Recreating A Medieval Style Ale

[brettprevans]

Mosher's Radical Brewing has a heap of info about this style. I'll check it out when I get home and post some info for you. Or of course you could buy a copy of it yourself. its a great read and useful resource.

 

[caleb]

What period are you aiming for? I've done a few brews for my historical fencing club. I'm using a range of sources from late 1500's-> early 1600's as that's the period our core style comes from (Silver's English Shortsword from his Paradoxes of Defence and Brief Instructions on my paradoxes). Also, what country? I'm assuming English.

Airgead, you are studying Silver? Excellent... I think I've been considering joining your club actually as I am interested in historical European and English combat. If you look in my personal page, you'll see I practise karate, but I have been looking at some historical fencing. Not sure if I can afford to fork out for the gear right now though. (One advantage of karate)

Not sure what exact period I'm aiming for. I guess pre-1500's, maybe something mid/late medieval rather than rennaisance. My idea was for an ale totally unflavored with herbs. I think this was considered a true "London Ale" and the use of ANY herbs (gruit) was frowned upon.

You say only a small % of smoked grain would be needed. Would, say 50 grams in a 22L batch be OK?

Re the old/new ale, I know that at some point sale of "old" ale was actually banned... which indicates that at least some people were actually doing it.

 

[raven19]

So Caleb, when is brewing day for this baby?

Cant wait to hear how it goes, along with a recipe.

(side note - I am assuming Wild Yeast would not be any good as it would be too hard to reproduce the same ale).

 

[caleb]

Well there is no set brew day. I've been desperately trying to build up stocks of "normal" beer for drinking and for my birthday party this weekend. Having to dump two batches (one due to my own impatience and stupidity) has not helped.

However, things are getting under control again. I plan to do some sort of summer ale next and maybe after that will give this a go... two fermenters are sitting empty right now and I have to get to the brewshop for more malt.

For the history buffs following this, what are your thoughts re use of oak chips in this recipe? Good idea, historical misinterpretation or all out anachronism?

 

[raven19]

For the history buffs following this, what are your thoughts re use of oak chips in this recipe? Good idea, historical misinterpretation or all out anachronism?

Surely it will have to be stored in a wooden barrel for authenticity!

Seriously though - can you split it into two halves once you get to the stage of pitching yeast (and oak chips)?

 

[Rurik]

At Newcastle Uni (early 1980's) there was this club, the "Society for Creative Anachronism" and they would have jousts and broad sword battles on campus and they had huge fun.

We still get togeather at newcastle uni

 

[King Brown]

In "how to brew" by John Palmer, he refers to hot break when boiling an extract brew.

Back OT, medieval ale sounds interesting. Never tried anything like this, but here are a few things I've read which may be of some help...

To get the smokey flavour you might want to consider a partial stove top mash which includes some rauch malts, though I believe you can get rauch extract is well (though you may have to order it online)

If you plan on using wood chips, there is some good info for wood age beers in "brewing classic styles" by Palmer and Jamil Zainasheff. It reccomends wood aging is best for high alcohol beers, and to use less wood chips for a longer period of time rather than a more for a shorter period, tasting regularly. When there is enough wood flavour for your liking, rack the beer off the wood chips. It also reccomends to sterilize the wood chips by boiling them.

If you boil the chips you probably wont get as much of a sour flavour, but you can get a more controlled sourness by taking a couple of litres of wort and fermenting it seperatley with a brettanomyces culture (I think its available through most brands of liquid yeast) When its nice and sour, heat it to 70c or so for a few minutes to kill off the bacteria, then when its cooled add it to your main wort gradually, tasting as you go until your happy with the level of sourness. This way it wont get too sour over time.

Goodluck, keep us all posted with progress!!

 

[Airgead]

Airgead, you are studying Silver? Excellent... I think I've been considering joining your club actually as I am interested in historical European and English combat. If you look in my personal page, you'll see I practise karate, but I have been looking at some historical fencing. Not sure if I can afford to fork out for the gear right now though. (One advantage of karate)

Not sure what exact period I'm aiming for. I guess pre-1500's, maybe something mid/late medieval rather than rennaisance. My idea was for an ale totally unflavored with herbs. I think this was considered a true "London Ale" and the use of ANY herbs (gruit) was frowned upon.

You say only a small % of smoked grain would be needed. Would, say 50 grams in a 22L batch be OK?

Re the old/new ale, I know that at some point sale of "old" ale was actually banned... which indicates that at least some people were actually doing it.

:icon_offtopic: We usually study Silver plus one other weapon each term. this term its a bit different - we are doing 1.33 (sword and bucker from 1250 or so) and Italian single sword from Morrozzo (late 1500s). Come along. We have gear you can borrow.

Back on topic - the quantity of smoked malts - i think it depends on whether you wanted to recreate a fine ale for gentlemen or a common man's drink. You might want to steep a bit of smoked malt separately and the smoke tea maybe in secondary until you get the taste you want.

Have you had a look at Digby? If not the full text (badly formatted ) is on Guttenberg - http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/16441. He's writing a little later than you are aiming for but it might be worth a read.

Cheers
Dave