British Strong Ale Recipe & Review: Homebrew Jar of Destiny
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- Опубліковано 7 вер 2024
- It's our first tasting from our Jar of Destiny Series: British Strong Ale.
We've dedicated ourselves to brewing new styles for ourselves (and you) this year. We're challenging ourselves by letting fate be our guide. We mixed up a jar of tokens each with a different 2015 BJCP recognized beer category on it. We plan to pull out one style a piece at least 4 times this year and we will research, design, and present a new recipe along with a tasting of each beer!
Learn more about the Homebrew Jar of Destiny: • The Homebrew Jar of De...
This week, it's Mike's attempt at British Strong Ale. British Strong Ale is a very malt forward ale with a distinct English Ale fermentation character. Lots of malt flavors of biscuits and toast and nutty grains. There will be plenty of earthy and spicy old world English hop character.
This style is not supposed to be an English Barleywine or English IPA. However, its supposed to have more character and oomph than even the strongest of the Bitters category.
This beer delivered really big toasty and biscuit malt flavors derived from Maris Otter, Amber Malt and Double Roasted Crystal Malt (DRC). The Challenger and EKG hops help round it all out. This one came out unbelievably drinkable at about 6.5% ABV.
Check out the full recipe below. Tell us about your British Strong Ale experiences in the comments! Cheers!
Recipe:
6.5 Gallon Batch
75% efficiency
OG 1.060
FG 1.013
14.5lb/6.57kg Maris Otter (Fawcett)
0.5lb/226g Amber Malt (22L)
0.5lb/226g DRC, Simpsons (152L)
2oz/56g Challenger 6.3%AA 60min (35IBU)
1oz/28g EKG 4.2%AA 30min (11IBU)
1oz/28g EKG 4.2%AA 10min
London ESB Yeast Wyeast 1968
MASH:
145F/63C 45min
156F/69C 20min
168F/76C 10min/Mashout
Yeast Pitch at 63F/17C, Free Rise to 68F/20C and hold until complete.
Sample beer and perform diacetyl rest if need be.
#BritishStrongAle #JarOfDestiny #BrewDudes
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0:18 I loved that, Mike
Aw Yeah... We are ramped up here for the Jar of Destiny. Cheers! -Mike
This beer sounds delicious, especially as I move from summer to fall. The recipe looks great - I look forward to giving it a go.
Love your vids. First time I have ever posted a comment. But I always have said/told people that real beer could be hazy or not, no matter what the style. I think you guys have done a great job with letting us other home brewers know what hops do and what malts do. I still don't know why you don't have more views. Keep up the great content. It always make think that some day I can open a brewery, but if not I will still keep home brewing for the love love of the craft and the science! Cheers!
I will come buy hazy or clear beer from your brewery one day! Thanks for the kind words! Cheers! -Mike
nice! great start for the jar of destiny ;-)
Cheers! -Mike
As a Brit its great to see you (albeit by the jar of destiny) brewing a classic British style and producing something excellent. Good job. With regards the chill haze what temperature are you serving it at, traditionally 50 - 54f is the norm. I do know we are often mocked for liking warm beer across the pond 🤣
I love British styles and its a heavy slant on most of what I brew. I've routinely explored the range of Bitters as well as British Brown Ales. I keep my serving fridge at 45F but don't mind at all letting my British Ales warm up in the glass first. Thanks for the comment and the support. CHEERS! -Mike
Thanks for all the content you guys! I always check out your channel for some inspiration. I seem to brew heavily a few months every year and then take a hiatus. Cream Ale is on this week and British Strong ale next!
Brew on! - John
GREAT color. I really like the Jar of Destiny format. Looking forward to the rest of the JOD series. Cheers Gents.
THanks much for the comment. We are excited too. Cheers! -Mike
Just on the note of wanting more aroma in it. There's nothing "un-british" with dry hopping, as long as it's a late addition (ferm almost finished). A traditional British method (well I know of it in the North of England) was to dry hop in the cask with whole hops when priming the cask.
Right on, Doug. Mike will take note! - John
Love the JOD concept, love what a recipe challenge gives you (research through to best possible output).
British beers have changed so much over time, and the names appended have drifted over styles.
Extra Special Bitter is a style category coined to work round Fuller's ESB as an example.
Breweries brew what they want and what sells.
I'd recommend trying some commercial examples (Bishops Finger, my own fave).
ESB is my first successful in house recipe development, so loved seeing this session.
Feel free to dry hop, prob 2nd FV rather than 1st FV as older beers could have hops in the cask.
Thanks for sharing, loved this.
Thanks Julian!
Love the jar of destiny concept! Cheers!
Thanks for the support. Cheers! -Mike
Interesting brew and great review.
These UK 5.5% - 6.5% ales, loads out there. But,, Theakstons and Blacksheep breweries are 15 miles from my doorstep, so it’s Old Peculiar/Riggwelter as the bench mark. Also Hambleton Ales, Nightmare is very good.
Great malts, balance and after a few, as good as a lump of 4”x2” to send you to sleep 😀
Thanks for the info!
Looks good. I've brewed beer since 1980. My local pub here in Hampshire, England is a Fullers pub. So ESB, London Pride and Bengal Lancer only a 400 yard walk away. We used to live in Kent, just next to the hop fields so saw EKG being grown along the side of the roads as a kid and dried in those iconic Oast Houses (worth an internet search). Yes they used to use and some still do use maltose syrup, brewers caramel, invert sugar (to retain residual sweetness), demerara and soft brown sugar. I have a CAMRA (CAmpaign For Real Ale) book from the 90s and they have recipes with those sugars in. The key thing is the yeast. Many British breweries kept their own yeast going for decades which added pronounced fruity esters. The character was often down to water chemistry or yeast. I have recipes going back to 1870. Beers were a lot stronger then. There was a reduction in ABV during WW1 due to supply and concern over the way it would affect the war effort and again in the 30s and WW2. Strong Ales up until the 1940s would have been 7 - 11%.
Thanks for that wonderful bit of history and thanks for watching. I am enamored with English brewing and beer styles. Cheers! -Mike
Hey dudes, this was excellent. I really like this series and look forward to learning more about the different styles. Perfect thing to sprinkle in throughout the year. This beer sounds outstanding and it’s obvious John is over the moon on it. I never would have thought of this style like you guys but I have to say it sounds like one may be in my future. Hey, I’ll give you some independent feedback, ha haaa!! Thanks guys, cheers from Uxbridge.
I didn't really realize this style existed as that in between strength English category. I've brew tons of English styled beers over the years and it's a general category I had fallen in love with. But I was getting bored with English beers the last few years and this new one really relit the English spark for me. It was quite fun to design and brew. Cheers! -Mike
love this idea and video series
Thank you. Cheers! -Mike
Interesting style. I've brewed some British ales but never this one. This one sounds tasty. Good to see your out of isolation.
This style guideline is more of a place holder for English style ales that creep out of the bitters definition in color and strength. Its a great way for an American Brewer to make a British beer when they can't seem to fathom a beer under 4.5% ABV. Cheers! -Mike
Glad to see both you dudes vertical ... brew on!!
Yeah baby! Back in studio! Cheers! -Mike
Simpsons DRC is a great crystal malt, I use it more and more in my English ales. Also amber malt, I seem to be using a bit of it in all my ales. Great video.
Awesome. Cheers! -Mike
Nice work on the strong ale! I just brewed my first for a local competition, turned out great, maybe not to so much exactly to style (with my US-05...), but great nonetheless. Cheers!
Sounds great. I was wondering if a blend of a neutral ale yeast and ESB yeast would tame the big English fermentation character and make this beer even more drinkable or amenable to some of my Americanized palatted guests. Cheers! -Mike
Nice work dudes!
Thanks for chiming in from the Campfire. Cheers! -Mike
Becker's invert #2 would absolutely set this off. Invert in English beers is sublime. Expensive but worth it..
Do you think it would be necessary to back down on some of the crystal or amber? I debated the brewing sugar thing for quite a while. Cheers! -Mike
South Australian brewery, Coopers, put out a "Coopers Vintage" every year, which is a different recipe every year. It's based on a British Strong Ale... Australian Stong Ale??
The historical reach of the Empire even through beer. Cheers! -Mike
Mmm. Gonna have to find me some double roasted crystal. Never even heard of that one...
It's out there. It's a Simpsons product. You might see it listed as Crystal DRC. Cheers! -Mike
Thanx for another excellent discussion and video. Funny, I was brewing a London strong ale for the first time a few weeks ago, it’s still aging, so I am very curious how it will finally turn out. I used lyles golden syrup (inverted caramel sugar) for having it more on the light side.
I considered Lyles as well. I do want to play with some of those English brewing syrups/sugars. If I was trying to make a version at the higher end of the spectrum at say 7.5-8% ABV then I'd probably aim to had added some sugars to help get there while maintaining higher attenuation. Hope yours comes out as great as mine did for us. Cheers! -Mike
What kind of beer do you recommend for a small BBQ event at the end of summer (early September, temperatures around 68F)? The beer should be compatible to braod audience - so nothing too special. I was thinking of a Vienna Lager.
Vienna is a good choice. If you really want to make something fun for yourself but still appease the crowd try a Kentucky Common! Light body due to the adjuncts, light and crisp enough for a warm day still but the color is a nod to the cooler weather ahead. I really am a poet. Cheers! -Mike
Love the vid and recipe. The burning question is, who is Warren?
If you know you know! Cheers! -Mike
Try a bit of candy syrup in it Amber colour . Make it yourself .
I debated it in the recipe design. If I repeat this in the future I'd dry it out a bit by using some brewing sugars. Cheers! -Mike
in uk we dont have anything specifically called british strong ale, some beers are darker than others and some are darker and stronger, suppose its a spectrum not sure when it becomes british strong ale.. its all called a Bitter
I was waiting for someone from the UK to chime in and say "Hey, I have no idea what this style is you're talking about." I think your comment is well timed the week after we discussed some opinions about how the BJCP works. We loved this beer and I think this "style" isn't really a style as much as it is a category or a place holder for beers that sit in the higher end of the bitter spectrum and are sometimes less traditional in strength and or color. Thanks for chiming in! Cheers! -Mike
Brew on!
Brew ON! to you! Cheers! -Mike
Is it widely known that when we say "biscuit" referring to a British malt, it means cookies to Americans?
I don't know if Americans think of biscuit as cookies, I thought that was a UK thing. No? Over here we tend to think of Biscuits as quick levend breads often made with minimal fuss and served as individually portioned out items. They tend to be floury, crumbly and take butter really well. Its almost a religion in the south to make a good biscuit. However! The top of a well made Biscuit, slightly golden brown, is what I equate to biscuity tasting malt character in English beer. Cheers! -Mike
Interesting discussion but this is a style that is probably known only to home brewers here in the UK. If you went into 99% of pubs here and asked for a British Strong Ale you would get strange looks.
And it states that in the guidelines. This category, according to the BJCP, is a sort of placeholder for British Ales that are too strong for the Bitter category but not strong enough to be in those of higher strength. Cheers! -Mike
Dang, I’m jealous that you can get more Samuel Smith beers than me! I’m in Utah so selection is limited. Always nice to see English styles on display. I think I’ll brew my ESB next!
Also, “independent feedback” - sounds like you should send them to me! 🤣
We have a chain of beer stores here called The Craft Beer Cellar. And they tend to curate a wide variety of beers. Wider than most other craft beer stores that present 82 NEIPAs as variety. Cheers! -Mike
@@BrewDudes In Utah, anything over 5% is only sold by state-run liquor stores, which have a very limited selection. Not a great state for beer... But more reason to homebrew!