Modern mild - am I really the only brewer who makes it?

[obscure]

Can anyone post some links here to mild malt specifications and suppliers? Somewhere down the road I would like to brew a mild, but I would like to compare malts first.

Personally I have being very happy with the Thomas Fawcett Mild Malt (only place I’ve seen stocking it is Malt Miller).

https://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/product/mild-ale-malt/
They also do one made by Warminster (I’m not sure why the text box implies oats the link is to a mild malt.

https://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/product/warminster-floor-mild/
It is a tad more expensive to use Mild malt than Maris Otter or generic pale Malt but frankly NEIPA brewers happily pay a small fortune for hops so paying five pounds a batch for my base malt doesn’t seem all that extravagant and I would say so much of the flavour in a Mild comes from the malt that I am happy to pay a little more.

I mostly use the Greg Hughes recipe for Mild which produces a really nice nutty Mild. Yeast wise I have mostly used CML Beoir (although London Ale III is great when I feel like paying the premium.

Also to answer @The magistrate I’m another Mild brewer, I confess I’m not old enough to have being drinking mild when it was routinely available in pubs so most of my experience with it is with home-brew. For me it’s a extremely tasty beer that I can down a few pints of and not regret it the following morning, it really is a underrated style.

 

[An Ankoù]

Can anyone post some links here to mild malt specifications and suppliers? Somewhere down the road I would like to brew a mild, but I would like to compare malts first.

Looking for the right colour in a continental malt, I think I'd give Château Pale Malt a go. At 8 ebc it looks about right. I must confess I haven't tried it, but, as Ive got some, I'm going to try it.

 

[marshbrewer]

Drinking one right now; bit of an experiment in that I brewed it with CML Belgian yeast, but many of the open fermented English yeasts are phenolic so I thought I'd give it a spin. It's nice; really nice. First pint I had last night was a bit cold and I felt it could be a bit thin; so I've served it a couple of degrees warmer tonight and it's bang on. It's about 10% simulated #3 invert (golden syrup+ black strap molasses)

 

[Scrattajack]

I brewed it with CML Belgian yeast, but many of the open fermented English yeasts are phenolic so I thought I'd give it a spin.

Definitely going to try that!

 

[marshbrewer]

I think it's worth a go. The plan wasn't to push the temp right up during fermentation to get bananas notes or anything, just a nice steady ferment in the middle of the range to get some phenol character. In this case, it's there, but you notice it more when you've stopped drinking not while you are supping. Works well.

 

[Wowbagga]

There's a good selection of mild recipes in the GW book. Sarah Hughes Dark Ruby is in my brew-queue and will done early next year with a few modifications from the Wheeler recipe. I can sometimes get it on draught when I'm in Nottingham. It's a bit of a legendary pint.

One of the World's Great Beers is that! :)

 

[user 43495]

If you have difficulty getting so called "mild" malt, Crisp's Vienna is more of a mild malt than it is a Vienna malt inasmuch as it's English spring barley rather than continental barley, kilned off to the same colour as mild malt.

Ah yes, Faram's suggested that to me a few years ago, but I wasn't impressed. I figured I might as well use good ol' crushed pale as clutter up one of my cellar dustbins with Vienna.

 

[user 43495]

One of the World's Great Beers is that! :)

You can get it 'live' from the Beacon Hotel in Sedgley. I wouldn't fuss with a published recipe: just formulate a Victorian porter and drink it "mild" as opposed to "sour" which is what mild historically meant. The true porter recipes were really simple, as were those for Burton IPA. If you want a reliable authentic recipe go for the Durden Park Beer Club book because they specialised in obtaining the real recipes from the brewery archives. I recall Wheeler used some sort of computer gizmo for a lot of his 'formulations'. If you can cook you can brew and the methodology is not wholly different. Know your ingredients, what they taste like and what they can do. I would frankly be sceptical about a cook's or a brewer's formulation skills if reliance of a computer progam is required, but that's just my view. Orwell wrote in 1984 about sentimental popular music being composed on a machine called The Versificator, and without doubt we've suffered from that in reality for decades. Let's not allow it to creep into what is after all supposed to be craft brewing. I have the Durden book and if I can locate it i will be happy to post their recipe. I would trust them over GW any day.

 

[user 43495]

Looking for the right colour in a continental malt, I think I'd give Château Pale Malt a go. At 8 ebc it looks about right. I must confess I haven't tried it, but, as Ive got some, I'm going to try it.

Just use vin ordinaire crushed pale. My preference only applies when I can get mild malt which CF used to get in but it's down to which suppliers they use. Latterly they haven't had it on their malt menu. A local brewery got me my last two sacks. The Homebrew shop supply it but as with hops the prices are silly. I asked them about buying a full sack because they must be buying it in that way but they insisted I had to buy daft little bags.

 

[user 43495]

I would say so much of the flavour in a Mild comes from the malt that I am happy to pay a little more.

The distinctive flavour comes from the black malt and/or roasted barley. That's why partigyled versions lack it.

 

[user 43495]

The distinctive flavour comes from the black malt and/or roasted barley. That's why partigyled versions lack it.

 

[user 43495]

Personally I have being very happy with the Thomas Fawcett Mild Malt (only place I’ve seen stocking it is Malt Miller).

https://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/product/mild-ale-malt/
They also do one made by Warminster (I’m not sure why the text box implies oats the link is to a mild malt.

https://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/product/warminster-floor-mild/
It is a tad more expensive to use Mild malt than Maris Otter or generic pale Malt but frankly NEIPA brewers happily pay a small fortune for hops so paying five pounds a batch for my base malt doesn’t seem all that extravagant and I would say so much of the flavour in a Mild comes from the malt that I am happy to pay a little more.

I mostly use the Greg Hughes recipe for Mild which produces a really nice nutty Mild. Yeast wise I have mostly used CML Beoir (although London Ale III is great when I feel like paying the premium.

Also to answer @The magistrate I’m another Mild brewer, I confess I’m not old enough to have being drinking mild when it was routinely available in pubs so most of my experience with it is with home-brew. For me it’s a extremely tasty beer that I can down a few pints of and not regret it the following morning, it really is a underrated style.

The distinctive flavour comes from the black malt and/or roasted barley. That's why partigyled versions lack it.

 

[obscure]

The distinctive flavour comes from the black malt and/or roasted barley. That's why partigyled versions lack it.

While it may be psychosomatic I do think their is a difference in flavour made with Mild over regular pale malt, and given that the extra cost is about 50p a kilo (on my standard 9L batch about £1) it‘s small enough that I’m willing to pay it.

 

[marshbrewer]

The distinctive flavour comes from the black malt and/or roasted barley. That's why partigyled versions lack it.

If you look at the brewery records for mild brewed since the war, most used dark brewing sugars to get the colour in dark milds up until very recently. Black malt was a bit more common, and sometimes Chocolate malt. Roasted barley was a distinct rarity.

 

[An Ankoù]

Ah yes, Faram's suggested that to me a few years ago, but I wasn't impressed. I figured I might as well use good ol' crushed pale as clutter up one of my cellar dustbins with Vienna.

Suit yourself. The point you may have missed is that Crisp's isn't really Vienna, but mild ale malt. Of course hardly any commercial brewer wants to buy MAM nowadays as not a lot of people drink mild. Vienna on the other hand sounds more hip.
If I have a recipe calling for genuine Vienna malt, I use Bestmalz hence I have a sack of each "cluttering up" my malt bins.

 

[DixeySJ]

No indeed - I have brewed the Sarah Hughes based recipe in GW referenced above several times. I have slightly tweaked it by using Mild Ale Malt and cutting down slightly on the Crystal.I just use Safale 04 yeast. Definitely a winner - can't comment on how it compares to the original as not yet had a chance to try it!

 

[moto748]

I was going to try the Sarah Hughes recipe too, and was going to ask about yeasts, but I must admit I wouldn't have thought of S-04, on the perhaps shaky grounds that I had found it not very successful with stouts in the past (US-05 or M42 much better), so figured it wasn't suitable for dark beers.

 

[obscure]

I was going to try the Sarah Hughes recipe too, and was going to ask about yeasts, but I must admit I wouldn't have thought of S-04, on the perhaps shaky grounds that I had found it not very successful with stouts in the past (US-05 or M42 much better), so figured it wasn't suitable for dark beers.

I’ve used S-04 in the Sarah Hughes recipe (the Graham Wheeler one) and it worked surprisingly well, I fermented fairly cool, and it came out pretty neutral. That’s not to say a different yeast would be a better choice but I was happy with the result.

 

[foxbat]

If you want a reliable authentic recipe go for the Durden Park Beer Club book because they specialised in obtaining the real recipes from the brewery archives.

I see they're doing a reprint of the 3rd edition so I've just bought a copy. Should be a good read. If anyone else wants to buy a copy here's the link:

https://durdenparkbeer.org.uk/index.php/product/old-british-beers-and-how-to-make-them/

 

[clib]

I'm in Manchester and dark milds are not uncommon here, both Holt's and Hydes make them and sell them in all their pubs, and some of the micros do them, like Phoenix Brewery, which does Monkeytown mild.

I agree with Ankou about the English Vienna malt, it works well in dark beers like dark mild.