Brewers tend to be cooks

[Bruscar]

I've noticed, as I grow like a mold in this place, that quite a few of you.....OK, mainly EdWort , tend to enjoy cooking. I, for one, was, in a previous decade,

a classically trained chef. Still love to cook, LOVE to BBQ, just hate doing it as a jawb...
The same things that I enjoy about cooking draw me to brewing. One of the things that helped move me lightyears down the track was learning what the various things in a brew contribute. Not following someone else's recipe, knowing how to come up with your own.

Sez you?

 

[NitrouStang96]

Confirmed.

 

[Yooper]

Oh, I agree. I LOVE to cook. I am very creative in the kitchen and make many different dishes and love to experiment with ethnic cooking.

I like to cook when I feel like it though- I couldn't do it for a living. Or even for my poor family. I have to feel inspired by something. I brew the same way- I brew what I want when I feel the inspiration. Today, I walked through the kitchen and my husband mentioned some sour cherries he picked last summer. So, I made cherry wine today. That makes it so fun!

 

[jacobyhale]

I also am a classically trained Chef, who has gotten sick of cooking as a career. I do enjoy the food business, and have started parlaying my restaurant knowledge into more of an office job. Brewing for me, is a sort of extension of cooking, that is heavier on the science side than general cooking skills. More closely related to baking I'd say. Hard to fix something while you're making it, you have to sort of know what it will turn out like before you throw it in the oven.

 

[Bruscar]

^^^^VERY true!

 

[kram]

Not me. I can barely make toast.

I have never been able to cook anything very well, even barbeque. I can cook a burger or a steak, but that's about it.

I've always brewing to be 'cooking for guys', (at least in my case). I jump at the opportunity to brew, and can barely wait between sessions, but I have no skill or interest in cooking food.

 

[Yuri_Rage]

Funny, SWMBO and I have the pretty classic "she's right-brained, he's left-brained" relationship, but the roles are definitely reversed in the kitchen. She absolutely HAS to follow a recipe, while I tend to be more creative and rarely read cookbooks. I really enjoy cooking - anything from simple things like scrambled egg breakfasts to complex dishes with French sauces and advanced techniques. It seems to me that brewing is just an extension of that.

 

[krispy d]

checking in. bona fide cook here! not by trade but for sure by passion.

 

[jzal8]

Cook everynight and weekend. It is my second favorite hobby.

 

[EdWort]

My SWMBO can cook better than I can, just not outside. I'm fortunate to have her. She is one of two woman I've ever dated that can cook better than me (that's why I'm on a diet).

 

[jeff967]

I do know my way around the kitchen and the pit. thanks to time spent with my mother and grandmothers.
now I think that thanks to HBT and you guys here, I am turning into a fair brewer.

 

[talleymonster]

I've always enjoyed cooking, since I was a little kid. 'nuff said.

 

[david_42]

I enjoy cooking, but it is just about impossible to cook for one without filling a freezer or two or six with "leftovers". Making 40 servings of beer at once makes sense, but 40 servings of lasagna?

 

[BlindLemonLars]

I enjoy cooking, but it is just about impossible to cook for one without filling a freezer or two or six with "leftovers". Making 40 servings of beer at once makes sense, but 40 servings of lasagna?

Absolutely! I do that all the time, quite intentionally. Slice and wrap up servings of that lasagna and pop them in the freezer. Next time you work late and come home starving but too tired to cook, a home cooked meal is just a few minutes away.

I understand that modern lifestyles often mean that you don't have time to cook fresh food every night. Still, if people took this approach instead of drive-thru junk food or fat/sodium laden frozen meals, our country would be a lot thinner and a lot healthier.

 

[niquejim]

I've noticed, as I grow like a mold in this place, that quite a few of you.....OK, mainly EdWort , tend to enjoy cooking. I, for one, was, in a previous decade,

a classically trained chef. Still love to cook, LOVE to BBQ, just hate doing it as a jawb...
The same things that I enjoy about cooking draw me to brewing. One of the things that helped move me lightyears down the track was learning what the various things in a brew contribute. Not following someone else's recipe, knowing how to come up with your own.

Sez you?

I love to cook, BBQ and I've been a baker for 20+ years. The reason I like brewing is that it gives me the ability to do what I can no longer do at work , create my own recipes.

 

[Bruscar]

Oh, and, uh, Blind? Encino ain't too far from Covina so iffin ya figger you gots too much lasagna, PM me!

 

[Orfy]

Nuff said....

Tonights nosh.

 

[Fingers]

My wife asked me to put the ham in the oven after she left the house. I had to go and ask the kids if you put water in the roaster with the ham. Apparently you do. I was too embarrassed to ask if the mesh that is covering the ham is supposed to come off. It looked pretty imbedded into the skin of the ham so I left it on. Nobody yelled at me so I guess it's supposed to stay on. In my own defense, there were no heating instructions on the package like there are on most other meals I make.

I can barbecue but SWMBO makes the marinade and the barbecue sauce. I think I'm pathetic.

 

[PseudoChef]

Huh?12243425235

 

[Fingers]

Short answer, Pseudo. This brewer isn't a chef.

 

[WortMonger]

I really love to cook. I'm learning to bake, there are great threads on here on baking breads.

 

[PseudoChef]

Short answer, Pseudo. This brewer isn't a chef.

I meant my comment as a sarcastic reply to the OP in reference to my user name.

 

[BrianP]

I too handle the cooking duties at home, and have enjoyed cooking since I was a teenager. I don't care for baking (it's too exacting), but my swmbo excels there. I prefer the creative 'wing it' style of cooking, improvising with ingredients that you have at hand, but you generally need to know what will go with what.

Brewing is like a mixture of cooking and baking - you can't go completely wild, you do need to measure some things (like bottling sugar), but you can experiment.

 

[adx]

I'm the cook in this house. SWMBO and myself have a simple deal: I cook, she cleans.

 

[AlaskaBrewing]

I too enjoy cooking. I sometimes cook to relax, although you wouldn't be able to tell as I can get very concentrated on what I am doing and sometimes look like I am going to explode. I usually kick everyone out of the kitchen as not to be disturbed. I sometimes think it would be fun to be trained as a real chef.

 

[Bruscar]

I sometimes think it would be fun to be trained as a real chef.

It was one of the hardest/most interesting/fun/frustrating things I've ever done. If only I could find a job where I did/learned something new every 3 weeks like in school.
A lot of the schools now offer weekend-length classes for civilians.

 

[Orfy]

I always get asked why I'm not in the trade or don't open a restaurant.

I don't have the drive or the $$$$$$$$

 

[Bruscar]

I always get asked why I'm not in the trade or don't open a restaurant.

I don't have the drive or the $$$$$$$$

Like a lot of things, fun to do on your own schedule/desire. A ***** to do for a living. You're now focused on the business (cash flow, employee issues, etc.), not the art.

 

[Short Drive]

Like a couple of brewers here I'm a classically trained chef, but I still work my trade. I've been at it for almost 37 years, and still love it. Brewing to me is just an extension of cooking. It came naturally. I do all the cooking when I'm home. But when I work I will bring my wife something home. I honestly think she hates cooking.

 

[Orfy]

I believe my SWMBO is one of the owrlds worst cooks.

She rang me up to ask how to cook an omlette.
She has burnt icecream before now. (Not a joke)

 

[McKBrew]

I Love to cook. Sometimes the SWMBO feels guilty because, I make many of the meals, but I let her know I don't care because I enjoy doing it.

I'm like Yuri, in the fact that I rarely use a cookbook. I've thrown together some really decent casserole type meals just using random ingredients. For some reason I always think about dinner starting first thing in the morning. I'll start to piece together an idea based on what we have available, come home and throw it all together.

Both my parents are awesome cooks, and while I never cooked at home, I learned alot just by watching.

 

[BierMuncher]

I've been doing the grocery shopping and cooking for the last 16 years. SWMBO isn't allowed in the kitchen except to clean up after me. That's our deal. I cook, she cleans up.

For me, deboning and stuffing a leg of lamb and slow coooking on a spit is no more work than throwing a frozen DiGiorno's in the oven.

But I do enjoy a frozen burrito, dipped in mustard every now and then.

 

[BNVince]

I've been doing the grocery shopping and cooking for the last 16 years. SWMBO isn't allowed in the kitchen except to clean up after me. That's our deal. I cook, she cleans up.

That's my deal too and I think I'm getting the better end of it. I love to cook but hate to clean. SWMBO hates to cook and hates to clean. Winner = Me.

 

[Bernie Brewer]

I am the cook in my family. SWMBO hates cooking, plus I'm usually the first one home from work, so I do it. I'm not a gourmet by any stretch of the imagination, but we don't go hungry, either.

 

[PeteOz77]

I am definitely the cook in the family. For a while I was studying hard to be a gourmet chef, but then I realised that 99% of what I make without a recipe is VERY good eating, and "Good" is based on what each person likes.

I have a few very nice dishes that I have put together that friends and family now make after getting the "recipe" from me

 

[Melana]

I love to cook. I guess brewing was just an extension of that. My husband can cook basic meals and is learning very quickly how to make a tasty dinner (and beer) though.

 

[zoebisch01]

My experiences in the restaurant world more or less led me to brewing. More importantly though, there is something special about people who love fermentation as an art form imho.

Fermentation in general (I am not just talking beer ) is really not terribly integrated in our modern culture of mass produced 'insert product here', but rather a fringe attraction to a minority. I am proud to be in that minority.

May all your ferments be successful!

 

[Beerthoven]

I cooked professionally for about 10 years, and I do much of the cooking at home as well. I really enjoy it. Its another one of my hobbies.

Having cooking experience definately made it easy to learn how to brew.

I haven't worked in a restaurant kitchen since 1995, but I still have dreams about it.

 

[Soulive]

I do about 85% of the cooking. Cooking for me is like brewing in that its relaxing. Actually cooking led me into brewing in a convoluted way. I've only recently started incorporating beer into recipes. Its a good time...

 

[jds]

Another confirmed cook here, although I'm a lousy baker. SWMBO does the baking and some cooking, I do a lot of the cooking and most of the kitchen cleaning. Thanks to a youth spent as a dishwasher and prep cook in restaurants, cleaning the kitchen is second nature to me.

I'm going to add a corollary to your theory: In the population of homebrewers, you find a greater proportion of home coffee roasters than you do in the general population.