Tribute style ale anybody done one ?

[Rotorgoat]

I always use a little Black Malt to adjust the colour of my brews: it's an adjunct grain so can be steeped rather than mashed. I use a bit of it in many brews as the colour of other grains such as Crystal Malt can vary a bit.

Thanks. I was thinking post fermentation. It looks ok and tastes fantastic. Going to put another one on to stock up for Christmas. I also have a good amount of creamy harvested proper job yeast for the next one. I highly recommend stepping up a starter from bottle conditioned proper job. It works very well and gave me 79% attenuation. Just put on a no boil Xmas beer with Kveik yeast. Can’t run out of beer over the festive period.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

My tribute looks lighter that the original.

Don't sweat it - British brewers generally adjust colour with either caramel (traditionally) or black malt (as a nod to CAMRA's ahistorical loathing of adjuncts).

If you think about it makes sense - people tend to "drink with their eyes", so if you want the final colour to be always consistent it makes sense to have a colour target that's always darker than the beer would come out of the fermenter, to allow for slight variations in fermentation, malting and so on.

Unfortunately you then get USians thinking that all the colour comes from crystal, which is how you end up with those weird US bitters that are 12-15% crystal abominations.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Don’t use Crystal in a Tribute, I use 7% Vienna & 2% Torrefied wheat, the rest is Maris Otter or Pale Malt.

 

[The Baron]

CC is right no Crystal in Tribute, I personally use Munich as my secondary malt but so many variations on this recipe

 

[Clint]

Mine is just maris otter and Munich.

 

[Rakey]

Been brewing a Tribute beer for a while, so first off thanks for this thread its given me some ideas on tweaking and improving it now that I can use Cornish Gold in it.

Yeast is something else I'm working on at the moment, might try the growing some up from a bottle, but also considering using slopes as I believe the Kent slope is Shepard Neame and the St Austell yeast originates from them.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Been brewing a Tribute beer for a while, so first off thanks for this thread its given me some ideas on tweaking and improving it now that I can use Cornish Gold in it.

I'll bite. :) Oooh - TMM now sell Cornish Gold from Simpsons (at the same price as eg Warminster Otter)

Yeast is something else I'm working on at the moment, might try the growing some up from a bottle, but also considering using slopes as I believe the Kent slope is Shepard Neame and the St Austell yeast originates from them.

Again, I don't mind the subtle ad for the Brewlab slopes, I really hope they do well for you even if I suspect that it really needs a pitching format to really work. That explains why the Kent is o/s, I'd assumed there had just been a dud batch!

I'd not heard Snozzell yeast came from Sheps - do you know when? Per a comment on this article, the drop in quality in Sheps ~30 years ago was partly down to an ex-Whitbread director insisting that they switch from their old multistrain to "Whitbread yeast". The fact that Brewlab Kent is described as a single strain suggests it postdates that move? Yeast from Proper Job bottles works well though.

Personally I'd happily swap 1-2 of the Brewlab core range for a rotating seasonal - be good to have more Yorkshire and Midlands strains in particular.

 

[Rakey]

I'd not heard Snozzell yeast came from Sheps - do you know when? Per a comment on this article, the drop in quality in Sheps ~30 years ago was partly down to an ex-Whitbread director insisting that they switch from their old multistrain to "Whitbread yeast". The fact that Brewlab Kent is described as a single strain suggests it postdates that move? Yeast from Proper Job bottles works well though.

Personally I'd happily swap 1-2 of the Brewlab core range for a rotating seasonal - be good to have more Yorkshire and Midlands strains in particular.

The yeast info came from someone at the brewery, it was about 20 years or so ago, when there was an issue in house so they had to 'borrow' Neames, and why you'll see on companies house that one of the Neame family was made a director at the time (now resigned).

Don't know about the quality of the Neame yeast 30 years ago though. Cleaning up a strain could be for any number of reasons, those who retain multi strain do hold a very important part that flavours the beer but its a right job and half to keep them all in check and produce something consistent.

Neame is thought to originate thought from Thwaites, which is turn comes from Whitbread, so all those mutations and changes are sure to be less and less these days as everyone goes for cleaner yeast I guess.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

The yeast info came from someone at the brewery, it was about 20 years or so ago, when there was an issue in house so they had to 'borrow' Neames, and why you'll see on companies house that one of the Neame family was made a director at the time (now resigned).

Heh, so he was - Jonathan Neame, who's been MD/CEO of Sheps since 1999, was a non-exec of Snozzell 2002-18. I didn't know that. It's funny because I've often compared the two in the past, they have a similar dynamic in being able to dominate their home county because they're peninsulas with no competition on three sides.

Don't know about the quality of the Neame yeast 30 years ago though. Cleaning up a strain could be for any number of reasons, those who retain multi strain do hold a very important part that flavours the beer but its a right job and half to keep them all in check and produce something consistent.

Indeed, although most of them came to terms with that a long time ago - I guess Adnams in the 70s and Urquell after the Iron Curtain came down are the only ones that come to mind as cutting down explicitly to reduce maintenance hassle.

More common is going down to one strain (often Whitbread B) as part of the move to conicals in the 1970s/80s, I wonder if that's part of the story at Sheps although it's not clear from what the commenter on Paul Bailey's blog says.

Neame is thought to originate thought from Thwaites, which is turn comes from Whitbread, so all those mutations and changes are sure to be less and less these days as everyone goes for cleaner yeast I guess.

Huh, that's a curveball. The guy from Sheps lab says that they got yeast (it's not entirely clear from the way he wrote it, but it looks like the new yeast rather than the Sheps original) from "Fremlins" which would make sense. Fremlins of Maidstone had taken over Rigden of Faversham before in turn being bought by Whitbread in 1967. Whitbread closed the Maidstone brewery soon afterwards, but kept the old Rigden brewery (now Faversham Tesco) making Trophy until 1990. So if an ex-Whitbread director wanted Whitbread yeast for Sheps before 1990, then it would make sense to go to the Whitbread brewery down the road rather than Lancashire.

Although the obvious ex-Whitbread guy would be Miles Templeman, who as head of Whitbread beer was the driving force behind Boddies and Stella in the 1990s and who joined Sheps as a non-exec in 2002, which would be too late for "Fremlins" other than via the Whitbread yeast bank. But you can imagine if Sheps had the choice of all the Whitbread variants, they would choose the one with a local connection.

Of course, it doesn't help that "comes from Whitbread" can mean two things, either the actual production yeast in one or other of the Whitbread breweries, or any yeast from their extensive yeast bank.

But my thoughts immediately turn to 1318 London Ale III, which the USians are convinced came from Boddingtons even though Strangeways is a long way from London. Phenotypically it's hard to square with Boddies recipes from the 1970s which had >90% apparent attenuation but genetically it's clearly a member of the Whitbread family. So my suspicion is that 1318 came from something labelled as Boddies produced in a Whitbread brewery after Whitbread bought them.

Which in turn means that potentially, Brewlab Kent, and yeast harvested from 1698 or Proper Job, could be interesting in a NEIPA..... Or at least a simple test brew with say 6g/l Chinook to see how biotransformy it is..... Hmmmmmmmmm

 

[clib]

Again, I don't mind the subtle ad for the Brewlab slopes, I really hope they do well for you even if I suspect that it really needs a pitching format to really work.

Do you mind explaining what you mean by the slopes needing a putching format? As in, no need for a starter?

If so, I think it's probably good to force/educate people to make starters really. Not good for sales maybe.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

As in, no need for a starter? If so, I think it's probably good to force/educate people to make starters really. Not good for sales maybe.

Yep, ready to pitch. In the old days Escarpment did it in a very basic fashion, in standard little media pots a bit like the one below, it doesn't have to be fancy (although I assume pouches are cheaper).

And I'm not a big fan of "forcing" your customers to do any more than they have to, especially since all the competition are in ready-to-pitch format (unless you regard the NCYC as "competition"....) and every extra step is one more opportunity for infection to set in.

But mostly yes - I don't think it's a particularly great idea to restrict yourself to the microbiologically competent, as they are exactly the kind of people who will have the knowledge to make glycerols and never order that strain again. So you're kinda shooting yourself in the foot.

 

[clib]

Yep, ready to pitch. In the old days Escarpment did it in a very basic fashion, in standard little media pots a bit like the one below, it doesn't have to be fancy (although I assume pouches are cheaper).
View attachment 82828
And I'm not a big fan of "forcing" your customers to do any more than they have to, especially since all the competition are in ready-to-pitch format (unless you regard the NCYC as "competition"....) and every extra step is one more opportunity for infection to set in.

But mostly yes - I don't think it's a particularly great idea to restrict yourself to the microbiologically competent, as they are exactly the kind of people who will have the knowledge to make glycerols and never order that strain again. So you're kinda shooting yourself in the foot.

I partially agree because a lot of people will not buy slopes as they'll see them as lab geek paraphernalia.

I disagree because liquid yeast often arrives in less than great condition and needs a starter. The Brewlab slopes provide yeast in very good condition. And there is nobody less microbiologically competent than me, and I can assure you it is a doddle to make a starter from a slope. Even for me.

If you can make beer you can make a Brewlab starter. It's barely different from any other starter. The issue is marketing. Brewlab isn't run as a homebrew yeast selling operation like the American operations. They are not out there selling the product, explaining the advantages and the simplicity and making it all look cool with sunlit photos of hazy orange juice.

 

[Rakey]

Heh, so he was - Jonathan Neame, who's been MD/CEO of Sheps since 1999, was a non-exec of Snozzell 2002-18. I didn't know that. It's funny because I've often compared the two in the past, they have a similar dynamic in being able to dominate their home county because they're peninsulas with no competition on three sides.



Indeed, although most of them came to terms with that a long time ago - I guess Adnams in the 70s and Urquell after the Iron Curtain came down are the only ones that come to mind as cutting down explicitly to reduce maintenance hassle.

More common is going down to one strain (often Whitbread B) as part of the move to conicals in the 1970s/80s, I wonder if that's part of the story at Sheps although it's not clear from what the commenter on Paul Bailey's blog says.



Huh, that's a curveball. The guy from Sheps lab says that they got yeast (it's not entirely clear from the way he wrote it, but it looks like the new yeast rather than the Sheps original) from "Fremlins" which would make sense. Fremlins of Maidstone had taken over Rigden of Faversham before in turn being bought by Whitbread in 1967. Whitbread closed the Maidstone brewery soon afterwards, but kept the old Rigden brewery (now Faversham Tesco) making Trophy until 1990. So if an ex-Whitbread director wanted Whitbread yeast for Sheps before 1990, then it would make sense to go to the Whitbread brewery down the road rather than Lancashire.

Although the obvious ex-Whitbread guy would be Miles Templeman, who as head of Whitbread beer was the driving force behind Boddies and Stella in the 1990s and who joined Sheps as a non-exec in 2002, which would be too late for "Fremlins" other than via the Whitbread yeast bank. But you can imagine if Sheps had the choice of all the Whitbread variants, they would choose the one with a local connection.

Of course, it doesn't help that "comes from Whitbread" can mean two things, either the actual production yeast in one or other of the Whitbread breweries, or any yeast from their extensive yeast bank.

But my thoughts immediately turn to 1318 London Ale III, which the USians are convinced came from Boddingtons even though Strangeways is a long way from London. Phenotypically it's hard to square with Boddies recipes from the 1970s which had >90% apparent attenuation but genetically it's clearly a member of the Whitbread family. So my suspicion is that 1318 came from something labelled as Boddies produced in a Whitbread brewery after Whitbread bought them.

Which in turn means that potentially, Brewlab Kent, and yeast harvested from 1698 or Proper Job, could be interesting in a NEIPA..... Or at least a simple test brew with say 6g/l Chinook to see how biotransformy it is..... Hmmmmmmmmm

Some seriously good yeast history info, thanks for sharing, certainly learnt more from this conversation that will be of help to me in future selections when brewing.

 

[Clint]

So...are we just swapping out the Munich for Cornish Gold?

 

[Northern_Brewer]

I partially agree because a lot of people will not buy slopes as they'll see them as lab geek paraphernalia.

Well quite - that and just the fear of the unknown. I want to reduce the numbers of that "lot of people", which means reducing the barriers to them giving Brewlab yeast a go. Some of that can be done with education (demos of a home microbiology setup at shows?) but the big one would be giving them the yeast in a format they are used to.

I disagree because liquid yeast often arrives in less than great condition and needs a starter. The Brewlab slopes provide yeast in very good condition. And there is nobody less microbiologically competent than me, and I can assure you it is a doddle to make a starter from a slope. Even for me.

I don't need persuading, I worked in labs with all the kit - laminar flowhoods etc - for several years. Sometimes I innoculated hundreds of yeast cultures in a day. It doesn't faze me at all - but that doesn't stop me from having empathy for people who are nervous about the whole thing.

It doesn't help that yeast is a bit of a forgotten ingredient, and it has a bit of mystique about it. So you get a lot people, particularly those into US styles, who might obsess over their hop selection and the exact timing and temperature of dryhops, but whose approach to yeast is "well just bung some US-05 in it". Or maybe if they're fancy - "smack a pack of 1318 and bung that in it".

Yes, I usually do a starter with liquid yeast, even if it's just a vitality starter on brewday - but how many people do that, versus "Oh well the manufacturer says it's ready to pitch, so I'll just bung it in"?

I suspect maybe 80+% of people?

If you can make beer you can make a Brewlab starter. It's barely different from any other starter. The issue is marketing. Brewlab isn't run as a homebrew yeast selling operation like the American operations.

The "American operations" are companies that sell to commercial breweries with a sideline in selling to homebrewers. The likes of Lallemand sell to bakeries with a sideline in brewing. Brewlab are selling to commercial breweries and are trying to figure out how to sell to homebrewers.

That's not the issue. With a slope you're just starting with a much smaller volume of yeast, which means that a) ideally you need stepped starters so an extra step to introduce contamination and b) any contamination at the "toothpick" stage is far more material than if you're eg making a starter with 200 billion cells from Omega as it's "diluted" in ?1000x less yeast.

And it's not always easy doing microbiology at home. To cut a long story short, I'm OK pouring plates at my place - you get the odd one contaminated but not enough to be a problem - and at a friend's place in winter it was worse but not too much of a problem. But in summer it was just impossible. It's an old house in the country with no extractor fan or anything, the only ventilation (in summer but not winter) is opening the back door and obviously it stirs up a whole swarm of mould spores that are lying around the place and/or coming in from the garden.

Obviously pouring plates is more vulnerable to contamination than innoculating a starter, but it taught me a bit of a lesson that you can't take it for granted that microbiology at home will be as easy as it is in a flowhood in a lab. But if it was someone without lab experience who tried to use their first slope in that house in the summer, they would assume that any contamination was their fault, so slopes are Too Difficult and just go back to smack packs.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

So...are we just swapping out the Munich for Cornish Gold?

Given that the reverse swap was that suggested by Roger Ryman (RIP), I'd say so.

 

[clib]

Well quite - that and just the fear of the unknown. I want to reduce the numbers of that "lot of people", which means reducing the barriers to them giving Brewlab yeast a go. Some of that can be done with education (demos of a home microbiology setup at shows?) but the big one would be giving them the yeast in a format they are used to.


I don't need persuading, I worked in labs with all the kit - laminar flowhoods etc - for several years. Sometimes I innoculated hundreds of yeast cultures in a day. It doesn't faze me at all - but that doesn't stop me from having empathy for people who are nervous about the whole thing.

It doesn't help that yeast is a bit of a forgotten ingredient, and it has a bit of mystique about it. So you get a lot people, particularly those into US styles, who might obsess over their hop selection and the exact timing and temperature of dryhops, but whose approach to yeast is "well just bung some US-05 in it". Or maybe if they're fancy - "smack a pack of 1318 and bung that in it".

Yes, I usually do a starter with liquid yeast, even if it's just a vitality starter on brewday - but how many people do that, versus "Oh well the manufacturer says it's ready to pitch, so I'll just bung it in"?

I suspect maybe 80+% of people?

The "American operations" are companies that sell to commercial breweries with a sideline in selling to homebrewers. The likes of Lallemand sell to bakeries with a sideline in brewing. Brewlab are selling to commercial breweries and are trying to figure out how to sell to homebrewers.

That's not the issue. With a slope you're just starting with a much smaller volume of yeast, which means that a) ideally you need stepped starters so an extra step to introduce contamination and b) any contamination at the "toothpick" stage is far more material than if you're eg making a starter with 200 billion cells from Omega as it's "diluted" in ?1000x less yeast.

And it's not always easy doing microbiology at home. To cut a long story short, I'm OK pouring plates at my place - you get the odd one contaminated but not enough to be a problem - and at a friend's place in winter it was worse but not too much of a problem. But in summer it was just impossible. It's an old house in the country with no extractor fan or anything, the only ventilation (in summer but not winter) is opening the back door and obviously it stirs up a whole swarm of mould spores that are lying around the place and/or coming in from the garden.

Obviously pouring plates is more vulnerable to contamination than innoculating a starter, but it taught me a bit of a lesson that you can't take it for granted that microbiology at home will be as easy as it is in a flowhood in a lab. But if it was someone without lab experience who tried to use their first slope in that house in the summer, they would assume that any contamination was their fault, so slopes are Too Difficult and just go back to smack packs.

It feels like you're over complicating things somewhat! I've never done any science since school and I struggled with it there. I just followed the instructions from Brewlab and it was very easy. If they had a short video people would see how easy. If they became popular people would crack on to it. The attraction is the yeast quality and slower loss of viability.

I didn't do stepped starters. They tell you to make a 300ml starter. That worked for me. They were super active. No waiting and hoping cos the yeast from America was past its best.

There is one difference from making a liquid yeast starter. You put a bit of wort into the slope tube, shake it and pour it into the starter wort. Hardly rocket science. I know some geeky people use loops to take a small amount of the yeast off the slope and save the rest but i just took the lot in that manner and repitched the yeast from the brew.

So the only barrier is making a starter and I think that applies to liquid yeast packs too. I always make a starter cos I don't trust them to ferment they way they should. The yeast can be weeks and months old and have crossed the Atlantic in the hold of a plane. Why would you just open the pack and pour it in?

 

[Pennine]

It feels like you're over complicating things somewhat! I've never done any science since school and I struggled with it there. I just followed the instructions from Brewlab and it was very easy. If they had a short video people would see how easy. If they became popular people would crack on to it. The attraction is the yeast quality and slower loss of viability.

I didn't do stepped starters. They tell you to make a 300ml starter. That worked for me. They were super active. No waiting and hoping cos the yeast from America was past its best.

There is one difference from making a liquid yeast starter. You put a bit of wort into the slope tube, shake it and pour it into the starter wort. Hardly rocket science. I know some geeky people use loops to take a small amount of the yeast off the slope and save the rest but i just took the lot in that manner and repitched the yeast from the brew.

So the only barrier is making a starter and I think that applies to liquid yeast packs too. I always make a starter cos I don't trust them to ferment they way they should. The yeast can be weeks and months old and have crossed the Atlantic in the hold of a plane. Why would you just open the pack and pour it in?

I have the same issues when sourcing in the US, wyeast and white labs are notorious underachievers. You may technically get better yeast due to the air freight and milder temps than we get over here with trucked freight.

Imperial hasn't let me down though.

 

[clib]

I have the same issues when sourcing in the US, wyeast and white labs are notorious underachievers. You may technically get better yeast due to the air freight and milder temps than we get over here with trucked freight.

Imperial hasn't let me down though.

There's a variance certainly. I'm also saying that the best way to prepare yeast for a healthy fermentation is with a starter. It's an easy and quick task so why not do it? The only issue is planning it 2 or 3 days before brew day but it's a key part of making beer - pitching the best yeast you can in the circumstances you are in. If you can make a starter, do. I reckon. Not preaching - I have years of dodging it, much of the time, behind me.

 

[Pennine]

There's a variance certainly. I'm also saying that the best way to prepare yeast for a healthy fermentation is with a starter. It's an easy and quick task so why not do it? The only issue is planning it 2 or 3 days before brew day but it's a key part of making beer - pitching the best yeast you can in the circumstances you are in. If you can make a starter, do. I reckon. Not preaching - I have years of dodging it, much of the time, behind me.

Agreed yes it's always best to do a starter for any liquid yeast. The issues I had were pitching direct from the package and thinking it was good enough for a 10l batch. I get grumpy now that on the packs they all say direct pitch and they never seem to work as advertised. Where as I never have an issue dumping in a pack of dry yeast. But now I am just complaining and this isn't the right thread for that.