLBM either
I'm not a fan of brown malt in larger quantities in anything drank fresh. About 5-7% in a brown ale or mild is nice but more than that it needs a few months of maturing time to mellow a bit.
Curious what you use instead of it in Stouts/Porters inspired by late 1800's/early 1900's ones, when the brown malt likely was fairly comparable to the one offered by Fawcett, Crisp etc today?
Colindo
Well-Known Member
I have not had issues with Brown Malt from Warminster and Crisp so far. The maximum I used was 10% and the beer had a nice mixture of bready and light chocolate aromas, even fresh.
DuncB
Well-Known Member
Well you've all got me worried about the historical brown stout 60% 2 row and 40% brown malt I brewed on the 9th December.
Been in the keg since the new year.
Not tasted it yet.
Been in the keg since the new year.
Not tasted it yet.
I find Crisp's a little harsh in larger amounts if the beer is young.
My base porter and stout is inspired by 1890's Truman partigyled ones.
13% brown and 7% black malt, 12% dark invert sugar.
Base is Crisp Vienna and 6% medium crystal to simulate Chevalier but without having to waste it on a roast heavy beer where all the more subtle qualities of it will be lost.
My base porter and stout is inspired by 1890's Truman partigyled ones.
13% brown and 7% black malt, 12% dark invert sugar.
Base is Crisp Vienna and 6% medium crystal to simulate Chevalier but without having to waste it on a roast heavy beer where all the more subtle qualities of it will be lost.
I think it'll be fine, with a proper aging time.
The only brown malt I've not liked is Simpson's, it is about double the EBC of all the other English maltsters and way too intense.
Weird since I prefer Simpson over Crisp for every other malt...
I think the one I tried was actually Simpsons.
It can be great for very patient people, i.e. not for homebrewers.
I used it in an undrinkable stronger bitter. After half a year it was quite enjoyable.
I put some brown in my brown ales as well. I have been playing with the ratio of it, pale chocolate, and chocolate (including trying without the brown altogether), and I prefer it in there. But I'm talking 3-4% of the grain bill with it. I get a bit of a light roast coffee / slightly burnt toast kind of thing from it. For me having a little in there is better than none at all. But certainly keep it low and only in a few styles.
I won't use Simpson's malt in anything "historical". Not because I don't like it ... quite the contrary. But they get up to things that I'm sure aren't compatible with "historical".
Fuller's (London) "1845" (my favorite commercial bottled beer) must have Simpson's Amber Malt to get its flavour. Simpson's "Imperial Malt" (45EBC and diastatic!) has flavour with fairly obvious echos of their "Amber Malt". And, as @Erik the Anglophile says, their "Brown Malt" is quite out-of-step with what other maltsters produce. Simpson are up to something!
My next two beers will use Brown Malt. Both skimmed off the historical records by Ron Pattinson and reproduced in his "Stout!" book: Whitbread's 1940 Extra Stout and Barclay Perkin's 1941 Imperial (at OG 1.058, hardly that!) Brown Stout: Very similar Stouts, but Barclay Perkin were messing with roast barley and crystal malt. Wartime recipes but the strength is remarkably kept quite high.
Brown Malt-wise I won't be doing anything controversial. By mid-20th C. all "historical" UK Brown Malt was extinct, so I'll use something like Crisp's Brown Malt as-is. Early 20th C. the situation was quite different, and earlier still, what was then called "Brown Malt" would be diastatic. What I'll do for back then isn't that controversial, you can see the well-known historical group "Durden Park Beer Club" doing the same >here< but less "controlled" ... yet it was way back in 1975 (clue: they are emulating something originally made from 100% historical diastatic brown malt in that recipe).
To keep things (un-necessarily) on-subject, here's something related I had a stash of over Xmas, and is an English Stout and one of my favourites (if a bit expensive, and calling it "Imperial" is a bit of a stretch of the imagination):
Fuller's (London) "1845" (my favorite commercial bottled beer) must have Simpson's Amber Malt to get its flavour. Simpson's "Imperial Malt" (45EBC and diastatic!) has flavour with fairly obvious echos of their "Amber Malt". And, as @Erik the Anglophile says, their "Brown Malt" is quite out-of-step with what other maltsters produce. Simpson are up to something!
My next two beers will use Brown Malt. Both skimmed off the historical records by Ron Pattinson and reproduced in his "Stout!" book: Whitbread's 1940 Extra Stout and Barclay Perkin's 1941 Imperial (at OG 1.058, hardly that!) Brown Stout: Very similar Stouts, but Barclay Perkin were messing with roast barley and crystal malt. Wartime recipes but the strength is remarkably kept quite high.
Brown Malt-wise I won't be doing anything controversial. By mid-20th C. all "historical" UK Brown Malt was extinct, so I'll use something like Crisp's Brown Malt as-is. Early 20th C. the situation was quite different, and earlier still, what was then called "Brown Malt" would be diastatic. What I'll do for back then isn't that controversial, you can see the well-known historical group "Durden Park Beer Club" doing the same >here< but less "controlled" ... yet it was way back in 1975 (clue: they are emulating something originally made from 100% historical diastatic brown malt in that recipe).
To keep things (un-necessarily) on-subject, here's something related I had a stash of over Xmas, and is an English Stout and one of my favourites (if a bit expensive, and calling it "Imperial" is a bit of a stretch of the imagination):
I'm being ganged up on. I feel a tantrum coming on
.
DuncB
Well-Known Member
IWWDASSIS.I'm being ganged up on. I feel a tantrum coming on
beren
Well-Known Member
It’s the quintessential acronym from the quintessential homebrew book. Get used to that one lol.
With things getting a bit snippy, let a dumb Yank's bumbling efforts become a target for your ridicule and derision.
Last year, I decided to revamp my ancient roster of UK-style ales (I say "UK-style" because I'm writing from the US, often working with dubious examples and suspicious sources). Frankly, my old recipes were a mess, each having been independently evolved from my earliest efforts as a brewer, roughly thirty years ago. Individually, they were fine, but they didn't make much sense as a whole and it was unwieldy stocking individual ingredients for each recipe. I was spending more time tracking down specific ingredients than I was swilling UK-style ales.
It was time for a change.
The new roster of UK-style ales was designed to keep things as effortless as possible and my kegs filled with UK-style ale on a whim. The new roster revolves around a core of reliably obtained ingredients: the Fullers and Yorkshire strains, Warminister Otter (it's a nice malt that is $40 cheaper per sack than Crisp or Simpsons), homemade invert, Crisp Amber and Brown, and Simpsons C-malts. I'll use Crisp and Simpsons chocolate and black barley/malt interchangeably. After decades of use, I can't claim a preference between the two and if one is not available the other typically is in stock. EKGs, Fuggles, Target (I like Target, okay?), and (naturally) Bramling Cross are my core hops.
I present, for your mockery, scorn, and contumely, the two most mature recipes in my new UK-style lineup. Both have been brewed three times and are drinking in line with how I envisioned them. As a clueless Yank, I'm blithely pleased with both recipes--but gnawed by doubt as I stare into my pint and think "Yeah, that's pretty good."
So much of brewing is in the actual brewing, rather than recipe construction, but I would sincerely appreciate any feedback you're able to tease out from the following recipes.
The first is an ordinary bitter with a bit too much hops on the first pint, but they're still present on the second and third pint. Gordon Strong wouldn't approve, but I like it this way. Also, I'm a dumb Yank so Freedom, hostile driving habits, and hops is always the right answer.
Batch Size: 6 US gal
OG: 1.040 (suck it, BJCP)
FG: 1.009
IBU: IBU 30
85% Warminster Otter
12% Invert #2
3% Medium Crystal--sadly, it is better with the C-malt
1/2oz Midnight Wheat for color
20 IBU of Bramling Cross @ 60
10 IBU of EKG @ 20
1oz of EKG @ KO
.5oz of EKG as keg hops (suck it, CAMRA)
Mash at 148F/65C for 40min, recirculate at 158F/70C for 20min, fly sparge for maximum efficiency because UK malt is suddenly stupidly expensive for a variety of complex reasons.
Fullers or Yorkshire strains, pitch at 63F/17C, let rise to 68F/20C and hold until half gravity, let rise to 72F/22C for the second half of the gravity
The second recipe is a brown porter. It's been twenty years since I've been in the UK and I didn't see a single porter on my many trips, much less a brown one. I don't have the foggiest idea about what a brown porter actually is. I have no justification for calling this a brown porter other than the fact that I read Ron Pattinson a bit too seriously, I've got a thing for brown malt, a suspicion that Gordon Strong pulled this style out of his ass, and I need a name for a dry brown beer that doesn't drink anything like a northern brown ale. I'm very fond of this beer and a keg is lucky to survive a month.
Batch size: 6 US gal
OG: 1.045
FG: 1.010
IBU: 27
73% Warminster Otter
11% Brown Malt
10% Invert #3
4% Chocolate Malt
2% Amber Malt (I tried deleting this, but it actually makes a difference)
1oz Midnight Wheat (for color)
17 IBU Bramling Cross @ 60
10 IBU Bramling Cross @ 20
1oz Fuggles at KO
(.25oz of Bramling Cross keg hops are pleasant, but get in the way of the malt)
Mash at 148F/65C for 40min, recirculate at 158F/70C for 20min, fly sparge for maximum efficiency because UK malt is suddenly stupidly expensive for a complex variety of totally unforeseeable reasons.
Fullers or Yorkshire strains, pitch at 63F/17C, let rise to 68F/20C and hold until half gravity, let rise to 72F/22C for the second half of the gravity
Your jeers, mockery, unpolite gestures, scathing reprimands, and death threats are justified. Honestly, I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm doing my best.
DuncB
Well-Known Member
Brew them taste them and let us know.
I'd give both of them a go.
I'd give both of them a go.
Oh, they've been brewed...
DuncB
Well-Known Member
That's good, happy with them?
They're solid ales. I've been very serious about UK-style ales for decades, but very much aware that they're made in the US, by a US brewer that is painfully aware that he cannot really understand UK ales anymore than a herpetologist can understand what it's like to be a frog. I can attempt to comprehend it from the outside, but I'll never be able to understand it from the inside.
Introspection, being what it is, always gnaws at the back of one's mind and wonders, "Certainly nice, but is this really any good? Would this pass muster in the UK?"
Not that it matters--study as I might, I'll never brew a proper UK pint. Like I said in my original post, things were getting a bit snippy, so I figured I'd offer a couple of recipes for a bit of lighthearted ridicule.
Last edited:
Similar threads
