To prime or not to prime

[An Ankoù]

With regards bottling he does say "All beer destined for bottling should first be matured for a time in a cask......Bottling straight from the fermentation vessel is bad practice and should be avoided......... even the worst commercial breweries mature their bottled beers in a conditioning tank before bottling."

So on the strength of that for those of us who bottle from the FV the advice seems irrelevant.
Having recently bought this book onj advice, despite some negative reviews I am disappointed with it. There is no yeast or fermentation guidance at all. I understand that the recipes are "in likeness" of their namesakes and not exact replicas so advising on the yeast used by the commercial brewery concerned may not be possible, but one would think he used yeast himself in the creation of these recipes and I would like some basic guideline on a style of yeast at least.

One reviewer said " It's as if somebody who doesn't really know what they are doing has gone to Wheeler (or Wheeler and Protz) earlier works to produce something modern and glossy which doesn't really work. There's a lot of dismissal of factors as unimportant, or a matter of taste, which are them elaborated at length, eg. hop utilisation. Much important stuff is just glossed over eg. culturing yeast. Most disappointing of all is the recipes: Protz went to great length to consult with breweries over the formulation of their recipes and this is reflected in Wheeler's earlier editions. The new recipes are standardised on pale malt, crystal, chocolate and black malt, where black malt appears to be use just for colour adjustment- might as well use caramel. No mention of yeast type in the recipes, either. A great disappointment. Don't waste your money on this edition, try to find an earlier one. "

In fact that sums up my assessment of the latest edition to a tee. In his book "Home Brewing", 1993 he deals with every aspect of home brewing from water treatment to yeast culturing, albeit superficially by today's standards, but a good introduction to the field, nevertheless. In "Brew your Own British Real Ale at Home" 1998 with Protz, he starts to offer clone recipes based on Protz' research and they're generally good except yeast and water chemistry are not mentioned in the recipes. I suspect Protz formulated the recipes and Wheeler abridged his earlier work here. They could have done a better job and gone beyond the listings in Protz' Real Ale Almanac. Nevertheless, compared with the 3rd edition, 2014, the recipes are infinitely more reliable as far as they go. In his posthumously published work with Andy Parker "CAMRA's Essential Home Brewing", Wheeler's methodology is abridged even further, but at least offers some fresh recipes contributed by various small and micro brewers even if the scaling needs to be double checked (see the recipe for Eight Arch "Corbel" for example). I suspect CAMRA have discovered a cash cow in Wheeler and have milked him dry.

 

[An Ankoù]

I don't have any of his recipe books but I suspect the sugar is probably there to lighten the body in English beers as a way of imitating the effect of brewers invert.

Edit to add: I think it's high time we got rid of the notion that all-malt beers are superior to malt+sugar beers.

I think this is a hang-over from the heady days of Watney's and Whitbread et al, who used quite a lot of sugar in otherwise light beers to save on malt. Having recently brewed three iterations of Whitbread Trophy or Best Bitter, I can vouch for the difference an all-malt beer of similar strength makes. Using sugars to lighten the body of heavier beers is, as you say, a completely different kettle of fish.

 

[Galena]

In fact this was my Amazon review of the July 2014 (latest) edition and I stand by every word. In his book "Home Brewing", 1993 he deals with every aspect of home brewing from water treatment to yeast culturing, albeit superficially by today's standards, but a good introduction to the field, nevertheless. In "Brew your Own British Real Ale at Home" 1998 with Protz, he starts to offer clone recipes based on Protz' research and they're generally good except yeast and water chemistry are not mentioned in the recipes. I suspect Protz formulated the recipes and Wheeler abridged his earlier work here. They could have done a better job and gone beyond the listings in Protz' Real Ale Almanac. Nevertheless, compared with the 3rd edition, 2014, the recipes are infinitely more reliable as far as they go. In his posthumously published work with Andy Parker "CAMRA's Essential Home Brewing", Wheeler's methodology is abridged even further, but at least offers some fresh recipes contributed by various small and micro brewers even if the scaling needs to be double checked (see the recipe for Eight Arch "Corbel" for example). I suspect CAMRA have discovered a cash cow in Wheeler and have milked him dry.

That was a good review I thought and on the strength of it I thought I had ordered the earlier version, but no I got the watered down version, disappointing but the recipes do give a starting point to develop from. I just made the Old Hooky, fairly close to Wheeler and am now going to try an AG version using a liquid yeast

 

[Drunkula]

Ron Pattinson talks about why there was a shift between sugar and grains and wheat in one of these - can't remember which. They're all great, especially when he gets a bit effyjeffy in one. You can find the audio only if you search for Ron Pattinson Beersmith





And I might as well add these

 

[strange-steve]

to save on malt

I don't know enough about British beer or brewing history to debate this point but I'm not sure that's entirely accurate.

 

[An Ankoù]

That was a good review I thought and on the strength of it I thought I had ordered the earlier version, but no I got the watered down version, disappointing but the recipes do give a starting point to develop from. I just made the Old Hooky, fairly close to Wheeler and am now going to try an AG version using a liquid yeast

Try and get an old copy of the The Real Ale Amanac by Roger Protz. It's an amazing source of information and an excellent staring point for formulating your own clone recipes.

 

[Clint]

The sugar thing....I think beers taste "good" with it as they are familiar....as it's probably used in most commercial,mass produced beers that every man and his dog has drank in volume over the years...so are conditioned to it and sort of expect it..

 

[MickDundee]

As much as there are genuine reasons some of the breweries used sugar or invert sugar in their recipes, it definitely seems to be a characteristic of 80s Homebrewing that loads of sugar is used.

My friend’s granddad wrote a book on brewing lager which was published in 1986 and he loaned to me about 2 years ago (and I really need to give back to him). Every single recipe has sugar in it. The one I’ve promised to brew is described as a pilsner but has 600g of sugar (350g flaked maize, 250g white sugar) in a 3.2kg grain bill. Definitely not a pilsner but ticks all of the boxes for an American Lager.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Do the Germans put sugar in their beers

 

[strange-steve]

Do the Germans put sugar in their beers

No but the Belgians do, and they seem to know a thing or two about good beer.

 

[Galena]

Try and get an old copy of the The Real Ale Amanac by Roger Protz. It's an amazing source of information and an excellent staring point for formulating your own clone recipes.

At £3 a copy, why not :)

 

[Hanglow]

On the original post, I have bottle spunded a couple of times, if you do a fast ferment test you can time it so you can bottle with residual extract. It is difficult to time with typical ale fermentations of course as they tend to be rather quick. I was doing weisse beers as well so was less worried about any turbidity. One of the reasons I did this is because of Graham Wheeler too, it was his ranting about leaving beer in the primary too long that made me explore how much quicker you can package the beer than the homebrewing dogma of leaving it two weeks.

On sugar it was often used as a brew extender and I think it is as good an ingredient as any other in brewing beer - great where appropriate, not so great where not. The old whitbread and watneys etc beers of the past may have suffered from too much sugar but I think it was ullage blended in that gave them a bad taste/rep - not that I am young enough to have tried them

 

[Drunkula]

I think it was ullage blended in that gave them a bad taste/rep

Ron Pattinson talks about that. I couldn't believe it - literally bottom of the barrel beer in returned casks put back into whatever was brewing.

 

[CD]

I’m glad that stirred up a bit of interest. Forgive the ignorance, but what is the 2:2:2 rule? As I see it, one of the troubles for anyone starting home brewing today, is a surfeit of information, as opposed to a complete and utter lack of it when my Dad, and then I, did so in the fifties.

I’m surprised people are so critical of Graham Wheeler. I enjoyed his first book with its humorous little asides, though I couldn’t forgive him for rubbishing the rich heritage of brewery terms by referring to them as ‘brewspeak’. I used to follow Ken Shales’ and then Dave Lines’ recipes with enthusiasm, but then started conducting all my experimentation at Beer Festivals, and if I found something I preferred to my own beer, found out what was in it, and altered my recipe accordingly. The only thing I alter these days, is the name! The last one was ‘Lockdown Liquor’.

I shudder when I recall the amount of sugar I used in the malt extract days, and you’d be surprised how much Ringwood did, but that was because they were struggling to meet the huge demand before they moved to larger premises.

 

[An Ankoù]

I, too, have Ken Shales on my bookshelf and there he has remained.
Ringwood was an epiphany for me as far as really real ales were concerned. I used to drink Old Thumper in the Old Thumper in Westbourne in the days when OG was declared but not abv. Now it's the Porterhouse and the beer's indifferent. It all went bad after their move from Christchurch Road. Now they're completely sold out to Marstons.
As for Peter Austin, he set up Shipyard and that's going OK, but he aso set up one in Morlaix, Coreff, and their stuff is far from being consistently good.
I enjoyed his first book with its humorous little asides, says Coffin Dodger.
Me too. His first book is great in the Dave Line tradition. His association with Protz was fruitful. He goes downhill from there.

 

[CD]

‘Brewing Better Beers’ by Ken Shales was the first book I came across on Home Brewing, and introduced me to adding a bit of crystal malt to the malt extract based alcoholic drink I made at the time. I also made a ‘Shales Rinsemaster’ from his design for bottle washing. I think people forget there wasn’t any information at all available until Maudling’s Budget of 1963.

One of the people at Ringwood Brewery when I was there was called Alan Pugsley, and I think you will find www.pugsleybrewing.com is well worth visiting, then click on ‘Peter Austin’ on the options list and listen to the clip from the BBC’s Last Word.

 

[Clint]

That's a great read CD...
My sister's husband's family are one of the founders of the original Wrexham Lager Brewery from the 1800's...most information lost in the mists of time or under lock and key....early brews probably "black" lager type..Munich or Helles,with the German heritage.

 

[terrym]

‘Brewing Better Beers’ by Ken Shales was the first book I came across on Home Brewing, and introduced me to adding a bit of crystal malt to the malt extract based alcoholic drink I made at the time. I also made a ‘Shales Rinsemaster’ from his design for bottle washing. I think people forget there wasn’t any information at all available until Maudling’s Budget of 1963.

I had both Ken Shales books many years ago, the second being 'Advanced Home Brewing', but disposed of them some time ago. Perhaps I should have kept them

 

[RichK]

.... Forgive the ignorance, but what is the 2:2:2 rule? ...

2 weeks in fermenter
2 weeks priming
2 weeks conditioning

 

[CD]

Thanks. No worries when you are brewing for pleasure, but to a commercial brewery that would mean investing in at least twice the number of casks, and needing the extra floor space to store them.