Monday 18 June 2012

Edinburgh United Breweries' beers 1926 - 1934

All those court cases and dodgy prospectuses are giving me a thirst. Time to take a look and the products of Edinburgh United Breweries.

I just noticed something weird about these beers. They were all brewed in the period when Edinburgh United Breweries were defrauding the revenue by brewing in secret. Were any of these beers, I wonder, brewed that way? It's a definite possibility.

Let's start with the Brown Ale. With a gravity of the mid 1050's, it's definitely not a Southern Brown Ale. Looks more like a Double Brown to me. I'd love to know what the beer was like. Were Scottish Brown Ales like English ones? Given the business they did in the Northeast of England, it's tempting to think that they must have been similar to Newcastle Brown or Vaux Double Maxim

I've got an analysis of Newcastle Brown from 1931: OG 1056, FG 1014, colour 62. It looks pretty similar to the EUB beer, except for the colour, which was paler. And an analysis of Vaux Double Maxim tells me that had an OG of 1053.2 and an FG of 1009.3. On the face of it, all three look quite similar.

Now for the Pale Ales. I'm still trying to get my head around the naming conventions in Scotland between the wars. Most of the 90/- Pale Ales I've seen were weaker than this one. Usually in the low to mid 1030's. And Export usually was used for something stronger than 1040º. I'm all confused.

Finally we've Disher's Ten Guinea Ale. A real beast of a beer. Amazing that they sold the stuff on draught. I assume that they didn't sell it in pints. Even I would struggle to get down more than one. It's quite well attenuated for a beer with an OG north of 1100º.

Edinburgh United Breweries beers 1926 - 1934
Year Brewer Beer Style Price size package FG OG colour ABV App. Atten-uation
1929 EUB Export Pale Ale
pint bottled 1008 1040 40 4.16 80.00%
1931 EUB Brown Ale Brown Ale
pint bottled 1015 1055 92 5.20 72.73%
1931 EUB Brown Ale Brown Ale 3.5d nip bottled 1014 1056 65 5.46 75.00%
1931 EUB Brown Ale Brown Ale 6d half bottled 1015 1055 75 5.20 72.73%
1933 EUB 90/- Pale Ale Pale Ale
pint bottled 1007 1040
4.29 82.50%
1934 EUB Pale Ale Pale Ale
pint draught 1013 1037
3.17 66.22%
1926 Disher Ten Guinea Draught Ale Strong Ale 20d pint draught 1035 1115.4
10.61 70.10%
1927 Disher £10.10/- (10 guinea) Strong Ale
pint bottled 1029 1114 130 11.20 74.56%
1928 Disher Strong Ale Strong Ale
pint bottled 1027 1104 120 10.11 74.04%
1931 Disher Strong Ale Strong Ale
pint bottled 1033 1091
7.53 63.74%
Sources:
Thomas Usher Gravity Book document TU/6/11 held at the Scottish Brewing Archive
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001
Younger, Wm. & Co Gravity Book document WY/6/1/1/19 held at the Scottish Brewing Archive


1 comment:

Geoff said...

IIRC Around 1970 Vaux Double Maxim was actually brewed at Lorimer & Clarks ( now the Caley brewery) and tankered to Sunderland for canning. I was in the bottling hall at Usher/Vaux Parkside at the time and I only remember seeing it on the line once.