# English Best Bitter



## wbosher (12/11/13)

Hi guys,

My old man is a pom, but been living in NZ for about 45 years. Untill his parents both passed away, he used go go back home every few years to visit. He said he bloody hated the place except for one thing, his beloved English Best Bitter.

I would love to make him an authentic EBB for Christmas, or thereabouts, but there are sooooo many recipes for this style is mind boggling. At it's base, it appears to be a very simple recipe, but it looks as though some people really complicate it, which has made my search more difficult.

The recipe that I've come up with below is a very simple one, but just want to know if there are any English folk out there who could give me some guidance...what to add, and/or what to take away.

I've gone with the Marris base because, well duh, English. The pale chocolate to give a toasted flavour, but without darkening it too much. The crystal to add a little sweetnes, but not too much. The sugar to give a little more kick, and increase the OG to within BJCP giudelines, but without adding to the malt. The sugar, I'm really not sure about as I've never used it before in an AG recipe, but have noticed it quite often in bitter recipes.

Hops, well even though it's a very low AA%, I wan't to stick with just the one hop, and I have bittered with Fuggle before with success. I was a very smooth bitterness in comparison with some of my other brews.

Let me know what you think

Recipe: Bosher's Best Bitter
Brewer: wbosher
Asst Brewer:
Style: Special/Best/Premium Bitter
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0)

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 35.54 l
Post Boil Volume: 30.16 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 23.00 l 
Bottling Volume: 21.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.044 SG
Estimated Color: 17.4 EBC
Estimated IBU: 32.7 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 88.3 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU 
4.00 kg Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 89.9 % 
0.25 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (130.0 EBC) Grain 2 5.6 % 
0.05 kg Chocolate Malt (700.0 EBC) Grain 3 1.1 % 
60.00 g Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 4 27.3 IBUs 
17.00 g Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 5 3.8 IBUs 
17.00 g Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 6 1.5 IBUs 
1.0 pkg Windsor Yeast (Lallemand #-) [23.66 ml] Yeast 7 - 
0.15 kg Corn Sugar (Dextrose) (0.0 EBC) Sugar 8 3.4 % 


Mash Schedule: BIAB My Profile 23L
Total Grain Weight: 4.45 kg
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperat Step Time 
Saccharification Add 38.17 l of water at 69.9 C 67.0 C 90 min 
Mash Out Add -0.00 l of water and heat to 78.0 C 78.0 C 0 min 

Sparge: Remove grains, and prepare to boil wort


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## mxd (12/11/13)

looks fine to me (maybe a tad more sugar), and possibly look at burtonizing your water.

N.B I'm not english and struggle to make a good ESB


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## yum beer (12/11/13)

I would replace the dex with brown sugar or golden syrup.
Looks good though.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

I might leave Burtonising the water for another time. As for changing or increasing the sugar, how much would you recommend? I initially started with almost half a kilo, but that pushed the alc too high for what I am after.


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## mxd (12/11/13)

the sugarz fine, I was more thinking of my ESB's not best.

The best attempts I have made have been with the water salts, to get close to burton, Melbourne wated is very soft so not too sure what your water is like.

Give it a shot and it will come out nicely.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

I've never played around with the water before. I did find a water anaysis from the council online, but don't really know what to make of it.

Was also thinking about the yeast. Other than Windsor, what other yeast would fit the style? Was thinking Notto also, but after a converstaion with Dr Smurto (he REALLY hates that yeast :lol, I'm not too sure. May not this time, but am also thinking about the possibility of using a liquid yeast in the not too distant future. Just playing around with reusing slurry at the moment, for the first time.


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## mxd (12/11/13)

I like 1968, but's probably because I'm trying to do a fullers ESB.


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## Not For Horses (12/11/13)

S04 is a good option if you want a dry yeast. Some hate it some love it so be prepared for that argument. I have used it many many times with great results.
Wyeast 1469 West Yorkshire is a great option if you go down the liquid path, really tasty ester profile with this one.


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## bconnery (12/11/13)

Windsor makes a very nice bitter. I'd mash a little lower, around 64, otherwise it has a real tendency to finish high. 

I believe in the past, and I'm not sure how widespread the practice is now, a lot of brewers in the UK used brewer's caramel, which the sugar you've seen in recipes may be intended to replace. 
I don't mind adding a little Lyle's Golden Syrup, but I'd second the idea of not using dextrose.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

If I were to user brown sugar or golden syrup, how much would you recommend? And what does it bring to the end result?


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## yum beer (12/11/13)

Just replace your dex weight for weight.
Exactly what it brings I could not tell you but lots of recipes call for invert sugar and golden syrup is an easy option even recommended by the brewer of Bombardier.

My mate brewed the bombardier a few months back was bloody nice, malty and sweet.

Recipe here:

Bombardier clone CYBI
Original Gravity (OG): 1.046 (°P): 11.4
Final Gravity (FG): 1.007 (°P): 1.8
Alcohol (ABV): 5.14 %
Colour (SRM): 14.5 (EBC): 28.6
Bitterness (IBU): 32.5 (Average - No Chill Adjusted)
58.8% Pale Ale Malt
14.54% Brown Sugar, Dark
10.18% Corn Sugar
5.65% Crystal 80
5.65% Crystal Pale
5.17% Wheat Malt
1 g/L Challenger (6.1% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (Boil)
2.1 g/L Fuggles (5.7% Alpha) @ 2 Minutes (Boil)
Single step Infusion at 66°C for 60 Minutes. Boil for 60 Minutes
Fermented at 17°C with WLP013 - London Ale
Notes: Brown sugar is 'invert sugar' or Dark Treacle Sugar or Lyles Golden Syrup. Using CSR Treacle............I don't know what my mate used here.
Ale Malt is winter variety, prefer Perle or Flagon.....will use JW Traditional Ale.


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## dago001 (12/11/13)

I recently brewed this after a bit of a guidance from bribieG. I have it on the Beer Engine as well as a carbed keg. Having recently been to the UK, I was keen to brew some UK style bitters. I have to say that this turned out pretty good, although the warm flat version was certainly more to style. If I were to brew this again and keg (which is a strong possibility) I would carb it a little less than this time (used the Ross method of force carbing)

Brains SA Clone (Special/Best/Premium Bitter)

Original Gravity (OG): 1.046 (°P): 11.4
Final Gravity (FG): 1.012 (°P): 3.1
Alcohol (ABV): 4.52 %
Colour (SRM): 11.2 (EBC): 22.1
Bitterness (IBU): 31.7 (Average - No Chill Adjusted)

93.48% Pale Ale Malt
6.52% Caraaroma

0.7 g/L Northern Brewer (9.6% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (Boil)
0.7 g/L East Kent Golding (4.7% Alpha) @ 10 Minutes (Boil)
0.7 g/L Fuggles (7.1% Alpha) @ 10 Minutes (Boil)


Single step Infusion at 66°C for 60 Minutes. Boil for 90 Minutes

Fermented at 18 with Wyeast Irish Ale.

I have also brewed it with nottingham but it lost a bit of flavour compared to the Irish Ale. I step mashed at 62-20mins, 68-45mins, 70-10mins. Mash out 76-10mins

Turned out a pretty good drinking beer.
Cheers
LagerBomb


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

Ok, I might sub the dex for golden syrup, and up it to 300g. Just plugged that into Beersmith and that will keep OG at about the same as when I used the dex. Still not 100% sure why I'm using it, but what the hell.

I set the carb level in Beersmith to 1.3 vols to keep to style, but it says to only add 37g of dex for priming. That sound way too low me. Does that sound about right?


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## Adr_0 (12/11/13)

wbosher, I actually think your original recipe is really good, just not the dextrose or brown - try Demerara sugar instead as it's awesome. definitely don't use any golden syrup with butter in it.

I would lift your medium crystal into the 7-8% range and demerara sugar up to 4-5%, which is 100-150g more for each. use a good crystal, e.g. Thomas Fawcett medium.

I can understand your sentiment to avoid Burton-ising your water, but check what you water is like - you definitely don't want carbonate or chloride to dominate, and probably do want to lift calcium and sulphate a bit. residual calcium around 100ppm and sulphate in the 150-250ppm range are pretty good.

IBU, I would actually go just a touch higher and add some at flameout, though 5min will probably be ok. more than 40 is probably going to be too high so maybe round your numbers up a bit and aim for 35-40.

enjoy...

EDIT: regarding your water, it looks pretty soft and doesn't have a lot of anything, so I think it could at least use some gypsum to lift the calcium and sulphate as I said above. the phosphates in your malt will steal you precious 18-20ppm calcium so you won't be left with any for the yeasties, so try to put some more in.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

Adr_0 said:


> I can understand your sentiment to avoid Burton-ising your water, but check what you water is like - you definitely don't want carbonate or chloride to dominate, and probably do want to lift calcium and sulphate a bit. residual calcium around 100ppm and sulphate in the 150-250ppm range are pretty good.
> 
> 
> EDIT: regarding your water, it looks pretty soft and doesn't have a lot of anything, so I think it could at least use some gypsum to lift the calcium and sulphate as I said above. the phosphates in your malt will steal you precious 18-20ppm calcium so you won't be left with any for the yeasties, so try to put some more in.


I was with you mate...until here. Guess i need to do some more reading about water. 

Edit: I still don't really understand what the difference would be between sugar/dex/golden syrup? The golden syrup in the cupboard is just cane sugar and water according to the ingredients on the label.

Re using quality crystal, will be using Bairds medium.


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## Byran (12/11/13)

View attachment Basic_Concepts_in_Water_Treatment_by_Tony_Wheeler.doc

Try reading this mate!
Its from another thread and its a great base line for getting into the magic world of water modification.
I made an EBB a few brews ago and it was great I just used dex but upped the cara malts. Tasted just like the commercial ones ive tried. With English hops, malt and yeast you cant go wrong!
Im pretty sure they boil down the sugar water mixture into the golden syrup you buy so there are some nice caramelised flavours in it you wont get from sugars.


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## Adr_0 (12/11/13)

On the sugar, hopefully I can at least partially answer:

Sugar/cane sugar = fructose + glucose. The glucose goes straight to alcohol but I understand the fructose breakdown can create some acids or aldehydes.
Dextrose = glucose. As above, alcohol. Not the end of the world, but there are other means to get there with a very simple change... but if you want, do it.

Golden syrup and demerara sugar are sugars that have had additional processing which converts monosaccharides (fructose, glucose) to higher order sugars, which give you colour and different flavours.

As long as your golden syrup doesn't have butter and is just sugar + water, the difference between that and demerara will be 1-2% and may be better or more to your liking.

Do it.


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## Adr_0 (12/11/13)

on the water chemistry, good stuff to know but a little knowledge or incorrectly applied knowledge can do more harm than good.

2g/kg of malt of calcium sulphate will help you along substantially without pushing past what you want. With 4.3-4.5kg of malt, that's about 8-10g or about 2 rounded teaspoons.

If you're afraid of that, there are people out there that would add 4tsp and wouldn't blink an eyelid, but 1 isn't quite enough IMO.

If you're really really really afraid, you could even add 0 teaspoons of calcium sulphate and be ok.


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## Lecterfan (12/11/13)

Many sugars add a flavour. Golden syrup, particularly Lyles golden syrup, adds a particular type of aroma and flavour on the back palate. Demerara sugar will also. 

I've made lots of English style things with a variety of sugar additions, some were great, some were shit. I've not been (to the UK) but trust the palate of a couple of brewers and friends who have.

I don't think you should add anything to a beer unless you know why you are doing it, and that includes dextrose. I personally won't be in a hurry to add sugars to <4% ales again.

Pretty hard to beat a nice all-grain bitter, one that has had a suitable mash schedule and a design based on the low apparent attenuation of Windsor (if that's what you end up using).

I also think burtonising your water as a blanket approach to making an English style ale is well-intentioned but unnecessary. The fact that there are lots of recipe for this stye should tell you something (not let it be mind boggling) - have a crack at something, make an easy-drinker, carbonate it to one volume or even less, and enjoy!


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## WarmBeer (12/11/13)

... have a crack at something, make an easy-drinker, carbonate it to one volume or even less, and enjoy!

... with a pocket sparkler.


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## Bribie G (12/11/13)

Golden syrup would be more like the breweries use, as it's partly inverted.
I'd go for two hops, the trad UK bitters get a bittering addition - your NZ goldings would be perfect, then Fuggles 10 mins from the end.

I always use NZ fuggles flowers, haven't used the UK stuff for years.

AFAIK Australian "demerara" sugar is just a fancy coffee crystals type sugar nowadays, Blacksheep brewery get it in from the West Indies, I expect ours is just a local CSR lookalike.

Sugars are often used in UK ales in a tradition from the 19th Century. Firstly as a tax dodge then during the two World Wars because of grain shortages. Poms got used to the taste. Some beers like Wells Bombardier use a frightening amount, but still taste amazing. Others such as Brains don't use any. :blink:

Cane sugar may add certain characters to a beer but acids and aldehydes ain't among them. Aussie lagers use up to 30% by gravity and say what you like about VB or Carlton Draught, the sugar doesn't contribute off flavours.


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## dago001 (12/11/13)

We drank a lot of beer in the UK ( and I mean a lot). Most of the Best Bitters we tried were pretty standard brews. Some of the bigger commercial beers may have had sugar of some sorts in them, but the majority of the smaller craft breweries didnt. They were all quite proudly claiming that they didnt as they were all CAMRA approved. We toured only 1 brewery and there was not a bag of sugar in sight.
If I was to go for a recipe, yours is ok, but dump the sugar, add some more malt if you want to up the abv. 31 IBU is fine. Listen to the advice from the 3 post above this one. I think they are on the money.
Cheers
LB


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

Wow, I go away for a couple of hours and the scroll bar is much smaller. :lol:

Thanks for all the advice guys, got a little bit to digest here. The old man will be happy.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

Ok, so dropping the sugar and upping the MO a little. Will have a read about the water, but TBH probably won't do anything with it, for this one anyway. Quite keen to look into it though for future brews.

Bribie, are you suggesting only two hop additions, one at 60 (NZ Goldings), and Fuggles at 10? What sort of amounts would you recommend? I'm guessing maybe 20-30g of Fuggles and take the 60min EKG addition up to 30 - 35 IBU? Any flameout or dry hop?


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## Adr_0 (12/11/13)

Bribie G said:


> Golden syrup would be more like the breweries use, as it's partly inverted.
> I'd go for two hops, the trad UK bitters get a bittering addition - your NZ goldings would be perfect, then Fuggles 10 mins from the end.
> 
> I always use NZ fuggles flowers, haven't used the UK stuff for years.
> ...


My mistake - ethanal (an aldehyde) is an intermediate but it gets further chewed into ethanol so is not a final product. I thought that might have explained the 'cidery' taste in canned homebrew with a lot of cane sugar.



LagerBomb said:


> We drank a lot of beer in the UK ( and I mean a lot). Most of the Best Bitters we tried were pretty standard brews. Some of the bigger commercial beers may have had sugar of some sorts in them, but the majority of the smaller craft breweries didnt. They were all quite proudly claiming that they didnt as they were all CAMRA approved. We toured only 1 brewery and there was not a bag of sugar in sight.
> If I was to go for a recipe, yours is ok, but dump the sugar, add some more malt if you want to up the abv. 31 IBU is fine. Listen to the advice from the 3 post above this one. I think they are on the money.
> Cheers
> LB


wbosher, as

Just on the sugars, Ray Daniels reckons the average quantity used in the commercial beers is 10 or 11% I think (from memory), but as per Lagerbomb's I think a lot of the Seppo's and craft brewers didn't use any.

Up to you, pretty hard to go wrong and as we said your starting recipe was 90% there anyway without the rest of us interfering.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

All good mate, I like interfering. It's how we learn. You ask several people the same thing, you'll get a lot of different answers. I'd rather have too much information to pick and choose from, than not enough.


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## Bribie G (12/11/13)

I'd go the Goldings to about 25 IBU then adjust with some Fuggles, depends if you are chilling or no chilling. If no chilling I'd add the Fuggles at 5 mins and use the flowers in a sock, and pull out before draining the kettle.
All goldings isn't too bad either, had a nice drop at Brewvana once, Twisted hop I think.


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## AndrewQLD (12/11/13)

Haven't seen a lot of recipes using fuggles unless they are a dark milds as it's pretty earthy and is suited well to the darker ales. On the other hand EKG, WGV, Bramling Cross and challenger are all good for a Bitter and ESB.


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## wbosher (12/11/13)

Ok, I've had another tinker. I've scrapped the sugar and increased the malt a little, also increase the crystal slightly. I've changed the hop schedule as per Bribie's suggestion also (I chill). I've lowered the OG a little to try to bring the alc down a bit also. It was creeping up towards the 5% mark, too high IMO for this beer.

Was going to mash lower but changed my mind, I don't like my beer too dry, and like a little body. Also that would have increase the alc even more, which I don't want.

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 35.54 l
Post Boil Volume: 30.16 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 23.00 l 
Bottling Volume: 21.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.044 SG
Estimated Color: 19.5 EBC
Estimated IBU: 32.2 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 88.3 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt  Name Type # %/IBU 
4.20 kg Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 91.3 % 
0.35 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (130.0 EBC) Grain 2 7.6 % 
0.05 kg Chocolate Malt (750.0 EBC) Grain 3 1.1 % 
45.00 g NZ Goldings [5.60 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 4 25.0 IBUs 
1.00 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 5 - 
45.00 g Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 6 7.3 IBUs 
1.0 pkg Windsor Yeast (Lallemand #-) [23.66 ml] Yeast 7 - 


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Medium Body
Total Grain Weight: 4.60 kg
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperat Step Time 
Saccharification Add 38.35 l of water at 70.0 C 67.0 C 90 min 
Mash Out Add -0.00 l of water and heat to 78.0 C 78.0 C 1 min 

Sparge: Remove grains, and prepare to boil wort


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## DeGarre (12/11/13)

I'd use plain table sugar as not to mask wonderful butterscotchy aromas of Maris Otter. Otherwise, don't change a thing.

With any other pale ale malt 10-15% Munich malt is very nice and somewhat replicates MO.


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## dago001 (13/11/13)

My only other advice would be to not spend too long pondering and debating the recipe. Pick a recipe, brew it, taste it, learn from it and enjoy it. It may not turn out exactly how you expected it to, but then they never really do when you are trying a recipe for the first time.. We all try to replicate beers and sometimes we get pretty close, but most importantly for you and this beer, you father will think its a great beer and appreciate all the effort that you went to for him. Drink it with him, it will be a good beer/good times.
Cheers
LB


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## wbosher (13/11/13)

Cheers for the help guys. 

lagerbomb, agreed will go with this one and we how she goes. Only desicion left to make is the yeast, very tempted to have a go at liquid so might give 1968 a go.

Once again, thanks guys.


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## manticle (13/11/13)

1968 is a very nice yeast but can be slow to finish. 1469 is a a cracker of a yeast in my experience.


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## wbosher (13/11/13)

Might give that a go, thanks Manticle. Will probably need to do a bit of reading on making starters though, don't these packs only do US 5 Gallon (19 litres)? I want to do 23L


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## Screwtop (13/11/13)

manticle said:


> 1968 is a very nice yeast but can be slow to finish. 1469 is a a cracker of a yeast in my experience.


Agree, 1469 is fantastic for the style. Make a 2-3L starter and pitch when 'active' and you will have plenty for your 23L of 1.044 wort.

Screwy


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## DennisKing (13/11/13)

As a pom who manly brews best bitters I would say ditch the chocolate. Can't get NZ goldings over here so can't comment but I would go for challenger for bittering and east Kent goldings for aroma, if you can get them over there. For me the yeast would always be Whitelabs WLP002 English, in 35 years of brewing I think this is the best yeast I know for this style of beer, reputed to be the Fullers strain. I've always found the whitelabs one better then the wyeast for some reason. As a twist you could caramelise some of the first runnings.


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## wbosher (13/11/13)

Thanks Dennis. LHBS is currently out of EKG, and I already have some Fuggles in the freezer. Will likely do the good doctors Landlord sometime soon so will grab some EKG for that when it comes in. Also they only supply wyeast, so 1469 it will be.

I never got the name of the bitter the the ol' boy drinks, and there are soooo many different type of bitters out there, so this will likely be close to one of them...probably just not the one he use to drink. :lol:


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## wbosher (13/11/13)

Just had a thought about the 1469, what temp would be best? Wondering whether to stay low around the 18 mark, or push it a little higher?


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