Trying to simulate British real ale...

[J_Flint]

This can be a great way of learning not to believe the myth that hop character is lost when added early on. Flavor and aroma do persist. You'd be surprised how many hoppy German beers, for example, have only one, early addition (spoiler: most of them) and the same is true of British beers. Historically, even when brewers used multiple additions, this was in the days of unfortunately long boils, and rarely was there an addition in the last hour.

Very interesting! I always doubted that ALL of the flavor and aroma was lost. I'm obviously not expecting it to be an American hop bomb or anything using that method.

Well I think I've got a good handle on what I wanna do on my next bitter. I've got a ton of fuggles on hand already. Do you think that would be just as good as some EKG?

 

[Robert65]

I love Fuggles. I know they have haters, but I'm sure not one!

 

[Schlenkerla]

I love Fuggles. I know they have haters, but I'm sure not one!

That and East Kent Golding. I made a strong bitter two months ago with 4 oz of hops. 2 Bittering, 2 late. Using both types of hops, EKG were the late.

I could taste a cantaloupe mellon like aroma/flavor. I loved it.

 

[ba-brewer]

FWIW here's my favorite British pale ale template: Chevallier pale malt, 15% no. 1 or 2 invert, stodgy English hops (you know the usual suspects) all in at copper up.

If you must use a modern malt (and in the scheme of things, MO is quite modern,) yes, even 1-2% light crystal can correct the malt flavor. It should be used to accent the sweetness of the pale malt, not to make any identifiable contribution of its own.

I'm not sure about other vendors but I think the current crisp Chevallier may be an acquired taste. There seems to be too much of a raw cereal flavor for me. I'm sticking with crisp #19 maris otter malt.

 

[Qhrumphf]

Some hops seem to carry their character over 60 mins more than others. The new world hops seem to the least (except for classic C hops- CTZ and Chinook carry more over 60 mins than anything I can think of)

I love Progress (similar to Fuggles, but heavier on the tobacco and lower on the topsoil note many find objectionable) or Bramling Cross in a Bitter. Challenger is one of my all time favs.

Most of my Bitters get #2 invert or periodically #3. #3-4 is Mild, Porter, Stout (the latter two tylically #4). If I'm doing a Golden Ale, a very light Bitter, or a Pale Mild, then I might go down to #1.

If you can't get brewers caramel (good luck stateside), Sinamar does the trick. I use it in my Milds to get em nice and dark.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

You're suggesting for color to use invert over crystal. Right?

Nooooooooo!
Don't use crystal malt to adjust colour in British beers
Don't use invert
Don't adjust colour with anything except brewer's caramel or black malt.
Or just leave it, colour is not critical (qv Boddies).

Why choose the invert in the first place? From what I've collected it contributes little to the flavor of the beer and really just thins it out. Is this assumption incorrect? If so please explain why one would choose it over some more malt, or plain table sugar...

As discussed, it's not mandatory, but it does have a distinct flavour (particularly in darker versions) but even if it was flavourless it still has a role to play in providing "easy" fermentables to dry out a beer to balance out crystal (and the lower attenuation of the more flavourful British yeasts). Going 1:1 invert : crystal is a good place to start but it does come down to personal taste - and in the UK, regional taste. It's worth noting that there's been a general trend among commercial breweries towards all-grain in recent years, encouraged by CAMRA, but that's not to say the use of sugar isn't widespread.

So you think that natural conditioning creates finer bubbles?

Definitely - certainly as they typically present at the bar.

And you're saying that bitter should not contain more than 5% crystal? Care to share a good recipe?

I've always had trouble believing that just a few ounces has much an effect on the resultant flavor. Like...at 5% does that even contribute anything to the beer?

Oh definitely, and the difference between 5% and 8% is significant. But it is the sort of thing that varies regionally and also between breweries, those kind of decisions contribute to house style. Fuller's use 7.2% light crystal (there's a homebrew version of ESB later in that thread, from which you could derive Pride as they're partigyled). But that's about as high as I'd go without any sugar to counteract the sweetness; Yorkshire bitters are more like 2-3% and Boddies has none. So it depends what you're going for. But as a first go I'd definitely aim for a best strength of 4.2-4.4% - it's even tougher to balance everything below 4% - and have a nice pale malt with mebbe 5% crystal, 5% invert #1/golden syrup (or just say 3% crystal on its own), 1.5% chocolate malt - and plenty of gypsum.

I get what you're saying about excess carbonation ruining delicate flavors. But if a British style were kegged, and force carbed to an appropriate level, say one ish volumes, wouldn't that be okay? After having trouble with my British yeasts producing odd flavors from bottle conditioning I just worry that another batch will end up cruddy.

It's better but still not the same.

if you could choose any widely available yeast for a good British ale, what would it be? I've heard good things about WLP023, WY1469, Wlp002 which I've used a lot and am only marginally happy with, and you mentioned WLP041 which I've been afraid to try because of negative things I've heard. But you've got me intrigued now because I am fascinated to hear what British folks have to say about brewing their own beers.

WLP002 is too dull. I'm still working my way through some of the mainstream homebrew yeasts, partly through lack of brewtime, partly because I get to play with "real" yeast from cask dregs and some Brewlab strains. So I've had 1469 sitting in the fridge for ages, but people seem to like it, as I say I enjoyed my one brew with WLP041, WLP028 is popular here but is a bit more neutral, a lot of the Vault British yeasts are worth a go as and when they come out (although this year is not a great year for White Lab seasonals) - some of the reviews of WLP038 Manchester sound very promising. Having said that there's a lot of smaller breweries here just using S-04 and Nottingham commercially, although not always with the best results... I've not tried it but others on HBT report that Imperial A09 Pub is has the same marmalade character as real Fuller's yeast has (but 002 and 1968 don't), which sounds promising.

It's worth pointing out that the main British beer thread on HBT is at https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/english-ales-whats-your-favorite-recipe.472464/ - there's 2000 posts there!

 

[J_Flint]

@Northern_Brewer would you condition a keg with priming sugar then, to better represent the true British beers? Or would you just go ahead and bottle at that point?

Also-could you point me to a good, traditional dark midd recipe? I see in the Favorite English Recipe thread you mention a few times what not to put into the recipe for it to be representative of the true style, but you don't go into much detail otherwise.

 

[Robert65]

If you want to really go down the rabbit hole on real, historical and traditional British recipes, you'll want to look into Ron Pattinson's blog, Shut up about Barclay Perkins, and his books. He has researched, transcribed, deciphered, and adapted thousands upon thousands of old brewery logs, and, as a bonus for you on the subject of dark mild, it's his personal preference and as such gets plenty of attention.

 

[Wayne1]

You can find all of Ron Pattinson's "Let's Brew" Historical Homebrew recipes here.
http://www.unholymess.com/blog/lets-brew/comment-page-1

 

[ba-brewer]

A dark mild recipe
http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2010/07/lets-brew-wednesday-1952-lees-best-mild.html

Edit: have not brewed it but had it bookmarked to give it a try someday.

 

[Schlenkerla]

Nooooooooo!
Don't use crystal malt to adjust colour in British beers
Don't use invert
Don't adjust colour with anything except brewer's caramel or black malt.
Or just leave it, colour is not critical (qv Boddies).



As discussed, it's not mandatory, but it does have a distinct flavour (particularly in darker versions) but even if it was flavourless it still has a role to play in providing "easy" fermentables to dry out a beer to balance out crystal (and the lower attenuation of the more flavourful British yeasts). Going 1:1 invert : crystal is a good place to start but it does come down to personal taste - and in the UK, regional taste. It's worth noting that there's been a general trend among commercial breweries towards all-grain in recent years, encouraged by CAMRA, but that's not to say the use of sugar isn't widespread.



Definitely - certainly as they typically present at the bar.



Oh definitely, and the difference between 5% and 8% is significant. But it is the sort of thing that varies regionally and also between breweries, those kind of decisions contribute to house style. Fuller's use 7.2% light crystal (there's a homebrew version of ESB later in that thread, from which you could derive Pride as they're partigyled). But that's about as high as I'd go without any sugar to counteract the sweetness; Yorkshire bitters are more like 2-3% and Boddies has none. So it depends what you're going for. But as a first go I'd definitely aim for a best strength of 4.2-4.4% - it's even tougher to balance everything below 4% - and have a nice pale malt with mebbe 5% crystal, 5% invert #1/golden syrup (or just say 3% crystal on its own), 1.5% chocolate malt - and plenty of gypsum.



It's better but still not the same.



WLP002 is too dull. I'm still working my way through some of the mainstream homebrew yeasts, partly through lack of brewtime, partly because I get to play with "real" yeast from cask dregs and some Brewlab strains. So I've had 1469 sitting in the fridge for ages, but people seem to like it, as I say I enjoyed my one brew with WLP041, WLP028 is popular here but is a bit more neutral, a lot of the Vault British yeasts are worth a go as and when they come out (although this year is not a great year for White Lab seasonals) - some of the reviews of WLP038 Manchester sound very promising. Having said that there's a lot of smaller breweries here just using S-04 and Nottingham commercially, although not always with the best results... I've not tried it but others on HBT report that Imperial A09 Pub is has the same marmalade character as real Fuller's yeast has (but 002 and 1968 don't), which sounds promising.

It's worth pointing out that the main British beer thread on HBT is at https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/english-ales-whats-your-favorite-recipe.472464/ - there's 2000 posts there!

The cask beer info I posted earlier by Jeff Alworth cited Craig Bennet head brewer from Greene King as saying its 1:1 sub invert for crystal.

Crystal without a doubt does two things adds flavor and color.

In your comment you're basically saying it's for mainly for taste and color just comes with it... correct?

 

[Northern_Brewer]

The cask beer info I posted earlier by Jeff Alworth cited Craig Bennet head brewer from Greene King as saying its 1:1 sub invert for crystal.

Crystal without a doubt does two things adds flavor and color.

In your comment you're basically saying it's for mainly for taste and color just comes with it... correct?

Exactly - normally you'd be adding a dedicated colouring agent like black malt or brewers caramel so the colour added by the crystal/invert just means a bit less caramel/black.

As an aside, I doubt many Brits would use Greene King as their benchmark for anything much, they are the BMC of cask ale. But his 9:5 ratio of crystal:sugar is typical of southern beers (and Fuller's are now just 7.2% light crystal with no sugar), compared to perhaps 1:2 in Yorkshire and 0 crystal in some Manchester beers. It's all part of that complex mix of tradition, regional tastes and house styles.

I've got a ton of fuggles on hand already. Do you think that would be just as good as some EKG?

They're both classic, and again it comes down to local tastes and brewer's preference. Personally I'm not a big Fuggles fan and adore Goldings - plus I have connections to Kent so I have a house rule that every beer I make always has some EKG in it. Call it personal terroir.

Personally I'd say that the more crystally southern beers can take more Fuggles than the drier northern ones, but there's plenty of counterexamples.
​

@Northern_Brewer would you condition a keg with priming sugar then, to better represent the true British beers? Or would you just go ahead and bottle at that point?

Personally I bottle because I just don't drink that much, but traditionally British homebrewers used to condition in pressure barrels for draught dispense by gravity, with handpulls as the gold standard. There's more keg in homebrew these days, reflecting commercial beer, but it tends not to be used for traditional British styles. But for instance LHBS typically have a pressure keg of beer in the backroom to show off their wares.

Also-could you point me to a good, traditional dark midd recipe? I see in the Favorite English Recipe thread you mention a few times what not to put into the recipe for it to be representative of the true style, but you don't go into much detail otherwise.

Yeah, just read some of Ron's stuff. I must admit I've had my eye on one of those Lees Best Mild recipes, albeit probably one of the ones from slightly later in the 1950s - see this table : https://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2010/08/lees-best-mild-1950-1963.html (you may have to zoom out the page to see the whole table (the right column is "Total"), and then copy and paste it to a spreadsheet to read it more easily). Although the whole idea of a Best Mild is a bit of a short-lived aberration. Personally I like a slightly stronger mild, back up in that best sort of ABV range, at some point I'll have to brew one - with a bit less crap in it than was typical in the dark days of the 1950s.

 

[J_Flint]

@Northern_Brewer
That's kind of what I'm after! I mild without all the adjuncts or special malts I see everywhere. I sort of thought that historically they would be very some beers, but never had a good understanding. I am only recently learning that the BJCP guides are quite flawed and are merely US adopted and reimagined concepts of what once was.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

And BJCP 2015 is a whole heap closer to reality than the quite fantastical 2008 version....

As far as the mild goes, I'd scan that table of the Lees bests, which are somewhat less full of crap than some, and figure out an "average" version pandering to your own particular prejudices. Personally I'd go for pale malt as the base with probably more brown than they used, bit of crystal and chocolate so it's heading a bit in the London porter direction because I really like London porter It's kinda hard to avoid a lot of sugar of some form, I'd drop the maize (again, personal) and so on.

Then look at some of Ron's detailed recipes at https://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/search/label/Lees to get an idea of process details.

 

[J_Flint]

And BJCP 2015 is a whole heap closer to reality than the quite fantastical 2008 version....

As far as the mild goes, I'd scan that table of the Lees bests, which are somewhat less full of crap than some, and figure out an "average" version pandering to your own particular prejudices. Personally I'd go for pale malt as the base with probably more brown than they used, bit of crystal and chocolate so it's heading a bit in the London porter direction because I really like London porter It's kinda hard to avoid a lot of sugar of some form, I'd drop the maize (again, personal) and so on.

Then look at some of Ron's detailed recipes at https://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/search/label/Lees to get an idea of process details.

When using a large percentage of invert is it okay to add to the boil? Will this cause problems with the fermentation. I've gathered that much more than 10% can cause the yeast to get lazy and stall out.

 

[ross.filipek]

For color per se, the British brewers conventionally use brewers caramel, aka class III ammonia caramel. It's available in homebrew quantities from British homebrew retailers if you can swallow the shipping, but only by the drum over here.

Late to this thread, but I've got a question for @Northern_Brewer or anyone else who's used brewer's caramel.

I picked up a bottle of the Brupaks 33,000 EBC caramel a while back and have experimented with adding it during the boil for some recipes and at racking for others. In either case, the color adjustment was great, but it also seemed to throw a significant haze into the beer (compared to what I get sans caramel). Really quite turbid. And the beer didn't seem to clear, even after months of cellaring.

So, I'm trying to figure out if this is a typical result of using caramel, or if I've got some process issue to correct. I didn't use any post-boil finings, but that will be my next test.

Normally I'd just use black malt for color, but I brew a lot of Ron Pattinson's recipes, and those tend to call for caramel.

 

[user 246304]

I have a Valterra Silver RV Rocket Hand Pump and five 1 gallon poly pins that collapse. This works well if you can keep the pins cool. This will NOT serve clear beer as the pins contraction disturbs the lees.

The Rocket hand pump works better with a corny keg and a make shift cask breather. I have a 2 psi propane regulator that pushes 2 psi to your keg. This is only used briefly at shut down after drinking. You disconnect the rocket quick disconnect. Open the gas manifold to allow 2psi into the keg. For this to work hassle free during serving you have to kill the gas and have PRV open during serving.

As things are now, many years later, i prefer using a stout faucet and Nitrogen. It's less fumbling around. I only use nitro to push beer through the facet. I turn it off after I'm done drinking. Naturally carbonate with a spund valve.View attachment 662475

Resurrecting, but looking for a higher .psi output low pressure regulator than the one I have. I've got .4 psig, looking for one like yours, 1-2 psi per @Peebee 's recommendation. Mind sharing what your regulator is, and where you got it?