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If my information for pre-war Scottish Stout was limited, for the war itself it’s nigh on non-existent. With the one exception of William Younger, for whom I have data aplenty.

I have analyses from just two breweries, and all are from 1939.

Not sure that tells us much. I’ll move quickly on to William Younger.

Over the course of the war, DBS suffered multiple cuts to its gravity. Between 1939 and 1944 its OG fell from 1066º to 1051º - a reduction of almost 25%.

The surprise is in the hopping. In 1939, it was 6 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt. Which for Scotland was pretty high.

During the war, brewers were told to reduce their hopping rate various times. Having become totally dependent on domestically-grown hops, once the size of the harvest was known, brewers were told how many they could use in the coming year as a percentage of their pre-war use.

It’s unusual to see a hopping rate almost unchanged in by 1943. Having looked at the situation with other Younger beers, this wasn’t the case across the board. The reduction in other styles is greater. Even though Younger, who was hopping at a rate below 1 lb per standard barrel, were exempt from the cuts.

Don’t pay too much attention to the FGs in the table. Younger’s brewing records only list the cleansing gravity, not the racking gravity. The real FG would have been several degrees lower.

Scottish Stout during WW II
Year Brewer Beer Price per pint (d) OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation
1939 Calder Alloa Milk Stout 10 1052.5 1021 4.06 60.00%
1939 Younger, Wm. Milk Stout (Monk Export Brand) 1065.8 1023.9 5.42 63.68%
1939 Younger, Wm. Milk Stout 12 1065.5 1019 6.04 70.99%
Sources:
Thomas Usher Gravity Book held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document number TU/6/11.
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001.


William Younger DBS Btlg 1939 - 1944
Date Year OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation lbs hops/ qtr hops lb/brl
14th Nov 1939 1066 1023 5.69 65.15% 6.06 1.59
11th Oct 1940 1061 1024 4.89 60.66% 6.06 1.45
27th Aug 1941 1060 1022.5 4.96 62.50% 5.45 1.32
4th Mar 1942 1056 1021.5 4.56 61.61% 5.48 1.25
31st Mar 1942 1053 1019 4.50 64.15% 5.48 1.22
5th May 1942 1051 1018 4.37 64.71% 5.50 1.17
27th Jan 1943 1053 1019 4.50 64.15% 5.83 1.26
2nd Nov 1943 1053 1017 4.76 67.92% 5.83 1.28
9th Nov 1943 1053 1019 4.50 64.15% 5.83 1.25
18th May 1944 1051 1021 3.97 58.82% 5.83 1.22
Source:
William Younger brewing records held at the Scottish Brewing Archive, document numbers WY/6/1/2/76, WY/6/1/2/77, WY/6/1/2/78, WY/6/1/2/7 and WY/6/1/2/81.




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