How can you improve your beer?

[jodell]

What are things you can do in your process that you can improve your beers with?

I'll start.

My post fermentation care is pretty rough. I spend great time with producing wort, caring for yeast, sanitation, and good fermention controll. My last ipa lasted about a week till it started going downhill when I realized I took terrible care transfering it to a keg. Lost all hop flavor and aroma, started turning cardboard-y, and really I just had to choke it down all due to careless transferring

Every brewer has something that can be improve, what's yours?

 

[AdamEltro]

For me it would be fermentation temp. control. I have a chest freezer & temperature controller, but its constantly full of kegs and bottles!

Likewise, I'd like to sort out a way of going from dry hopping to keg with no exposure to oxygen

 

[theowlman16]

Stick to the recipe instead of using whatever hops and yeast I have on hand.

 

[k1ngl1ves]

I have a tendency to change my mind on what I want to brew half way through a brew session.

Almost every time, I'll have a recipe set and will follow it for a while... then I go crazy and end up with some off the wall beer. I made a crazy Mandarina/Citra bomb that you could smell across the room. It would have been an unbelievable IPA... except that it started out as a porter. Lol! It was still very good! I don't know what I'm thinking some times.

 

[jodell]

now I know there are more than 4 people who can improve their beers...

 

[TexasDroughtBrewery]

Although I am not a big believer I guess i have not tried it either so i'll say that, it might improve my beer if I worried more about my water and PH levels. I know local breweries that treat the water and some that don't in my area, I think I might of lucked out and just be in an area where the water just works. However, I do like IPA's a lot and if I was to adjust my water that would be a good style to begin the testing.

 

[pvpeacock]

Good equipment -- check
Sanitation -- check
Yeast starters -- check
O2 prior to pitching yeast -- check
Fermentation temperature control -- check
Fresh ingredients properly stored -- check
Good transfer techniques from fermenter to keg -- check
The only thing I have not delved into yet is water/PH, but I'm reluctant to go there since my beer tastes great (but is not less filling).

 

[oceanic_brew]

Yeast handling

I do No-Chill brewing and it takes a full 24 hrs to chill to pitching temps. I don't know why but I often dont have my yeast starter chilled and decanted. I do a lot of 1.080's and up and my starter volume can be anywhere from 2l to 4 or 5 so pitching the entire thing isn't acceptable.

Problem is that I brew on a whim pretty often.

I've gotten a couple infections. But it's only after taking samples, no infection on beers that have zero oxygen exposure post-fermentation

 

[brewcat]

To actually improve my beer...Maybe start doing yeast starters, but realistically I get great beer from one Wyeast smack-pack (fresh & kept in range). I'm starting to think about doing some higher gravity brews, so I'll want to do starters then.

Transferring under pressure might be another plus. Although I've only had an aging problem once and that was when bottling. And in that case I think it was hot side aeration.

Maybe looking at water profile. But the beer is already good. How much improvement would it yield?

 

[kristiismean]

I need to learn water chemistry and PH. i'll probably be ordering my ph meter from amazon or aliexpress here in a week or so.

 

[catdaddy66]

Many ways that I can improve my beers include digital temp control, wort aeration pre pitching, water chemistry, better efficiency, fresher ingredients, etc.

Having said that, my beers have been trending upward in quality recently regardless.