Blackburn Dark Mild - All Grain

Blackburn Dark Mild
English Dark Mild
All Grain
5.25g
1.044
1.016
3.7% ABV
22 SRM
19 IBUs

70% Efficiency

5 lbs. Baird's Marris Otter
2.5 lbs. Thomas Fawcett Golden Promise
1 lb. Baird's Brown Malt
4 oz. Baird's Medium Crystal Malt
4 oz. Baird's Dark Crystal Malt
4 oz. Thomas Fawcett Pale Chocolate Malt
4 oz. Baird's Chocolate Malt

1 oz. East Kent Goldings [4.8% AA] at 60 mins.

1 Liter, decanted starter of London ESB (White Labs 1968)

Water profile used (ppm): Ca: 106, Mg: 44, Na: 8, Cl: 72, SO4: 52, 1.38 Cl/SO4 ratio

Just a standard singe infusion mash with a 152°F sacch. Mash out, drain first runnings and a single batch sparge.

Been working on this recipe for awhile. I had an awesome Dark Mild at a local brewpub and wanted to have something like it on tap at home. Finally settled on this recipe. The key is to use ALL English malts, American substitues won't cut it. I like this beer because it is low in ABV yet high in flavor and it has quick turn around from brew day to glass. You can be drinking this beer in 14 days if you keg.

I've only entered it in 2 comps so far, I received a Bronze at Schooner last year and, while it didn't place, it did score a 36 in the Grumpy Troll challenge this year. Most of the judge comments were that the beer was too dry and a bit too bitter, which I attribute to the West Yorkshire yeast I had used originally, which caused the beer to attenuate all the way down to 1.012. I have since switched to London ESB which leaves some residual sweetness in the beer.

Lots of flavor with nice body. Flavor and aroma are dominated with toasted, coffee, and mild chocolate, additionally the flavor has some nice date, or fig like fruitiness with a pleasant, earthy and/or herbal hop finish. Well balanced, malty but not sweet. Color is perfect, very dark brown almost black when sitting on the table, but a glowing bronze or copper color when held to the light. Force carbed to 1.5 volumes of c02 and served at 45°F adds to an overall creamy mouthfeel.

 

I've always been a big fan of combining base malts, and almost all my recipes have multiple base malts, something I picked up from Mike "Tasty" McDole. I feel I get a bit more malt complexity without having to add a bunch of specialty malts. Although in a beer like this with all the specialty malts, I suppose that defeats the purpose, so yeah, just habit I guess, lol. One could probably just go with one or the other and be just fine.

Oh, and I was actually looking for a bit of coffee/mild roast in my dark mild, which is why I added the brown malt in addition to the English crystal, and of course the 2 chocolate malts, which I split between pale chocolate and regular chocolate to keep it form getting too dark.

 

Funny, I just brewed this again and was drinking this past weekend. Tasty as always! Hope you enjoy!

 

Yeah, that yeast does like a warmer temp. I usually start at 68 and 24 hrs after pitching incrementally increase to 72 over a couple days to finish.

 

Ouch. Yeah Wyeast's temp range for that strain is 64-72. Did you try just warming it up?

 

Well, I'll be curious to see how it comes out.