Brew the same or something different?

[CoreyD]

I keep a brew log on all my beers. Have done different styles, plus some small changes to previous brews. When my log is full (only have space for one more) my plan is to go back and rebrew all of them. With more experience, I want to see how I can make each better.

 

[Sadu]

I saw you say earlier that if you go from recipe to recipe without isolating variables you'll never know why your beer turned out bad. In commercial practice this is untrue. "Bad" is not a flavor or aroma. There's specific things that make beer taste bad. If you're unable to describe why it's bad that points to a lack of lexicon and a lack of understanding regarding common off flavors in beer.

I agree with your basic argument that a lot of brewing is not recipe-dependent. But also I think some things are best learned by brewing the same recipe over again.

If your beer has diacetyl then that is an off flavour and there is plenty of literature on how to fix that. Not recipe dependent.
Want to learn how Saison yeast works? Brew 3 different saisons and you'll have a fair idea. Not recipe dependent.

But what about if you put 40% smoked malt in a Rauchbier because that's what the recipe says? Tastes good, but you wish it had more smoke in it. Your tasting has identified a parameter that needs tweaking FOR THIS RECIPE, FOR YOUR PALATE. Some of us would brew it again with 60% smoked malt and find that batch 2 is "great" rather than "good".

You could argue that this is a matter of understanding the ingredient. With experience using smoked malt you would learn how smoked malt behaves and you would know how much to use. This makes sense to some degree. But how do you apply that knowledge to a smoked baltic bourbon barrel porter where the balance of flavours is completely different? How do you know whether to use 10% or 20%? What I'm saying is that sometimes, the flavour profile you get from an ingredient really does depend on the recipe, or at least the style.

I'm not saying that brewing the same recipe again is exclusively the way to make better beer. But to be able to identify a flaw or missed opportunity in a beer than go ahead and correct it in the next batch is a very useful learning tool, and results in improved beer.

 

[aprichman]

I agree that dialing in a recipe for personal taste will require fine tuning, although technically if you're changing up the ingredients you're no longer meeting the criteria of brewing the same beer twice.

 

[mongoose33]

aprichman said: ↑
I'm not sure what you're trying to "dial in" in your process. The practices required to make good beer aren't exclusive to a recipe. If anything limiting yourself to a particular set of recipes may make finding a bad practice more difficult.

I dropped the original statement in here to refer back to it. What I'm interested in is how limiting oneself to a particular set of practices may make finding a bad practice more difficult.

You make a logical argument about isolating variables mongoose, but I would respectfully suggest that this is a flawed way to look at brewing. The making of beer has been more or less solved. Best practices are largely understood on a commercial level and more recently a homebrew level.

You asked me to expand on practices that aren't exclusive to brewing the same recipe multiple times to improve your process - I'd redirect you to your own post earlier in this thread:

Well, this isn't what I was aiming at. I want to know how brewing the same recipes will make finding a process error more difficult.

"I've followed a process of continuous quality improvement as I've gone from a newbie to a brewer of some really good beer (not my evaluation, others'). It's simply this: every time you brew, try to do at least one thing better than last time. Control temps better, control fermentation better, make a better starter or rehydrate your yeast if dry, time your hop additions more accurately, bottle the beer better, do whatever. "

I can't find anything in your process of continuous quality improvement that is dependent on a recipe.

It's not. But that isn't the thing I'm looking for. I'm trying to learn why brewing the same set of recipes repeatedly would make finding a process error more difficult.

CQI is about controlling the process better. More precision on temps. Timing. Water. Crush. For instance, early on in my all-grain learning curve I was getting efficiencies in the 60s. One part of the process to improve efficiency was stirring the mash; I now do it at 15- and 30-minutes, and my efficiencies rose to the upper 70s. That's what I mean by improving the process, and there are dozens of places people can get better.

None of them are necessarily dependent on recipe, though when you go from a "normal" ale to dry hopping an IPA, there's a recipe-dependent element of the process that is very different. How long do you leave that dry hop in there? Three days? Seven days? A month? In a sock? Loose in the keg? In a torpedo screen?

If you're not brewing the same recipe can you not control temperatures better? Can you not make a starter or try yeast rehydration?

Yes--but what you cannot do is determine if it made a discernable difference IF you're also changing other elements of the process as well.

My point has, I think, always been about what newbie brewers should optimally do. It's not that people shouldn't try new things, expand their recipes, etc. Not at all. It's that when you're new, there are a lot of variables for which to account. Limiting them is the better move IF your goal is to refine the process and improve it.

BTW, other examples: using tap water or RO water. Including a campden tablet to account for chlorine in tap water. Accounting for the alkalinity of the water so as to get the mash pH where it needs to be. Etc. etc.

Making beer isn't trying to fly in the dark. Good recipes are readily available. Good advice is readily available. Obviously there's a learning curve to making beer, getting used to your system, etc. but I don't see how this is dependent on brewing the same recipe. If you can expand on this, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

One of the beauties of brewing is that the process, generally, is pretty robust and it's going to produce beer for you even if you screw things up. But will screwups help one produce great beer--assuming that's the goal? I don't think anyone would suggest that.

I suspect also it might be that people are assuming something about brewing the same recipe--I'm not talking about 40 times. (You must brew a brown ale 40 times, grasshopper, before you can move to an Amber... )

Rather, I'm thinking 2, 3, 4 times as one refines the process. Obviously, if one is only doing extract batches, the number of variables is much more limited, and maybe it doesn't matter as much. But I do recall my first brew very well. Took about 6 hours from start to finish, and that was with an extract. Set things up, figure out how to configure my propane burner for the boil, read the instructions, screw up the instructions, screw up the timing of the steeping grains, the timing of the hop additions during the boil....

I saw you say earlier that if you go from recipe to recipe without isolating variables you'll never know why your beer turned out bad. In commercial practice this is untrue.

Commercial brewers aren't newbies. You can give me a new recipe and I would expect, because I have nailed down my process, for it to turn out. Same with you.

But I'm not a newbie. I don't think you can go from advice for newbies to a generalized conclusion.

"Bad" is not a flavor or aroma. There's specific things that make beer taste bad. If you're unable to describe why it's bad that points to a lack of lexicon and a lack of understanding regarding common off flavors in beer. Off flavor kits are available through Siebel. I'm a food scientist, and had the opportunity to take two terms of brewing classes as part of my BS. The brewing classes used these kits; learning how to correctly identify off flavors was part of the curriculum. In a brewery QC position this type of sensory training is fairly common and typically required unless you're working for a small craft brewery. Some of the bigger breweries run in house sensory programs that train multiple staff members on off flavors for quality control.

I don't disagree--but you're not a newbie, and you are a food scientist. My suggestions are for newbies, who know little of the things you and I know. Commercial breweries need absolute consistency. Newbie brewers are using a bucket (often).

From a brewing QC perspective, this is how you should be approaching your root cause analysis. Once you can accurately identify off flavors you can start to look at what part of your process is out of control. I could discuss how to best approach root cause analysis from a food manufacturing standpoint if you're interested but this is probably a better conversation to take private. In general though, if you have good sanitation, use good ingredients, take good care of the yeast, and transfer your beer with limited oxygen exposure you're going to make great beer.

I'm not necessarily disagreeing. But a newbie brewer knows almost none of that stuff. They need some brews under their belt so as to start to get sense of the timing, rhythm, tempo of brewing, as well as the process variables. You're applying what you know, as a food scientist, to a newbie who doesn't know any of it. Heck, ask a newbie what diacetyl is and where it comes from, I'll bet most don't know. (Meanwhile, I have the sense I'd like to sit down with you over a few beers and pick your brain... )

It occurs to me that we're approaching this problem from different directions. You're theory--I'm practice. Neither is necessarily wrong, but my thinking is that newbies won't understand the theory very well without having gone through the practice.

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I have a sense that many new brewers want to bounce from recipe to recipe because they think the recipe is the thing that matters most. So my beer was ok, but I want better--I'll try this recipe next. Well, that one was OK, I'll try this one next. All the while they're bouncing from recipe to recipe hoping that's the answer, when (as it was in my case), the water is NG for brewing anything but a Stout.

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BTW, and this is absolutely coincidental, I am attending a local workshop tonite and Thursday night on off-flavors in beer. Don't know how good it'll be--it's costing me $150, so I have hopes.

BTW, II: I appreciate the civil tone of the discussion here. Maybe we could go out in public and model for our political overlords how to do that?

 

[Desert_Sky]

When I was first starting out I brewed a Blonde Ale 3 times in a row. It's light enough that you can identify off flavors really easy and learn from mistakes better