which book to order

ok guys, by now I read how to brew, complete joy of home brewing, brew like a monk, radical brewing and now i have a dilemma: brewing classic styles or designing great beers

what do you think and why?


thank you!

Do you want recipe ready to go? If so, get Brewing Classic styles. If you want to learn how to formulate your own recipe, get Designing Great Beers.

Suggest Brewing Classic Styles or Brewing Better Beer. Designing Great Beers is getting pretty outdated in some respects.

ArcaneXor said:

Suggest Brewing Classic Styles or Brewing Better Beer. Designing Great Beers is getting pretty outdated in some respects.

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could you please be more precise - what particular respects?

400d said:

could you please be more precise - what particular respects?

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Well, I don't have the book memorized, but it's from 1998. Many styles are not included, other have "evolved" since then, as has our hobby as a whole. Many ingredients we now have available were not included in the database. The database is very limited; based on a mid-1990s NHC, and the sample sizes are sometimes very small. The basic recipe formulation process has not changed much since then, however, and the book is still good for that. Overall, I think most brewers these days will get more out of Brewing Better Beer and use the recipes in Brewing Classic Styles as a base for iterative revision to match your personal preferences.

ArcaneXor said:

Many styles are not included.

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That is a great point - I don't think I've ever heard that said before, but it is completely true; it may actually be the biggest flaw the book has. In its defense, it has much more technical information about the styles it does feature than BCS.

I have both books, but I reach for BCS about 10 times more often than DGB. I simply find that BCS is just much more user friendly - it teaches you quickly about ingredients and styles, and it offers a great baseline for anything you are looking to brew.

I would agree that I look through BCS way more than I look at DGB. But its more like a recipe cook book.

I got more use out of DGB than BCS. but to be honest theyre sort of complimentary. I design my beers based on what I learned in DGB and then check it against BCS.

Brewing Better Beer: Master Lessons for Advanced Homebrewers by Gordon Strong is pretty good. Its not for beginners though, as the title suggests. It gives good pointers and tips from a pro on all grain brewing.

BCS is great from a beginner standpoint, we grabbed it a couple weeks back when we couldnt decide on a recipe to brew next. Extract based and plenty of basic recipes. Its the equivalent of grabbing a cookbook from your favorite chef - it's not going to teach you how to create your own meal, but it'll show you exactly how to make his.

I think all the Classic beer style series of books are great for beginners and advanced brewers. They teach you about the history of each beer and how to brew them in both extract and all grain. Lots of recipes in them too. I have them all and still refer back to them alot.