SEYMOUR BOG STANDARD BEST BITTER

[seymour]

This is a tasty and authentic English Ale recipe I brew as-is, or use as a base-line for hop trials, increase hops for an IPA, increase maltbill or reduce water to brew an ESB, etc. I sometimes add 3-5% unmalted grain (torrified wheat, flaked barley, steel-cut oats, etc) to improve the mouthfeel, head retention and lace. You can substitute flaked corn or white sugar to lighten the colour and body.

The possibilities are endless. It is especially great cask-conditioned and/or dispensed via beer engine.

SEYMOUR BOG STANDARD BEST BITTER
6 US gallons = 5 Imperial gallons = 22.7 Liters

GRAINBILL
83% = 7.47 lbs = 3388 g, UK Pale Malt (Maris Otter, Golden Promise, Pauls Mild Malt, etc.)
10% = .9 lb = 408 g, UK Crystal Malt (light or dark, as you prefer)
2% = .18 lb = 82 g, UK Amber Malt
5% = .45 lb = 204 g, Molasses (or Treacle, Dark Invert Syrup, Brewers Caramel, Dark Brown Sugar, etc)
TOTAL: 9 lbs = 4.08 kg

MASH at 150°F/65.6°C for 60 min, optional: stir-in a pinch of Calcium Carbonate

SPARGE to collect 6.5 US gallons/5.4 Imperial gallons/24.6 L pre-boil

BOIL 60 min, add Molasses at this time, optional: a pinch of gypsum to make hops pop

HOPS
1.2 oz = 21 g, East Kent Goldings, First Wort Hops
.6 oz = 21 g, East Kent Goldings, 15 min remaining (add Irish Moss at this time as well)

YEAST
Ringwood Brewery dual-strain, or the complex, high-attenuating English ale yeast of your choice

STATS
OG: 1043
FG: 1010
ABV: 4.3%
IBU: 30
Colour: clear orange amber

[Barley Water]

Where are you getting the dual strain Ringwood yeast? I would just love to get my mits on some of that stuff. As it turns out, I just brewed my version of an English summer ale (or I guess you could call it a golden best bitter) with WLP05 which is supposed to be from Ringwood but of course is not the dual strain "real" stuff. My plan, such as it is, is to use the yeast for an English IPA this weekend ('cause I do what I can to avoid making starters). WLP05 can bite you in the butt and yeah, I have had it happen to me but I really like the results. I know many of the older micros, especially on the east coast have been using it for years and I would love to make a few ales with the "official" strain.

[DeadFall]

How do you deal with that much crystal? Is it the yeast? Or is it I brewed up a beer that's just ready for drinking, it was 9.2% dark crystal, 86.6% pale malt, 3.7% toasted oats and 0.6 % chocolate malt. Everyone else loves it, I think it's too sweet. If I do it again I'll use about 4% crystal. Maybe it's just me having a dry taste in beer?

[seymour]

Good question, Barley Water. Fellow JBK member Monkeybrew toured Ringwood Brewery while on holiday awhile back, and was given a baggie of fresh yeast by the brewer. He brewed a delicious Ringwood XXXX Porter clone and kindly sent me a bottle for analysis. I cultured-up the bottle dregs and have successfully used this yeast over and over, just like Shipyard, Kennebunkport, Sea Dog, Federal Jacks, Magic Hat, Ale Works, Arcadia, McAuslan, Gritty McDuff's, etc. Brewmaster Alan Pugsley who brought the yeast from Ringwood to the USA has said in interviews that he paid to archive both strains but has never once needed to reset any of the breweries' dual-strain yeasts even after thousands of reuses. Amazing, but I can vouch it hasn't drifted at all in my dozen or so repitches.



It is made-up of two strains, obviously, one higher-attenuating and lower-flocculating, the other lower-attenuating and higher-flocculating, both necessary for the fast start and fast finish. And both required for the correct flavour balance. Needless to say, the White Lab single-strain must be the lower-attenuating and higher-flocculating one, which struggles to finish in a timely manner and struggles to clean-up its own diacetyl.

Anyway, I've just started a fresh Ringwood yeast starter after a break from using it for several months. PM me your address and I'll gladly send you a bottle containing dual-strain dregs in a month or so. I retrieved Ringwood dregs from bottles of my Javelina ESB and Rosemary Golden Ale. Of course I had to drink the bottle contents while I was at it.

[will_raymo2000]

This is a tasty and authentic English Ale recipe I brew as-is, or use as a base-line for hop trials, increase hops for an IPA, increase maltbill or reduce water to brew an ESB, etc. I sometimes add 3-5% unmalted grain (torrified wheat, flaked barley, steel-cut oats, etc) to improve the mouthfeel, head retention and lace. You can substitute flaked corn or white sugar to lighten the colour and body.

The possibilities are endless. It is especially great cask-conditioned and/or dispensed via beer engine.

SEYMOUR BOG STANDARD BEST BITTER
6 US gallons = 5 Imperial gallons = 22.7 Liters

GRAINBILL
83% = 7.47 lbs = 2028 g, UK Pale Malt (Maris Otter, Golden Promise, Pauls Mild Malt, etc.)...

Just put this into beersmith and wondered why the OG was so low. Looked back through and your conversion from 7.47lb to kg is a bit off. Should read 3.38kg not the 2.028kg.

Looks like a cracking beer, will have to give this a go next brewday

[seymour]

Oh, you're exactly right. Good catch. I've corrected the original post.

[Barley Water]

I have made some really good beers with WLP05 (and Wyeast's version of the same yeast) but it occasionally does some wierd things. As you know, I like to use the same yeast at least twice in a row; the first beer being a low O.G. beer and generally something a bit bigger. I got burned once doing the second beer, it started extremely slowly which really surprised me because my pitch was plenty big and the first beer behaved and tasted just fine. Generally speaking, when I do this the second beer takes off really fast, I have had lagers throw up 3 inches of foam 4 hours after pitching the second generation of yeast. Of course the Ringwood strain is notorious for diacetyl so the worst thing you can do is take the beer off the yeast cake too soon. Really though, Fuller's strain as well as the Guiness strain will also cause problems if you try to rush things. The thing about diacetyl that many homebrewers over here don't seem to get though is that a little is actually welcome in certain styles (bitters, brown porters are two that come to mind). If you put a beer in a competition that has any at all it will get scored down even if the style guidelines allow for a little in the flavor profile. When I make British beers I generally ferment them so that I get a pretty big shot of yeast character and if the judges don't like it I say screw 'um; if I want clean tasting beer I'll use the Chico strain or make lagers.

[seymour]

How do you deal with that much crystal? Is it the yeast?...Maybe it's just me having a dry taste in beer?

Deadfall, yes it's the yeast. For this particular recipe approach, you MUST use a high-attenuating English ale yeast and allow MUCH longer conditioning time than typical, but it's worth the wait. True Ringwood Brewery dual-strain yeast (same goes for Adnams dual-strain yeast) is extraordinary. Those buggers will keep chomping away at anything resembling sugar indefinitely.

One of my favourite beers of last year was Schlafly India Brown Ale with 20% crystal malt, if you can believe that! Sarah Hughes Ruby Mild is close to that too, isn't it? Anyway, the Schlafly one wasn't cloyingly sweet, it finished bone dry, but yes...that's entirely due to fermentation technique (and ridiculous quantities of pungent American hops.)

So yes, it's the yeast, but it's partly the sugar addition too, both of which are historic English brewing techniques. That 5% molasses addition is a highly fermentable sugar which contributes a little rummy flavour but at the same time slightly thins the body relative to an all-malt recipe with an equivalent ABV%...

[YeastWhisperer]

I plated a Ringwood hydrometer sample that I obtained from the defunct Pugsley-built brewery back in 1994. Back then, most people did not know that Ringwood was a multi-strain culture. I discovered it by accident. I transferred several well isolated colonies from the plate to separate slants because I figured that I would never get another shot at the culture (this process is known as preparing isolates). After propagating a few of the slants and getting non-consistent results, I realized that there had to be more than one yeast strain in the culture. I reviewed my notes to see if any of the slants produced like results. I combined starters made from the two most promising slants, and voilà', I had a clean Ringwood culture that behaved like the brewery culture.

With that said, Ringwood is a Yorkshire culture. It was originally obtained from the Fountain Head Brewery in Halifax. Like most Yorkshire cultures, it has higher than normal O2 requirements.