AM I Crazy? Or should beer be simple and enjoyable?

[boxboybrewing]

I homebrew because I love beer. I believe beer should be simple, and enjoyable. Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"? NO! They wanted beer that tasted good and made them feel good. I'm not a Cicerone, or an aspiring microbrewery owner. I make beer that I like and want to drink. I'm not an engineer, or a chemist. Is there anyone else out there who wants to keep this hobby simple and enjoyable?

 

[z-bob]

I am an engineer. But I try to brew as simply as possible (but no simpler.) If I could just push a button and an hour later had finished beer, I don't think I would do it because that would take all the fun out of it.

I think it's worthwhile knowing the difference between American, German, and British hops, and when to use what. But I don't get too hung up on it. I agree it's supposed to be fun.

 

[MaxStout]

I do a little of both. I like the challenge of building a complex beer and part of what I find enjoyable about brewing is learning how different ingredients interact. I like to experiment. But sometimes, it's nice to just turn out a basic SMaSH ale that's grain-to-glass in a couple weeks.

 

[bracconiere]

AMEN BROTHER!

i malt my own, but don't even worry about consistency....i reuse my yeast....only use PBW sparingly....

(i did dry hop my new years batch though)

edit: and yes beer should be simple, that's why 9 out of 10 guys like it better then wine!

 

[Sadu]

Brewing is just like any other art form. There is beauty in simplicity, much like the early Beatles songs or Bob Ross paintings. But "Eleanor Rigby" is more interesting than "8 days a week", and I wouldn't fill my house with Bob Ross paintings.

Both have their place. Both will suck if they aren't balanced properly.

Gotta say I'm drawn towards complexity because I find it interesting and fun to make. Because this is a hobby, I'm as interested in the process being fun as I am in the beer being good to drink.

 

[anotherbeerplease]

One of the things I like about the hobby is it's as simple or complex as you want to make it.

Quick tap water BIAB or extract, go for it!

Multi step decoction mash with RO and brewing salts? Do it!

Personally I like the more complex stuff because I think some of the process shows through in the end result, even if I'm the only one who can taste it.

 

[day_trippr]

Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"? NO! [...]

Well, heck, "our ancestors" from just 50 years ago likely didn't care about any of that either.
Beer was functional and likely wholly unexciting. Not something I care to emulate...

Cheers!

 

[SanPancho]

You ever see that special about dogfish head doing that egyptian beer? Didnt strike me as a simple recipe. Lots of crap in there.


And trippr is right. Simplicity doesn’t always come out on top.

Theres a place for everything under the sun.

 

[mongoose33]

I homebrew because I love beer. I believe beer should be simple, and enjoyable. Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"? NO! They wanted beer that tasted good and made them feel good. I'm not a Cicerone, or an aspiring microbrewery owner. I make beer that I like and want to drink. I'm not an engineer, or a chemist. Is there anyone else out there who wants to keep this hobby simple and enjoyable?

You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. You don't have to read anything you don't want to read, including here on HBT. And you don't have to endorse any methods that don't make you happy.

That said, I don't think anyone knows what our ancestors had for beer. You say their beer tasted good....but do you know that? Or was it simply better than the alternatives, which is to say, maybe compared to our modern beers, our ancestral beers sucked.

Our ancestors had no ferm temp control, no way to manage the yeast that was fermenting for them, and the additions to control sweetness before hops became widely used were....iffy.

We tend to have this romantic vision of our ancestors and their beer, almost as if it was aphrodisiacal in nature.

It wasn't.

 

[bobeer]

I'm all for simple and enjoyable. The best thing about this hobby is it's as easy or as in-depth as you want it to be. There's no boil brewing that takes 30-45 minutes total to get a batch going or there's partial mash, BIAB, HERMS, electric setups, 3 tier setups, etc... The diversity makes it awesome and refreshing. I don't practice most of it as I am in still in the stone age with my 3 vessel, 100% manual brewhouse. Some of the trends are silly, and the level of "notes" can be a bit eccentric at times, but, again, it's what makes it more interesting. Brewing is always evolving.

I like that I can stay where I am here and just brew what I want to drink and it turns out the way I want it to. Most of us have endless resources to get ingredients, recipes, and information, and great communities to talk about the hobby with. I think we owe a lot of it to the "mouthfeel" folks, haha.

 

[Jayjay1976]

I wish there were more simple recipes around. I have a stubborn streak of skepticism toward complex grain bills that makes me practically incapable of following a recipe exactly, and even when I try real hard they just don't live up to my expectations. IMHO, a vienna lager should be Vienna malt plus a pinch of dark malt for color, hopped with saaz or hallertau in no more than 3 additions, fermented in the 50's with the contents of one smack pack. 5 liter starter?! Do I have to? Oxygenating the wort with an airstone sounds unnecessary to me too. I was reading some recipes in the last issue of BYO for some fancy schmancy styles and noted SEVEN PROPRIETARY MALTS in the grain bill. Oh yeah, one of the authors was a Weyermann, so he's a malt salesman too. I suspect there is a conspiracy to smuggle this commercialism into our hobby by inventing new ingredients and complex recipes just to sell us more stuff. I have a freezer full of hops and still never seem to have what a recipe calls for. I just want to make beer, dammit.[/RANT]

 

[Sadu]

LODO brewing is a great example of a more complex brewing process that yields better beer.





(ducks for cover )

 

[Jayjay1976]

LODO brewing is a great example of a more complex brewing process that yields better beer.





(ducks for cover )

I think oxygenating wort is too much of a hassle and the lodo bros are telling me I need to de-oxygenate my strike water and mash in a condom? Hah!

 

[S-Met]

I'm not a Cicerone, or an aspiring microbrewery owner.

I wish more micro-brews made simple quality beer rather than complex crap! I think of it like hearing a guitarist play a beautiful acoustic set vs a some hack (like me) who only sounds good if its passed through multiple fx pedals.
But I do appreciate when someone nails a complex recipe. Even if I don't like it, I appreciate the effort to produce.

Well, heck, "our ancestors" from just 50 years ago likely didn't care about any of that either.
Beer was functional and likely wholly unexciting. Not something I care to emulate...

Cheers!

50 years ago in Europe, I'll bet they did care about mouth-feel. Here state side, we were not too far out of prohibition and post ww2. I doubt beer was that exciting, especially home-brew.

 

[505-Brewer]

Our ancestors had dentures made with wooden teeth. On that fact I’ll side with progress. Todays beer is much better. It doesnt have to be complicated to be better.

 

[anotherbeerplease]

I wish there were more simple recipes around. I have a stubborn streak of skepticism toward complex grain bills that makes me practically incapable of following a recipe exactly, and even when I try real hard they just don't live up to my expectations. IMHO, a vienna lager should be Vienna malt plus a pinch of dark malt for color, hopped with saaz or hallertau in no more than 3 additions, fermented in the 50's with the contents of one smack pack. 5 liter starter?! Do I have to? Oxygenating the wort with an airstone sounds unnecessary to me too. I was reading some recipes in the last issue of BYO for some fancy schmancy styles and noted SEVEN PROPRIETARY MALTS in the grain bill. Oh yeah, one of the authors was a Weyermann, so he's a malt salesman too. I suspect there is a conspiracy to smuggle this commercialism into our hobby by inventing new ingredients and complex recipes just to sell us more stuff. I have a freezer full of hops and still never seem to have what a recipe calls for. I just want to make beer, dammit.[/RANT]

Make your own recipes! Pilsner w/ 100% pilsner malt.

 

[Jayjay1976]

I'd like to try the wooden teeth for a while, at least as motivation to leap into the space age.

 

[Bilsch]

I think first one should decide the acceptable quality level of the beer one wants to drink. Then figure out how complicated a process it will take to get there. Not the other way around.

 

[Jayjay1976]

I think first one should decide the acceptable quality level of the beer one wants to drink. Then figure out how complicated a process it will take to get there. Not the other way around.

I see your point, but my position is simply this:
I'd like to brew and drink the best possible tasting beer that I am able to produce whilst simultaneously having a nice time. Oh, and I'm frugal, too.

 

[Bilsch]

This reminds me of the statement: fast cheap or good, pick two.

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

On the “when did malt become modern malt” thread, it became obvious to me that there has been really good beer around for a really long time. From what I have seen, at least since the 1700’s and probably long before that. Given there was more bad beer and more mediocre beer, but it’s not so complicated that our forefathers couldn’t make really good beer. It would have spoiled faster, but they made really good beer too.

Aristotle lived in the 300s BC and remains a great philosopher. It is extremely arrogant to believe that our little breweries are greater than any that have come before ours. Sure we have some hacks and a lot of information that they didn’t, but I would bet a lot of my own money that if there were some way to objectively judge the best beer in the world from 300 BC compared to the average homebrew that’s out there today, that the ancient beer would win.

 

[gunhaus]

I homebrew because I love beer. I believe beer should be simple, and enjoyable. Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"? NO! They wanted beer that tasted good and made them feel good. I'm not a Cicerone, or an aspiring microbrewery owner. I make beer that I like and want to drink. I'm not an engineer, or a chemist. Is there anyone else out there who wants to keep this hobby simple and enjoyable?

Are you saying that you feel beer flavored beer, made from simple grain bills, with fairly basic ingredients appeals to you - And that all those fruity Pebbles, Gummy Bear, Sour Patch kid, guava, blueberry, avocado, concoctions so thick with hop oils that they require a knife and fork to consume that now dominate the beer shelves and brew pubs are growing tedious, and that a good old cream ale or dry stout is just fine by you? AND - are you implying that it is just fine to brew beer with a cooler tun, and a brew pot, and that the world will still go around if you ferment it in a bucket, and if you do not obsess over each O2 molecule, and the exact chemical composition of everything in your kitchen? IS THAT WHAT YOU'RE SAYING? Huh! The idea never crossed my mind . . . .HONEST!

 

[cactusgarrett]

They wanted beer that tasted good and made them feel good.

I gravitate to "simpler styles", myself, but complex beers taste good, so why should i not make them?

Oak aged = good.
Layered flavors via specialty grains or yeast = good.

Is there anyone else out there who wants to keep this hobby simple and enjoyable?

Do you mean for your own person or for everyone? Yourself? You do you. Others? Don't kick that hornet's nest.

 

[boxboybrewing]

Wow! Thanks EVERYONE for your replies. I'm not knocking anyone for how they break or what they brew, etc. We all love beer and we all love brewing. The diversity of our tastes and processes, etc, is a GOOD THING. I lean toward simplicity in this very complex world. But, that's just me.

 

[Kharnynb]

I do both, I love to make smash styles, especially munich or vienna smash and will throw in anything that is leftover in the freezer hop wise.

on the other hand, I also make belgian quads with caramelised sugars, spices etc., just depends on what is running out in the cellar.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

You can brew any beer, simple or complex, and some people will taste it and get notes of citrus, stone fruit, leather, coffee, whatever because they are into tasting and analyzing the taste experience. The brewing process doesn't have to be complex to get a myriad of individual flavors that combine to make the overall taste experience. That's just the nature of some people and how they drink a beer.

I like to brew beer that I like and, to some extent, what my friends and family like. I get a lot of satisfaction out of serving my beer to people and hearing them go "holy crap, that's fantastic" or something similar. I feel the same way about my BBQ, my award winning chili, etc.

To that end, my process has the level of complexity required to brew beer that goes beyond good and into "wow". That includes managing fermentation temp control, pH, water chemistry, mash process, yeast management, etc. I like brewing the best beer I can. "Good enough" isn't my goal in anything I do.

That being said, I like my beer better than about 90% of the commercial beer out there. My goal is to get to 100% (which is where I am with BBQ).

 

[lump42]

No need to pick just simple or complex beers. I went from an oak-aged bourbon cherry porter with tedious record keeping and tasting notes, right into a SMASH american lite lager done on the whim, no notes, no gravity readings, no calculated ibus. I brew as complicated as my mood suits me at the time.

That said, I don't think anyone knows what our ancestors had for beer. You say their beer tasted good....but do you know that? Or was it simply better than the alternatives, which is to say, maybe compared to our modern beers, our ancestral beers sucked.

I'm sure their beer was much better than dysentery and cholera for sure. Those both sound like they would suck compared to any beer.

 

[z-bob]

"You have died of dissin' Terry"

My standard for whether one of my beers is good or not is, would I pay $1 a bottle for this. If yes, it's good beer. I have a few bottles left of an imperial brown porter I brewed a year ago. It tastes very much like some expensive beers that I've had that I didn't like all that much (way too boozy, and not in a good way) I won't be brewing that again even if other people would pay $12 for a bomber of it.

 

[Rev2010]

I make beer that I like and want to drink.

If if you make a beer and there's something you don't like about it do you try to fix it? If so, then you just made things more complicated. Why bother to try and improve it? Keep it simple.

Come on, people try to shoot for what they want. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it takes a lot of work. You can say the same about anything with keep it simple - but sorry dude I don't want to watch movies on a 13" black and white TV, I want the 55" UHD TV with HDR. If you make a beer that you find too thin and watery I'm guessing you will try to improve it. Guess what... you're now working to improve both flavor and mouthfeel.


Rev.

 

[kh54s10]

If you really want simple just go to the store and buy Budweiser......

I enjoy brewing and drinking lots of styles of beer. Some of them just can't be made simply. How complex you make it is another story.

Since I enjoy the process of making beer, simple is not always even desired.

 

[beernutz]

Cake mixes are simple and generally make edible cakes.

 

[day_trippr]

[...]I would bet a lot of my own money that if there were some way to objectively judge the best beer in the world from 300 BC compared to the average homebrew that’s out there today, that the ancient beer would win.

Strange matchup...you'd think you had rigged the obvious winner, but I bet you wouldn't even recognize "300 BC Beer" as "beer"...

Cheers!

 

[bleme]

Belgian abbey beers and saisons have both been around for a LONG time and can be pretty complex, both in recipe and in taste. If you enjoy simple beers, that is fine, but your argument that everyone should because that's the way it's always been is flawed.

 

[S-Met]

If if you make a beer and there's something you don't like about it do you try to fix it? If so, then you just made things more complicated. Why bother to try and improve it? Keep it simple.

Come on, people try to shoot for what they want. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it takes a lot of work. You can say the same about anything with keep it simple - but sorry dude I don't want to watch movies on a 13" black and white TV, I want the 55" UHD TV with HDR. If you make a beer that you find too thin and watery I'm guessing you will try to improve it. Guess what... you're now working to improve both flavor and mouthfeel.


Rev.

If you really want simple just go to the store and buy Budweiser......

I enjoy brewing and drinking lots of styles of beer. Some of them just can't be made simply. How complex you make it is another story.

Since I enjoy the process of making beer, simple is not always even desired.

I think you are going down the wrong side of @boxboybrewing rabbit hole. I dont believe he is saying don't improve a recipe, he is saying, just make a fvcking beer. Not every beer you make has to have 37 separate hop additions, 51 different specialty malts, a 13 step mash temp and 42 added adjuncts.

And depending, but beer from 300 bc would be made strictly with what was locally available, spontaneous fermentation and whatever quality the local water may have been. At least it wasn't municipal water and wouldn't worry about chlorine, etc.

 

[kh54s10]

I think you are going down the wrong side of @boxboybrewing rabbit hole. I dont believe he is saying don't improve a recipe, he is saying, just make a fvcking beer. Not every beer you make has to have 37 separate hop additions, 51 different specialty malts, a 13 step mash temp and 42 added adjuncts.

And depending, but beer from 300 bc would be made strictly with what was locally available, spontaneous fermentation and whatever quality the local water may have been. At least it wasn't municipal water and wouldn't worry about chlorine, etc.

I am saying that simple is not always the aim. I don't know how I can make a really good Stout using just two malts and a hop.

I do try to limit things though. I don't do step mashes (difficult to do in a cooler) I limit hop additions to bittering then one or two late additions and maybe a dry hop. Adjuncts are usually just one, if any at all.

But since I like the process of making the beer, a few extra steps doesn't bother me at all. All SMaSH beers would be simple but would get very boring after a while.

 

[Soulshine2]

I homebrew because I love beer. I believe beer should be simple, and enjoyable. Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"? NO! They wanted beer that tasted good and made them feel good. I'm not a Cicerone, or an aspiring microbrewery owner. I make beer that I like and want to drink. I'm not an engineer, or a chemist. Is there anyone else out there who wants to keep this hobby simple and enjoyable?

I've been saying exactly what you are saying, sometimes I've been known to speak firmly about it.
Im not into the fancy shiny expensive gadgets either. I do like to make beer that cant be bought off the shelf. I use equipment that is readily available or easily made at home or out of a hardware store and gets the job done. Even Charlie Papazian made do with a few buckets .his Zapap mash strainer was a bucket with a thousand holes drilled in it . It nested inside another bucket ,his home kitchen stove, a glass carboy and ...1 gallon pitchers to move his water/wort and some clear hose. His methods are simple and straightforward. It doesnt need to be as technical and automated as a commercial brewery but if you have the space and funds , go for it. I look at those things from time to time and I ask myself "will this make my beer that much better or my brew day that much easier for the cost?" Most times my answer to that is No ,because it's money I really don't have I'd rather spend on a grain kit. It'd just make my electric bill go up. It'd be one more "thing" to possibly go wrong. or it'd be that much more to clean and store . If you have the basic essentials and can heat water ,have a milled grain,track temperature, transfer it ,ferment it in a sanitary way and package it to your liking, and YOU LIKE IT. Thats all it really has to be. My shortest AG brew day from heating water and milling grains to chilling wort and clean up is 6 hours. For me its something to do on a rainy day, not turn on an electronic brewbot so I can go do something else...
Different people have their own reasons .
Brew what you like , how you like. Like what you brew. Its just that simple.

 

[jrgtr42]

There's simple for the sake of being simple, and simple that takes away from potential.
One of my favorite homebrews is a study in simplicity. pilsner malt, a dash of Crystal 10, Cascade hops, at 60, 10 and 5. Ferment with WLP001 or WY1056, good to go.
Another favorite is far more complex - half a dozen different malts, 3 hop additions, then a year souring, with cherries, then rum-soaked oak. Very complex, but delicious.
Could that first beer be made more complicated? Sure, but to what cost?
Could the second be simpler? To get these results, probably not.
I guess my point is, that if you want simple, you can brew SMASHs and be as easy as you want, or if you want to experiment and go nuts, that's fine too. I enjoy the process of brewing, from coming up with a recipe, tweaking it as needed, brewing it and waiting for fermentation / conditioning (I don't really like cleaning up, though... ) IF a recipe or style demands simplicity, that's what it gets. If it needs to be more, it gets that too. There's more than one way to skin the proverbial cat. If someone wants to make a triple-dry hopped kettle sour oaked hibiscus dandelion Simon & Garfunkle blond stout, they're more than welcome to. Someone else who wants to do nothing more than SMASH pale ales is no more or no less a brewer than the other guy.

 

[Soulshine2]

I'm all for simple and enjoyable. The best thing about this hobby is it's as easy or as in-depth as you want it to be. There's no boil brewing that takes 30-45 minutes total to get a batch going or there's partial mash, BIAB, HERMS, electric setups, 3 tier setups, etc... The diversity makes it awesome and refreshing. I don't practice most of it as I am in still in the stone age with my 3 vessel, 100% manual brewhouse. Some of the trends are silly, and the level of "notes" can be a bit eccentric at times, but, again, it's what makes it more interesting. Brewing is always evolving.

I like that I can stay where I am here and just brew what I want to drink and it turns out the way I want it to. Most of us have endless resources to get ingredients, recipes, and information, and great communities to talk about the hobby with. I think we owe a lot of it to the "mouthfeel" folks, haha.

Exactly !!

 

[treacheroustexan]

I like to keep it simple as possible, but enjoy the process of brewing. Most of my grain bills only use 1-2 grains (base malt and occasionally a specialty) and I like to design my recipes to use hops in 1 oz increments so I don't have to measure. Simple. Tasty.

 

[Rev2010]

Not every beer you make has to have 37 separate hop additions, 51 different specialty malts, a 13 step mash temp and 42 added adjuncts.

Nowhere in his first post was there any mention of ridiculous numbers of ingredients, instead he said, '"Did our ancestors who drank beer worry about "mouthfeel" or "notes of citrus and flowers"?' Improving mouthfeel isn't not some uber-complicated process and there's nothing wrong or overly complex with wanting notes of citrus or floral notes. They are things people shoot for to make a specific taste.

As mentioned already by kh54s10, if you really want to keep it simple why even bother to homebrew?, just go out and buy the cheapest beer out there.

Lastly, 300BC beer was most likely not a beer that "tasted good" but definitely gave them the buzz and is likely why they drank it. It also certainly would taste *nothing* like today's beers.



Rev.