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Fine Welsh Ale

A traditional Welsh ale brewed with malt, hops, yeast, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Malt and beer work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 55 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fine Welsh Ale

Ingredients

Directions

Make the wort

  1. Pour hot water over the malt and let it stand covered for 3 hours.

  2. Infuse hops in a little hot water, then add to the tub.

  3. Run the wort over the hops and boil for 3 hours.

  4. Strain off the hops and let the wort cool.

Ferment

  1. Once cool, add the yeast and mix well.

  2. When fermentation is complete (usually on the third day), remove the yeast and gently pour in the ale.

  3. Cover the bunghole with paper for 3 days before sealing.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Malt + beertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together55 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Hops + beertop 42% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together0 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  3. Malt + hopstop 49% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1 recipe

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Malt
Provides the sugars that the yeast ferments into alcohol.
Hops
Adds bitterness that balances the malt's sweetness and helps preserve the ale.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide.

The step that matters

Let the wort cool before adding the yeast. Yeast is a living organism, and very hot wort can kill it or slow fermentation. Cooling the wort first lets the yeast survive and start converting sugars into alcohol.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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