Really disappointed by the article on Scottish Ales in the July August issue. Full of the same unresearched rubbish about Scottish beer. I despair. It doesn’t even convert 12 guineas into shillings properly: it’s 252 not 156. (A guinea is 21 shillings.)
Roast barley for colour, long boils, cool fermentations - none of it is true. There’s also no connection between the Shilling Ales of the 19th century and modern 60/-, 70/- and 80/-. The old ones were Milds Ales, the modern ones are all Pale Ales.
The 80/- recipe bears no resemblance to any 80/- ever brewed in Scotland. Too strong, for a start. 1045º is a strong as it gets.
I’ve published plenty of real information (based on brewing records) on Scottish beer. Ne excuse for anyone getting it so wrong any more.
Being on the cutting edge of anything has its perils. Ron is suffering from this now. All I can say is for Ron to get the word out more widely and then those tired texts and wives tales will fall from use.
PS: I loved the education on Scottish beers and brewing in Indy this Spring!
Ron, I am very interested in your work on Scottish Ales. Where can I find the information? I was considering brewing the recipe in the article but of course would brew a more authentic recipe if available. The Barclay Perkins site?
Ron, I am very interested in your work on Scottish Ales. Where can I find the information? I was considering brewing the recipe in the article but of course would brew a more authentic recipe if available. The Barclay Perkins site?
There’s a whole load of stuff on my blog. And I recently published a book on Scottish beer with 370 recipes.
This, for Maclay 80/-, is one of them:
1965 Maclay Export
pale malt 6.25 lb 73.62%
flaked maize 1.00 lb 11.78%
malt extract 0.25 lb 2.94%
No. 1 invert 0.66 lb 7.77%
No. 3 invert 0.33 lb 3.89%
Northern Brewer 90 min 0.75 oz
Fuggles 60 min 0.75 oz
Goldings 30 min 0.75 oz
Goldings dry hops 0.25 oz
OG 1040
FG 1011
ABV 3.84
Apparent attenuation 72.50%
IBU 38
SRM 6
Mash at 148/158º F
Sparge at 165º F
Boil time 90 minutes
pitching temp 63.5º F
Yeast WLP028 Edinburgh Ale
I don’t blame the average homebrewer for not keeping up on every bit of historical research (even though Ron and others have been giving it away from free on their blogs for a really long time), but the editors at Zymurgy (and Brew Your Own) seem to have abdicated all responsibility for fact checking on historical beer styles. If the editors haven’t heard of Ron Pattinson and allow an article to go through that only cites a reference from 1993 (oh wait, its from Brewers Publications, so it must be ok) then they aren’t doing their jobs.
Here’s an idea. Find a homebrewer or historian or two and invite them to the editorial advisory board. And if there’s an article that makes a claim about historical beer styles, email it it to them and ask them if it stands up to what historical beer research has been saying. I’m sure Ron would rather give you feedback before it is published rather than have a heart attack while reading it after it is published.
“This is a shameless listing of the Let’s Brew (Wednesday) Postings from Ron’s blog at Shut Up About Barclay Perkins. All of the posts can be found at the Let’s Brew tag.”
