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Hi all

Maybe there is already a thread on this and if so please let me know. I am embarking on brewing some vintage beers, some from the rather excellent Ron Pattison's website (shutupaboutbarclayperkins) (and yes I have also bought a book from there (Edwardian Beers or something like that)) and also from the Durdan Beer Club (again I have purchased the book - just waiting on both to arrive). I have in the fermenter a beer from the long gone Russell's brewery in Gravesend (1911) and plan on an 1862 Export and a 1944 IPA from William Youngers. I just wondered if anyone had tried brewing these and what they turned out like? I am especially interested in whether a high strength beer (>6%) with IBUs of over 122 is balanced enough to not have to wait for a year to drink? Also (I know I am greedy!) if anyone has made Invert sugars I would like to know their experiences.

Cheers!
 
I've made quite a few

My favourites have been the Burtons (strong, bitter) and Export stouts ( strong, bitter -see a pattern? :)) They take a lot of age if you want to lay them down, I bottled some Burton with BrettC that was excellent for a couple of years in the bottle.

They are very strongly flavoured beers, so you have to decide if you like that - I personally always like a good dose of bitterness to most of my beers.

As for the invert, I love using it and use it in most of the british style beers I make, burtons/strong ales/stouts/bitters etc.

I have made it before on the hob, but found that a bit of a faff having to constantly adjust the temperature to maintain it - it's very important not to go too high or you will burn the sugar. Instead I make a large batch in a pot in the oven - just add a bit of water and lactic acid, heat on the hob to dissolve then put in the oven @120c until I find it is done - this can take a good few hours in the oven as it's low and slow, depending on what colour I want, but it's easy as long as your oven maintains correct temperature.
 
I've made quite a few

My favourites have been the Burtons (strong, bitter) and Export stouts ( strong, bitter -see a pattern? :)) They take a lot of age if you want to lay them down, I bottled some Burton with BrettC that was excellent for a couple of years in the bottle.

They are very strongly flavoured beers, so you have to decide if you like that - I personally always like a good dose of bitterness to most of my beers.

As for the invert, I love using it and use it in most of the british style beers I make, burtons/strong ales/stouts/bitters etc.

I have made it before on the hob, but found that a bit of a faff having to constantly adjust the temperature to maintain it - it's very important not to go too high or you will burn the sugar. Instead I make a large batch in a pot in the oven - just add a bit of water and lactic acid, heat on the hob to dissolve then put in the oven @120c until I find it is done - this can take a good few hours in the oven as it's low and slow, depending on what colour I want, but it's easy as long as your oven maintains correct temperature.
+1 for home made invert. Adds loads of complex flavours
 
I think using Chevallier malt on the heavily hopped beers makes a difference, it's a totally different beast to any modern malt. Other than being more authentic, it has more sweetness and flavour to it.
 
I think using Chevallier malt on the heavily hopped beers makes a difference, it's a totally different beast to any modern malt. Other than being more authentic, it has more sweetness and flavour to it.
I intend to get that for a Barclay-Perkins Mild - lots of hops and high %
 
I've made quite a few

My favourites have been the Burtons (strong, bitter) and Export stouts ( strong, bitter -see a pattern? :)) They take a lot of age if you want to lay them down, I bottled some Burton with BrettC that was excellent for a couple of years in the bottle.

They are very strongly flavoured beers, so you have to decide if you like that - I personally always like a good dose of bitterness to most of my beers.

As for the invert, I love using it and use it in most of the british style beers I make, burtons/strong ales/stouts/bitters etc.

I have made it before on the hob, but found that a bit of a faff having to constantly adjust the temperature to maintain it - it's very important not to go too high or you will burn the sugar. Instead I make a large batch in a pot in the oven - just add a bit of water and lactic acid, heat on the hob to dissolve then put in the oven @120c until I find it is done - this can take a good few hours in the oven as it's low and slow, depending on what colour I want, but it's easy as long as your oven maintains correct temperature.

I guess I am going to find out if I like the strong tastes! My only issue is that I store my beers in a garage and when the temp goes up like it did the other week I can sit back and listen to bottles exploding! Our house apparently has a concrete bunker buried somewhere under the patio and I think I should open it up as a brew store. Thanks for the tip on Invert in the oven!
 
I have just made a historical bitter (Terry Wheeler recipe) I added a fair bit of Munich to it cant get anything like the old style malts over here. I also favour the more bitter taste the one I made was 70 IBU and around 5.5% ABV. You will have to find somewhere to keep your beer under 20 C, even if they didn't explode they will deteriorate rapidly.
 
I guess I am going to find out if I like the strong tastes! My only issue is that I store my beers in a garage and when the temp goes up like it did the other week I can sit back and listen to bottles exploding! Our house apparently has a concrete bunker buried somewhere under the patio and I think I should open it up as a brew store. Thanks for the tip on Invert in the oven!
at my old house I used the shed and I worried a lot about this. I never had any bottle bombs in the shed but on a couple of occasions I dropped a bottle taking it out of the shed and it’s exploded.

My garage now seems to stay around the 12-15C mark most of the year, maybe slightly colder in the winter, so it’s ideal as a beer cellar.
 
I use the inspection pit in my garage, it topped out at about 16c when we had that massive heatwave a couple of years ago. It goes down to about 8c in winter.
 
Another source of old recipes is "Edd the brew's" blog. I've got one that'll be ready this month MORRELL & Co : BITTER 1889. A "Victorian" bitter; quite rare because Porter and Mild was king until after WWII. Not so heavy on hops (42IBU) so ready earlier (I've a 1850 Porter starting for Christmas, but it's 75IBUs needs 4 months to moderate). Interesting mash schedule (I compared to a modern day "Hochkurz" mash): I used Chevallier malt (love the stuff) and got 82% attenuation using this mash technique ("Ringwood" yeast which normally is only given up to 75% attenuation).
 
Our club brewed a vintage Kottbusser Ale last year as a collaboration with our local microbrewery to help celebrate our county’s Beer Week. I pieced the recipe together from a variety of sources. Though Ron Pattison describes the original versions as sour, we didn’t do that and stuck with a Kolsch yeast, and the beer turned out great. Here is the homebrew-scaled recipe:

https://beersmithrecipes.com/viewrecipe/2644420/kottbusser-collaboration
 
@Hanglow : also thanks for the tip of the oven! I regularly make my own invert sugar, but I have never let it color (except by adding cane sugar or dark brown sugar).
 

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