A simple ESB recipe

[YeastWhisperer]

Simple ESB

Grist

10 lbs. M&F Marris Otter
1 lb. dark Czech crystal malt

Mash

Single infusion, 90 minutes @ 149F (65C)

Liquor

4 U.S. gallons (15 liters) of filtered 170F (77C) water (mash-in liquor)
5 U.S. gallons (19 liters) of 180F (82C) water (sparge liquor)


Hops

1 oz whole U.S. Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (60 minutes)
1 oz.whole Willamette 4.0% alpha acid (60 minutes)
1 oz. whole U.S. Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (0 minutes)

Note: The total boil time is 60 minutes after the hot break. The first addition of hops is added immediately after the hot break. One teaspoon of Irish Moss should be added to the kettle thirty minutes after the first hop addition.


Yeast

A one liter starter of Adnam's pitching yeast (any decent British ale yeast will do)


O.G. : 14.5P (1.058)
F.G. : 3.25P (1.013)
ABV : 5.9%


This recipe was formulated for 5.75 U.S. gallons (just shy of 22 liters) at an extraction rate of at least 30 gravity points per pound of grain. I collected 5.5 U.S. gallons of wort in the primary. The remaining wort was left with the break and hops after force chilling with an immersion chiller. The final product had good back of the mouth bitterness with just enough front of the mouth bitterness to be interesting. It was designed to be easy to drink while not being a training wheel beer ABV-wise.

[seymour]

Where/how do you get your Adnams yeast? Have you managed a way to maintain their proprietary dual-strain?!

[YeastWhisperer]

Where/how do you get your Adnams yeast? Have you managed a way to maintain their proprietary dual-strain?!

I received my Adnams culture on slant indirectly from the guy who brought it into the country. However, it is available through the homebrew trade as WLP025. There is nothing magical about keeping a multi-strain culture alive on slant. The strains in a multi-strain culture have often coexisted for several hundred, if not thousands of years. Up until the late nineteenth century, all yeast cultures were multi-strain cultures. Emil Hansen basically pioneered single-cell isolation at the Carlsberg Laboratory when he separated S. carslbergensis (now known as S. pastorianus) from a mixed culture that also contained S. cerevisiae.

[seymour]

With all due respect, I disagree. WLP025 might, just might be one of Adnams' two strains, but it's definitely not both. Adnams must work very hard to keep the one killer strain from out-competing the weaker strain, and as you say, at the given price point and willy-nilly delivery, there is no way White Labs is doing the same. I know in "the olden days" English breweries used to all share productive yeasts around, and were thus all diverse, heterogenous multistrains. But that's not the case with Adnams. They now have a very modern yeast lab onsite, and their resident biochemist carefully manages each strain separately, and blends them together, even visually counting a sample under the microscope before pitching. This "ratio reset" is done every few brewdays.

I'm not trying to sound like a know-it-all, you OBVIOUSLY possess an enormous amount of yeast knowledge, and I've already learned a lot from you since your recent return. Thank you and keep it coming. It's just that the Adnams dual-strain yeast is a big personal obsession of mine. They don't use their primary strains in any bottle-conditioned beers, so pretty much the only way to swipe it is from their live mini-casks, which are not exported. JMC very generously sent me some dregs, from which I brewed a tasty Best Bitter, but the slurry killed itself off before I could pitch it again. That's why I was so surprised you claimed to have it.

By the way, which guy who brought it into the country are you referring to? Kristen England? Greg Noonan?

[asd]

Hi,

The liquor measurements - are they American gallons?

[YeastWhisperer]

By the way, which guy who brought it into the country are you referring to? Kristen England? Greg Noonan?

I received the culture indirectly through Maribeth Raines. She did not disclose the person who brought it into the country, but she was the "go to" person for yeast in the nineties. Everyone was sending her yeast. I sent her the Ringwood culture that I am fairly sure is the parent of at least one of the major offerings. I plated both of the major strains in that culture from a crop that was taken at a former Alan Pugsley-built brewery in early 1994. It was my first major yeast culturing accomplishment.

[YeastWhisperer]

Hi,

The liquor measurements - are they American gallons?

Yes, the liquor measurements are U.S. gallons. Feel free to substitute U.K. Goldings for U.S. Goldings and U.K. Fuggle for Willamette in the recipe. I use U.S. hops because I prefer to purchase my hops directly from hop farmers and hop cooperatives on the West Coast.