Developing beer names...

So, how do all of you HBT loyals come up with the names for your brews? I've been working on pale ale recipe that hopefully will come out pretty nice, I'm not going to label, but it'd be nice to have some sort of a name for it. Maybe I just need a few more beers or the Hawks to extend their current lead of the Cyclones right now, but man, I'm drawing a blank.

As you can see below, my creativity is greatly lacking in this area. I figure, they taste great, that's all that matters. If inspiration happens to hit me, I'll throw a nice name up, but I usually don't worry about it.

I did have a co-worker who tried my IPA (having never had one before) and said it tasted like a meadow farted. So I call it "Meadow Fart IPA". Fits with the whole "Broken Wind" thing anyway...

Well, I think that the best advice I can give is to name it after something you either have an interest in or knowledge of. I know New Glarus uses animals. They even tell a little story on their labels. Just an idea.

Well, I did an Australian Ale, and the brew site sent me 1 oz of hops instead of 1.5. So I named it One Legged Joey (like the baby kangaroos) because it's not so hoppy. I know, bad pun.

My mead operation has the overall name Herot Mead, see my username, after the mead house in Beowulf. (The poem, not the film).

Other than that names are assigned as they pop up.

Pick a theme and stick within that theme. Believe it or not, placing restrictions on yourself actually helps you be more creative, as opposed to having a whole world of possibilities and no clue how to chose. For example, I'm a giant geek. I give all my beers Klngon-themed names. E.g., Bird of Prey; Black Bat'leth; Disruptor; Beer of Honor, etc. So pick a theme, something you're interested in, and name lots of beers within that theme. It's easier than just naming one. If you like cars, say all of your beers this year are going to be named after cars.

If you label your beers, that can help with the naming too. Using a sort of label template, or master design, for a particular theme basically makes your beers into a brand (even if only you and your friends are ever going to see it), and working within that "brand" restricts your choices and narrows your decision field.

I'm extremely creative with naming my brews. I have a blueberry ale I'm currently brewing and if it comes out anywhere close to what I want I'm going to call it.....



Blueberry Ale.

I name all of my beers. I'm the bitter/sarcastic type so many of my beers are along those lines. Some are more of inside jokes between the friends I know who will drink it. Some are to do with the brew process or what is happening at the time.

Examples:
Labor Day Lambic (brewed labor day).
Mary's First Strawberry Blonde (Giggity!) (my gf's name is Mary, she helped me brew)
Floor Hopped Whiskey Porter (we were really drunk and dropped the hops on the floor while brewing).
Old World/New World Cranberry/Banana Wheat (Brewed on Columbus Day, was a wheat kit that I split 50/50 Cranberry/Banana)
Festivus Ale (Christmas Ale I'm about to keg, but I'm not the religious type).
Sodom Stout and Gomorrah Bock (brewed both over a weekend - a weekend spent with my new girlfriend, drunk, eating crap food all weekend).
MSNBC (Maple Syrup Nut Brown Concoction)
Molitov HOPTail (Imperial IPA brewed July 3rd)

I find it both fun and challenging to come up with them.

I'm pretty new to the hobby, but I'm very interested in music and literature (and movies and some tv series), so I'm planning many brews named after songs/albums/books I like which fit the style or taste of the beer. Or I've also picked the name FIRST, and then tried to imagine what that beer would taste like. So I have some notes of beers I want to make when I have have more experience. Like "Whiskeyjack's Malazan Imperial Stout" (Steven Erikson fans should like this!) or "Dark Star" (a Grateful Dead song) - those are phrases which conjure images in my mind, and then I try to imagine a beer fitting those images... I don't know if that makes sense to anyone else, but it does to me I think maybe I have a kinda artistic approach to brewing

It's also cool to have a brewery name, a logo and a label template you use for every label, with variations. It gives a sense of a brand, even if it's just for you and your friends, as someone else said. I really take pleasure in the esthetic/poetic/humorous aspects of a beer as well as taste & effect

My christmas ale went a little overboard though, being named "Christ! Mmm... Ass Ale!" and on the label there's a picture I found with google of a girl in a skimpy santa outfit with her back towards the camera...

Summary: I'd also suggest pick something you're interested in / passionate about, and go from there! Read what "Captain Damage" wrote, I think he said it quite eloquently!

I google any special ingredients that i use in the beer and find any cool mythology on it.

"Lumberjack" - googled "maple tree"
"Scarecrow" - googled "wheat fields"
"1776" - recipe based on a George washington molasses small beer
"Genesis" - just picked a word out of the old testament.

Not listed in my sig:
"Queen of Thrace" Almond cream stout, in greek mythology Phyllis the queen of thrace was turned into an almond tree (thanks google)

"Boxer Rebellion Barleywine" - steeped with Jasmine petals and Earl Grey tea (thanks high school history for this one)

I'm a big fan/collector of Blues music, so I've been naming my beers after some of my favorite Blues songs or Artists.....
Here are a few:

Red House Ale (Amber Ale)
3 Kings Kolsch (After the 3 Kings of the Blues guitar: Albert, B.B. and Freddie)
Stormy Monday Marzen

I'm a fan of math and physics, so I usually find names relating to those two fields. Examples: Acceleration Ale and Perturbed IPA.

Living in the south, I also sometimes give my brews southern sounding names.
Examples: Wallamelon Ale and bumpkin ale.

I'm a fan of HP Lovecraft so I name all my recipes after creatures from his pantheon:

Ex: Cthulhu Stout, Dagon Baltic Porter, Yog Sothoth Ale, Alhazred Ale.

It's just plain fun to try and answer the question, what would Cthulhu brew? (WWCB?)

Is your username a tribute to the great San Francisco tattoo artist Norman Collins? If so that world can be a deep well for great beer names.

SailorJerry said:

Maybe I just need a few more beers or the Hawks to extend their current lead of the Cyclones right now, but man, I'm drawing a blank.

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hmmm... well, since that didn't happen, maybe you could just name it after scott christopherson? he is a pale person... scotty's pale 30?

sorry man, couldn't resist. i about had a coronary during that game.

Well, I appreciate all in the input thus far, except from the Clone fan! Man, Christensen rocked us, hard. That was a hell of a game between two not so good teams! It's nice to see some up tempo basketball.

Back to naming beers, I'm a big country music fan and outdoors kinda guy. I guess I will just have to do a little thinking for my pale ale that I was SUPPOSED to make today, but the weather got in the way of me making the trip to my buddies house to brew. Ugh. 50 degrees on Friday, blizzard warning Saturday. Only in Iowa....

However, I am drinking a Eggenberg Boppelbock that I cracked open after a Breckinridge Vanilla Porter, so Im coping with the weather...

Like everyone said if you have a passion or theme it really helps. Personally I'm a massive Seinfeld fan and have thus named my brewery "Vandelay Industries" after a long running joke in the show brew names include:

Not That There's Anything Wrong With That Raspberry Wheat
Summer of George- Blonde Ale
Susan B. Ross Memorial Honey Brown
"The Kramer" Kolsch
Serenity Now IPA
Bubble Boy California Common
VanBuren Boys Cream Ale (was the 8th one I made)
Puffy Shirt White
Prickly Pete's Hampton Apfelwein
Cigar Store Indian Pumpkin Ale
Thirst Pretzel Pale Ale
Frogger Legacy Limeade
Mr. Pitt's Light Scotch Ale
Marble Rye Wee Heavy
Master of Your Domain BarleyWine

Finally for Christmas I made up Sampler 12-packs courtesy of the Human Fund with:
Aluminum Pole English Brown
Feats of Strength Double Chocolate Stout
Festivus Spiced Ale (I see I'm not the only one)
Airing of Greviances Spiced Apple Cider

I have ingredients for what I was going to call a
FestivAle - which was an Ale that was going to be a nice wintery Ale, however, I never got around to getting that made, and obviously it's getting to near X-Mas for it to be completed and drinkable, but I might do it any way when I have the ability to, and see what I need to fix before next year

Veinman said:

Like everyone said if you have a passion or theme it really helps. Personally I'm a massive Seinfeld fan and have thus named my brewery "Vandelay Industries" after a long running joke in the show brew names include:

Not That There's Anything Wrong With That Raspberry Wheat
Summer of George- Blonde Ale
Susan B. Ross Memorial Honey Brown
"The Kramer" Kolsch
Serenity Now IPA
Bubble Boy California Common
VanBuren Boys Cream Ale (was the 8th one I made)
Puffy Shirt White
Prickly Pete's Hampton Apfelwein
Cigar Store Indian Pumpkin Ale
Thirst Pretzel Pale Ale
Frogger Legacy Limeade
Mr. Pitt's Light Scotch Ale
Marble Rye Wee Heavy
Master of Your Domain BarleyWine

Finally for Christmas I made up Sampler 12-packs courtesy of the Human Fund with:
Aluminum Pole English Brown
Feats of Strength Double Chocolate Stout
Festivus Spiced Ale (I see I'm not the only one)
Airing of Greviances Spiced Apple Cider

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HAH! GET OUT! I like everything you've done there sir.

SailorJerry said:

So, how do all of you HBT loyals come up with the names for your brews? I've been working on pale ale recipe that hopefully will come out pretty nice, I'm not going to label, but it'd be nice to have some sort of a name for it. Maybe I just need a few more beers or the Hawks to extend their current lead of the Cyclones right now, but man, I'm drawing a blank.

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"Bob" Call it "Bob"

SailorJerry said:

Back to naming beers, I'm a big country music fan and outdoors kinda guy.

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That's a rich vein right there. Off the top of my head, Lineman, 12-string, Memphis, Momma Tried and of course Whiskey River come to mind.

I rarely name beers. I tell my friends what it is when they drink some. I sometimes name them when the style coincides with something my friends will "get". I'm a big Phish fan, so my Rye IPA is called "Punch You in The Rye". If my kegerator is acting up, I'm serving "Foam".

For me it always depends on what just pops into my head. My stout still has a working title "Black Magic". It's thick, rich, with a lingering sweetness from licorice root, and its black as pitch.

My Irish Red became my "Irish Blunder". When I botched my hops addition because I was on the phone and looked at the timer wrong. My first time with Irish Ale yeast too, it was so slow and steady I accidentally over carbed it too....

I've been formulating a "Slow Burn" that I plan on using chili peppers in. But it may just become a full blown "Conflagration" as I've got some Habaneros in the freezer. lol

Well my First pale ale we named for a friends 3rd son who was born just before the brew was finished.. Joshua was his name so it was JPA .. the second was one i sort of created out of a bunch of home grown and other hoppy hops so my name is Jonathan so we called it JPA2 lol .. Now i have an overly hopped esb still thinking about that one and a uber hoppy ipa still in primary..called overhopped IPA..

Most of my beer names come from the fact that I am a huge Halloween fan, I have my Pale Horse APA, Reaper of Souls Hefe 7% ABV (formally named toe-tag Hefe until recipe revamp), HopGoblin pumpkin seed ESB, Rye of the Storm Smoked RyePA, Sweet Darkness (chocolate mint milk stout) and a few others are still in the inspiration stages and I need to draw up some artwork.

Well I'm kind of a gun nut and went with the name "Hollow Point", as in hollow point bullets. Thus my kitchen is the "Hollow Point Brewery and Winery." I rarely name beers but when I do I try to stick with the theme. I have some good names that are awaiting a good enough beer to get them. Some great beers that I haven't come up with names for yet. A few have been named.

John Moses Brown Ale, Ricochet IPA, Boat Tail Summer Ale, Kolsch 45, Smoke Pole Porter, Double 00 Doppel Bock.....

Feel free to send me suggestions!

I just create derivatives of what the beer actually is.

For example, my Imperial Blonde I named "Queen Roxy"

Imperial - Queen
Blonde - Roxy "Nickname for my blonde wife."

I'm a designer so I really get into the branding and label making. Almost as fun for me as drinking the beer....

Almost.

i just recently started to name my brews, just for the fun of it. i name them to whatever comes to mind. my nut brown i named "squirrel spit". my wheat i named "hawkeye wheat". i'm still thinking up and revising some of my brew names.

Edcculus said:

I'm a big Phish fan, so my Rye IPA is called "Punch You in The Rye". If my kegerator is acting up, I'm serving "Foam".

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That's awesome!! I dig Phish myself "Foam" lol

OP: As a country music fan you have a giant well to dip into! "Tear in my beer" (hank williams) was the first that came to my mind.

for being a 'creative writer' in my younger years, I always sucked at titles.

last year I moved onto a street called Camelot Court, so I've been trying to come up with Arthurian names for all my brews lately.

SailorJerry said:

So, how do all of you HBT loyals come up with the names for your brews?

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Come up with a theme. My place (Blue Skies Brewing) is based on a skydiving theme. Some names are:

Sitfly Saison
Swooper Stout
Skydiver Blonde
WylieBrau (so named because George Wylie brought some peaches over one day)
Big Way Brown
Diamond Dubbel
Rubick Raspberry
Piver Peach (diamond, rubick and piver are all formation names in skydiving)

And yes, I have to get away from the alliteration.

Rotted Rodent Imperial Stout--bottled in a batch of old bottles in which I discovered a dead mouse

Fat Czech Pilsner--made for a buddy who likes large girls

I brewed a coffee porter one time, mis-read the recipe and put in too little coffee. I named it Little Joe Porter.

I was just going to make a post about this. I generally try for a balance between cute, funny, and informative. Some names I came up with lately:

Game Night IPA. Because it's the brew of choice for my friends at boardgame night.

Prince of Amber. An amber ale, and a nod toward Zelazny.

Forum Troll Scotch Ale. Because I added 2 oz of peated barley to the recipe, and it seems like the use of peated barley is the single most divisive topic in all of homebrewdom (even more than iodophor vs star san).

Leaf Peeper. A fall-themed wheat ale, dunkelweisen style but with cardamom, honey and a touch of orange.

Bugbear Brown Ale. Used to brew this for my D&D group, but then I moved away from them. Someday, I'll have call to brew it again.

Captain Damage said:

Pick a theme and stick within that theme.

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This is great advice. I brewed my first lager, an Oktoberfest, to celebrate my first daughter's birth, and called it Oliviafest (you can guess). Later I brewed a Doppelbock and called it Oliviator, and a Pilsen called Oliviois. Not creative, perhaps, but fun.

Now I need to work Sofia in...maybe with the ales.