100 Bottles of Beer: Welcome to the Newcastle

We are going regal in this edition with a visit to the Palace and two Castles and then we will blow it all up with a couple of Bombay Bombers. Let's just jump right in and get started.

Our first brew this time around comes from Charlie Papazian's The New Complete Joy of Home Brewing. Charlie specified Styrian Goldings hops but I had to settle for Kent Goldings. The Kent Goldings are a traditional old English variety of hop and the Styrian is very similar to Fuggle. Using the Kent probably adds variety to this brew along with the Fuggle, both being very English. I also adjusted the hop quantities to fully use 1 oz packages. The combination of whole cone and pellets was due to availability.

Palace Bitter

4 1/2 lbs M&F light DME

13 oz 53L British crystal malt

1/2 oz Fuggles hop pellets (60 min)

1/2 oz Kent Goldings hop pellets (60 min)

1/4 oz Kent Goldings whole cone hops (60 min)

1/2 oz Fuggles hop pellets (30 min)

3/4 oz Kent Goldings whole cone hops (30 min)

1/2 oz Kent Goldings hop pellets (2 min)

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

2 pkg (12g) Muntons ale yeast

Priming: ¾ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

Standard procedure here, bring milled crystal malt to boil in 2 gallons cold water, remove from heat, strain and sparge with ½ gallon hot water. Add extracts, bring to boil and add hops and Irish Moss at times indicated for total one hour boil. Pour into fermentation bucket with cold water topping to 5 gallons and pitch re-hydrated yeast when cooled.

I left the beer three days in the primary and eleven days in the secondary. It came out darker than expected, probably should have used lighter Lovibond crystal malt. The body was kind of light and thin with considerable chill haze. Hoppy as a bitter should be.

I was initially not too impressed with this brew but it definitely improved with age and was quite enjoyable by the time it was gone.

OK, from the Palace we go to the Castle, Newcastle Brown Ale that is. Newcastle is perhaps the quintessential example of brown ale to be found anywhere in the world. This recipe was found on Cats Meow and was credited to one Peter Graves who states it was based on a recipe found in Dave Miller's "Brewing the World's Great Beers" I am not familiar with this book but did find it on amazon.com. It was published in 1992.

I have made a few tweaks to this as well.

Newcastle Brown Ale

3.3 lbs M&F light LME

3.3 lbs M&F amber LME

1 lb Turbinado sugar

8 oz British 53L crystal malt

4 oz British chocolate malt

4 oz Belgian wheat malt

1 oz Fuggle hop pellets (60 min)

1 oz Fuggle hop pellets (30 min)

1 oz Fuggle hop pellets (10 min)

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

1 pkg (1/3 oz) Burton Water Salts

Wyeast 1028 London ale yeast

Priming: ¾ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

Heat milled grains in 1 ½ gallons cold water treated with Burton Water Salts to 150F and hold for 30 minutes. At least that was the plan. My actual temperature varied from 140 to 170. Strain and sparge with ½ gallon 170F water. Add extracts and sugar and return to boil, adding hops and Irish Moss at times indicated for total 60 minute boil. Pour into glass carboy with cold water, topping to 5 ½ gallons. Pitch yeast when cooled.

It fermented slow and steady for 6 days in the primary and 14 days in the secondary. This started out to be a little under-carbonated, winy and overly sweet with quite a bit of chill haze. It improved dramatically with further aging. All of the defects diminished as the carbonation level improved. I did not do a side-by-side comparison but I believe it was very close to the real thing. It was so good that not long after it was gone I decided to make it again.

As you can see, I changed the extracts and the yeast and used whole cone instead of pellet hops. This was all due to availability and not any desire to try something different.

Newcastle Brown Ale

3.3 lbs John Bull plain light LME

3.3 lbs Northwestern plain amber LME

1 lb Turbinado sugar

8 oz British 53L crystal malt

4 oz British chocolate malt

4 oz Belgian wheat malt

1 oz Fuggle whole cone hops (60 min)

1 oz Fuggle whole cone hops (30 min)

1 oz Fuggle whole cone hops (10 min)

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

1 tsp Burton Water Salts

Wyeast 1318 London Ale III yeast

Priming: ¾ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

Procedure for this was identical to the first Newcastle with the exception of using a plastic fermentation bucket instead of a carboy for the primary. Primary fermentation was about the same at five days and secondary was slower at 23 days. This version turned out very well. A little darker, sweeter and the winy character of the first was not apparent. I believe the first one was slightly better.

From the Palace to the Castle to a little trip to India by way of the Steelhead Brewing Company in Eugene, OR where I discovered their Bombay Bomber IPA. I spent a week in Eugene on business and was delighted to find Steelhead Brewing. It was my choice for dinner and brews for the entire week. I was sitting at the bar one evening and, after sampling several of their offerings, I had settled on the IPA to be my choice. It was truly perhaps the best IPA I had tried to that point.

Conversation turned to home brewing as often does in these situations and I made the comment that I would kill to know what is in this IPA. The next thing I know, the bartender, who also happened to be one of the brewers, was writing the recipe on a coaster for me. He said to be aware this is for ten barrels (310 gallons) so I may need to cut it down a bit. The following recipe is what I came up with after cutting it back to five gallons and converting from an all-grain recipe to an extract recipe. I also took a couple of ideas from Palilalia IPA which we discussed in part three of our journey.

Steelhead Bombay Bomber IPA

6.6 lbs M&F Plain Extra Light LME

1 lb Vienna Malt

1 lb 20L Munich Malt

1 1/2 oz Mt. Hood hop pellets (75 min)

1/2 oz Chinook hop pellets (75 min)

1/2 oz Mt. Hood hop pellets (15 min)

1/2 oz Chinook hop pellets (15 min)

1 oz Chinook hop pellets (dry hop in secondary)

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

1 pkg Burton Water Salts

1 tsp gypsum

1 oz oak chips (in secondary)

Wyeast 1098 British Ale yeast

Priming: ¾ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

Toast two ounces each of the Vienna and Munich malts for 10 minutes at 350F and mill along with the rest of the grains.

Bring all grains to a boil in 2 gallons cold water treated with gypsum and Burton Water Salts. Strain and sparge with ½ gallon boiling water. Add LME and return to boil adding hops and Irish Moss at times indicated for total 75 minute boil. Pour into carboy with cold water, topping to 5 ½ gallons and pitch yeast when cooled.

After five days in the primary, rack to secondary along with steamed oak chips and one ounce Chinook hop pellets, each in a hop bag, and leave in secondary for 21 days before bottling.

Although this did not turn out to be exactly like the Steelhead IPA, it was still very good and I did make it again about 16 months later. This version turned out even better. I used a different extract, more hops, more oak, different yeast, no toasted grains, and a modified mash process.

Steelhead Bombay Bomber IPA

6.6 lbs Briess Golden Light LME

1 lb Vienna Malt

1 lb Munich Malt

2 oz Mt Hood hop pellets (80min)

1 oz Chinook hop pellets (80 min)

1 oz Mt Hood hop pellets (20 min)

1 oz Chinook hop pellets (20 min)

1 oz Chinook hop pellets (dry hop in secondary)

1/4 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

1/2 tsp Burton Water Salts

1 tsp gypsum

2 oz oak chips (in secondary)

Wyeast 1275 Thames Valley Ale

Priming: ¾ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

Heat all milled grains to 160F in 1 gallon cold water treated with gypsum and Burton Water Salts. Remove from heat and let steep for 75 minutes. Strain into kettle and sparge with 1 ½ gallons 174F water. Add LME and return to boil adding hops and Irish Moss at times indicated for total 80 minute boil. Pour wort into carboy with cold water, topping to 5 ½ gallons and pitch yeast when cooled.

After six days in the primary, rack to secondary along with steamed oak chips and one ounce Chinook hop pellets, each in a hop bag, and leave in secondary for 21 days before bottling.

This had an amazing floral, citrus hop aroma and bitter, citrus, not quite grapefruit hop flavor. Although the first version was very good, this was excellent, a wonderful example of what I believe an IPA should be. I couldn't really say if it was similar or better than the original I had in Eugene, but that didn't really matter anymore. This was great!

You have probably noticed that I do not give any gravity readings or ABV for any of these beers. By this time I had gotten very lazy about this, taking the stand that it is what it is and as long as it is good, I don't care. Charlie's target gravities for the Palace Bitter would indicate an ABV of about 3.7%. I would guess the Newcastle to be somewhere between 4 - 5% and the IPA around 6%. I did eventually get back to understanding the importance of taking hydrometer readings and now keep track of it very carefully.

Well, that is five more down bringing us to 61 brews left on our journey. When we come back I will tell the sad tale of an Australian Red Lager going horribly wrong, a Black Ginger Ale, and three versions of a Rye-Weizen.

To be continued...

References:

Charlie Papazian, The New Complete Joy of Home Brewing, 2^nd edition, October 1991

Karl F. Lutzen & Mark Stevens, Cat's Meow