Body rejecting beer!!! Leaning towards low ABV (session) beers

Why spend the time/money/effort on any hobby? They're invariably a time/money suck you'll never get back. There is no "cost-benefit analysis" going on in my head when I'm thinking of making a beer.

befus said:

Guess I'll take the heat on this one, but it's what I'm thinking. Why do you boys that say you drink three beers a week even bother with homebrew? Three a week? It would take you 16 weeks to drink a 5 gallon batch! To tie up the $$ and time, and storage space, to brew once every four months just doesn't compute for me. What with all the really decent craft brews available these days why don't you just buy a case once every blue moon and party down? No offense intended, and to each his own, but it really just seems to me not to be worth the effort if you drink so infrequently.

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Classic 5-gallon mentality. I do 1 gallon brews and love it. I drink, maybe not like most posters on here but I also enjoy "researching" my next brew by picking up a 6-pack or a couple bombers each week. Right now I have 5 16ozers of my brew in the fridge...2 batches (12-pack) just finished carbing, 2 more batches are dryhopping, and 1 batch is just finishing fermenting. Thats 6 different brews I get to do and unlike a 5 galloner who only has one style. I get it, more beer for the same time of work...its a valid point. But some of us enjoy the smaller brews and experimenting. Just remember that 5 gallon is not the smallest size you have to brew.

Calichusetts said:

Classic 5-gallon mentality. I do 1 gallon brews and love it. I drink, maybe not like most posters on here but I also enjoy "researching" my next brew by picking up a 6-pack or a couple bombers each week. Right now I have 5 16ozers of my brew in the fridge...2 batches (12-pack) just finished carbing, 2 more batches are dryhopping, and 1 batch is just finishing fermenting. Thats 6 different brews I get to do and unlike a 5 galloner who only has one style. I get it, more beer for the same time of work...its a valid point. But some of us enjoy the smaller brews and experimenting. Just remember that 5 gallon is not the smallest size you have to brew.

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I'm classic in many ways......including my age . You misconstrued my comments. I had a little trouble understanding why someone would go to all the trouble if they drank three a week AND brewed once every four months. The smaller, more often brewed batches I absolutely understand. I was not being critical, I just needed clarification...........what with my five gallon mentality and all .

I have been noticing this also and I am only 26. Four years ago I could drink anyone under the table, it was nothing to come home and shotgun 2-3 beers and finish a case 3-4 days a week. Now, if I have 10 BMC or a sixer of something higher in ABV I feel it the next day. I only expect this to get worse as I get older.

Just about any well crafted beer I will not get a hangover the next day. Even my 55 year old father says the same thing. If I have a BMC mixed in, and it only takes 1, I will feel it the next day. I have proven this true by trying it multiple times. And there's alot of **** beer out there that may seem like craft beers that will do the same. After a swig or two of bad beer It immediately gets poured out. I am 28 and will drink on average 15-25 beers a week - mostly on weekends when I brew or attend to the hop garden. All the beers I drink are 8% + as that's what I like to drink. Like others have mentioned.. eating right, drinking water with beer and only drink either beer or water/tea in life as well as exercising is beneficial.

I find each percentage point between 4 and 6 makes a world of difference.
At 4 percent I can pretty much drink indefinitely and hardly feel the effect. At 6 I have three or four and suddenly I'm on the wonky side of sober.
Keeping it light is my rule. I shoot for just 4-5 percent. Sometimes even lighter.
I'll have some barley wine or imp something sitting in bottles somewhere, but the problem for me is less the sickness than the Doom Fear the next day.
Being self employed I can't afford to be a total phantoid the next day, or I make a tit of everything

Low abv beer is brilliant though. Just up the mash temp a bit to leave in some body or aggressively dry hop if that'syour thing. I like a session neipa as a go to drink. Plenty of stuff going on to keep your mind of the lack of alky bite.

Skimming through from the start...

Four to five beers a day is a lot, and I'm not surprised to see negative health effects from that. That's pretty much the weekly recommended maximum in just one to two days.

I'm 53, been being for three years. I find myself having typically 1-2 beers a day. Don't drink too get drunk, but i enjoya good brew! Since I've gone to all grain, my focus is been on brewing session beers. Most my beers are between 4-4.7% ABV. I'm likely to stick to this, even though the guys in my home brew club give me allot of **** for it. I hate the monkeys with hammers in my head now!

Fermenting a lower temperatures helps a lot with this. Drinking lagers done below 50f will make your head feel much better the next day.