Gordon Strong's New Book

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sonetlumiere85 said:
I read this book in most of one night and returned it the next day. To me, there's nothing new in it.

I know it was a few pages back, but just because someone enters some ridiculous number of beers into competitions doesn't mean anything to me. The dude clearly has a narrow view of brewing that is centered around getting as much praise and adoration from "lesser" homebrewers as possible. Lame.
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Haters gonna hate.
 
I am about half way through this book now. Since I am new to AG brewing (and really new to brewing period) I have learned a lot. However, I can see where some of you guys that have been doing AG brewing for years would find this not really an advanced book. I had imagine that this book would go more into the science of brewing and thought that I would try and read it and then put it back on the shelf till I was more experienced.

That has not happened. I actually understand ever he has said up to this point. I would say this is not an advanced book, but more along the lines of an intermediate level. That's just my $0.02 worth though.

-Stanley
 
I'm about halfway through this book, and I think it's easily one of the best I have read on the subject. Not a textbook, but a long conversation with one of the best home brewers in the game. Money well spent IMO.
 
Finished the book last night. Frankly, I wasn't as impressed by it as I have other books coming from Brewer's Publications. It is largely a series of loosely tied together essays many of which don't seem to present much real interesting information. The book doesn't have a lot of cohesion, and could have benefited from some self-editing (I don't really need to know that Gordon drinks Propel to avoid hangovers). Additionally, the book seems somewhat self-indulgent. That being said, seeing his point of view on several topics was interesting (bottle filling, cold steeping, competitions), and I appreciate his attempt at producing a book that is more centered on the art / theory / zen of brewing and less on the technical aspects. I think he has good ideas in his head, but was not capable of expressing them in book form to the point that they really became interesting and something that makes you become more introspective on the topic. There are many books in my brewing library I refer to time and time again. I don't see myself going back to this book.

On a side note, I have read a ton on the topic so perhaps that is why I didn't find a lot of meaningful new information in the book.
 
stanley1271 said:
I am about half way through this book now. Since I am new to AG brewing (and really new to brewing period) I have learned a lot. However, I can see where some of you guys that have been doing AG brewing for years would find this not really an advanced book. I had imagine that this book would go more into the science of brewing and thought that I would try and read it and then put it back on the shelf till I was more experienced.

That has not happened. I actually understand ever he has said up to this point. I would say this is not an advanced book, but more along the lines of an intermediate level. That's just my $0.02 worth though.

-Stanley
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You should read the introduction again (assuming you read it to begin with). Your comments do not gel with the aim of the book. Without an understanding of the introduction, you do not have an understanding of everything he has said.
 
ayoungrad said:
You should read the introduction again (assuming you read it to begin with). Your comments do not gel with the aim of the book. Without an understanding of the introduction, you do not have an understanding of everything he has said.
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Ok I have re-read the intro and I am not sure what it is that you believe does not gel with the aim of the book. I do admit from what I have read of the book there is lots I do not understand, but that is why I am reading it. What I said in my previous post on this book was just my opinion and what I thought (before starting to read the book) it would be like. I still believe this is more of an intermediate book and not an advanced one. My assumption that it would be more about the science was corrected when I started reading the book.

Perhaps you should take my post for what it really was, my opinion on what I thought the book would be and what I think it is now.

-Stanley
 
ayoungrad said:
I just got my copy of the book delivered today.

I have only read the introduction, but it makes the discussion of extract and judgmentalism seem kind of amusing. The portion of the introduction before the quoted passage reiterates that his book is about opinions and that brewing is different for everyone. We all make choices and they may be vastly different from the ones he made.

Then he gives a strong opinion about extract. Prefaced and presented as opinion - not as fact.

This book is not a textbook and is not intended to be. But I'm looking forward to reading more.
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I was mostly referring to this post of mine from earlier. His book is not presented as a textbook or technique book but a book about his experiences and helping others through their experiences. His book is not a do this then that book but it is a guide through learning all-grain homebrewing.

I'm not saying its perfect but I'm saying that your critique seems to be that you were disappointed because you were expecting something different from what the book was intended to be.
 
ayoungrad said:
I was mostly referring to this post of mine from earlier. His book is not presented as a textbook or technique book but a book about his experiences and helping others through their experiences. His book is not a do this then that book but it is a guide through learning all-grain homebrewing.

I'm not saying its perfect but I'm saying that your critique seems to be that you were disappointed because you expecting something different from what the book was intended to be.
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Actually before I got the book I did think of it as more of a textbook or at least something similar. And yes I am disapointed in the book in some way that it is not what I had expected. I do not blame the publisher or the writer, as that was my assumption. To me the title "Brewing Better Beer" says that he would get more into the details of brewing. This is, in my opinion, how you brew better beer, by knowing more about the processes.

I would like to clarify that I have learned a lot from this, if not on the science of the subject as I had first thought I would, but instead on what he does to brew his beer. Overall I like the book so far, but I had hoped for more. I guess a lot of that is what I anticipated from hype I had heard from others about the book and the author.

-Stanley
 
stubbornman said:
I'm about halfway through this book, and I think it's easily one of the best I have read on the subject. Not a textbook, but a long conversation with one of the best home brewers in the game. Money well spent IMO.
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Bingo, this man gets it. You get at a point in brewing where all you can learn is little nuggets that stick out in conversations. Same reason I think the Sunday Session is the best source of information online. It's like a big long drunken conversation, but more often than not you pick up something you can apply.

If someone wants technical brewing discussion in a non-technical tone, read Noonan's book, it has everything you need technically.
 
Leaving aside remilard's rather tedious insistence that anybody who doesn't agree with his assessment of this book "doesn't get it", I do think that it reads a lot like a written version of the Sunday Session (minus the smutty jokes), for both better and worse.

I suspect that I shouldn't blame Gordon for this, but it seems that a lot of the issue is the gap between how the book was billed and how it actually reads. I continue to enjoy it, but "Master lessons for advanced homebrewers" seems too ambitious for both its style and content. "Shootin' the **** with an extremely talented brewer" would feel more accurate, but in any case the book is worth the $13.
 
remilard said:
Bingo, this man gets it. You get at a point in brewing where all you can learn is little nuggets that stick out in conversations. Same reason I think the Sunday Session is the best source of information online. It's like a big long drunken conversation, but more often than not you pick up something you can apply.

If someone wants technical brewing discussion in a non-technical tone, read Noonan's book, it has everything you need technically.
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I agree - lots of good info in that book. The mashing instructions are fully focused on decoctions with undermodified malts though imo.
 
StMarcos said:
I agree - lots of good info in that book. The mashing instructions are fully focused on decoctions with undermodified malts though imo.
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Right, but if you can do that, you can probably handle any other type of mashing.

I sometimes joke about how I use almost nothing I learned getting my math degree at work. In reality though, to be an expert at a given level you usually have to be proficient at a higher level first. So I think the best infusion mashers are probably the people that can do a decoction if they need to. All that work to learn the harder case creates a level of maturity and instinct that can be applied to the simpler case but can't have been gained there.
 
I think most of the advanced stuff we already know about here. It's stuff that's been more or less common knowledge for a couple of years on either of the forums. But the book goes a bit further IMO. It's more like all of that information, but really how it applies to Gordon's brewing, or how Gordon applies it in his brewing. And beyond that, what's his rationale for doing things the way he does it.

It seems like a book that he wrote because people were always asking his advice and why he does things the way he does. I'm sure he finally just figured one day to write it all down and make it available to everyone.

Keep in mind that there are a lot of brewers who are looking to go beyond extract brewing, but don't hang out here reading up on all of the advanced brewing information. This book might be just what they need to not just learn about the techniques, but understand why this (successful) homebrewer does what he does.

There's plenty of stuff I probably would not do the same as Gordon, but on the other hand, sometimes the book either reinforces my method, or makes me at least think about why I do it my way, and would it be better to change equipment or methods.
 
jfowler1 said:
I'll follow up after the weekend and let you know my own thoughts.

Joe
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OP Here.

Thanks to everyone who contributed. It took a bit longer than planned, but I finished the book last night, and wanted to share my thoughts.

First of all, IMO, the "extract isn't brewing" thing got overblown early in this thread. It was a throwaway sentence, and certainly is not the point of the book.

More on point, I really enjoyed the format of;

Here are techniques A,B,C for a given process. I do "B", and this is why.

A few other things I really enjoyed were his thoughts on hop blends (Cascade/Centennial , Simcoe/Amarillo), yeast selections, clashing flavors, post boil hop usage, and his thoughts about top mashing/steeping roasted grains. I also appreciate his opinion that the community may be going a little overboard on the neccessity of extending the primary fermentation timeline. Those are all pretty finite thoughts that came from Gordon's experience, and really lend to the "chatting with a brewer" flow of the book. If I had 10 minutes with Gordon, those are the things I would be picking his brain about. I will definately be incorporating a few of those tips into my process.

I started to lose interest a bit when the book started leaning toward "how to win in competitions". I like the competition format for the sake of honest feedback, but personally, have no interest in entering a competition with the goal of winning a medal. For someone more competitive/involved than me, this may be their favorite part of the book. Small scale blending, carbonating in a soda bottle, etc., are all great tips for the sake of increased success in competition, but for my brewing interests, they weren't very practical.

All in all, a good read. However, IMO, reads more like "brewing to win a competition" than "brewing better beer".

Are they the same thing? Maybe; maybe not.

Joe
 
jfowler1 said:
OP Here.
More on point, I really enjoyed the format of;
Here are techniques A,B,C for a given process. I do "B", and this is why.

A few other things I really enjoyed were his thoughts on hop blends (Cascade/Centennial , Simcoe/Amarillo), yeast selections, clashing flavors, post boil hop usage, and his thoughts about top mashing/steeping roasted grains. I also appreciate his opinion that the community may be going a little overboard on the neccessity of extending the primary fermentation timeline. Those are all pretty finite thoughts that came from Gordon's experience, and really lend to the "chatting with a brewer" flow of the book. If I had 10 minutes with Gordon, those are the things I would be picking his brain about. I will definately be incorporating a few of those tips into my process.

Joe
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Gordon is speaking at my local homebrew club (DRAFT - Dayton Regional Amateur Fermentation Technologists) this Friday night to discuss tips for entering the NHC. Guests are welcome. See www.daytondraft.org for information. I'm looking forward to having him try some of my homebrews. I'm a glutton for punishment.........
 
MalFet said:
I continue to enjoy it, but "Master lessons for advanced homebrewers" seems too ambitious for both its style and content. "Shootin' the **** with an extremely talented brewer" would feel more accurate, but in any case the book is worth the $13.
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I agree with your thoughts on the title. It was basically Gordon just saying "This is what I do...here are some reasons why."
 
stubbornman said:
I'm about halfway through this book, and I think it's easily one of the best I have read on the subject. Not a textbook, but a long conversation with one of the best home brewers in the game. Money well spent IMO.
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Quoted for truth.. to me, this book read like a long forum post from an engineer who's had tons of experience brewing. It's not meant to be a technical manual if that's what you're expecting.
 
Zen_Brew said:
They talked about how he will often cold steep his dark grains like chocolate or carafe. Now I had heard about steeping these once or twice before, but what I hadn't considered was the fact that it allows you to not have to buffer your water so heavily with salts to balance the PH against the acidity these grains add in the mash.QUOTE]


One of the things I picked up from reading the book also.
I'm only part way through and must say it is one of the better books I have read so far. It is very readable and do throw some light into what he does to make his beer so good.
Most of what I have read only rehashes what I have read somewhere else, but then again, where is anything really new being introduced in the brewing world that will relate to us homebrewers?
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overflow said:
Quoted for truth.. to me, this book read like a long forum post from an engineer who's had tons of experience brewing. It's not meant to be a technical manual if that's what you're expecting.
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I'm hoping he brings some of his beer to share with others tonight.....
 
boo boo said:
Zen_Brew said:
They talked about how he will often cold steep his dark grains like chocolate or carafe. Now I had heard about steeping these once or twice before, but what I hadn't considered was the fact that it allows you to not have to buffer your water so heavily with salts to balance the PH against the acidity these grains add in the mash.QUOTE]


One of the things I picked up from reading the book also.
I'm only part way through and must say it is one of the better books I have read so far. It is very readable and do throw some light into what he does to make his beer so good.
Most of what I have read only rehashes what I have read somewhere else, but then again, where is anything really new being introduced in the brewing world that will relate to us homebrewers?
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I think I said this earlier in the thread, but a lot of the cold steeping stuff originally came from a Briess employee and George Fix wrote about it on HBD.

I bring this up because, if you liked Gordon's book and want similar insights and tips from two other great brewers and are willing to do some extra work and accept less organization, the following are two really good exercises.

1. Read everything George Fix every posted to HBD.
2. Read everything Jamil Z. every posted to the morebeer forums.

With Jamil I specify the morebeer forums because I think the forums he posted on later (like brewing network) he was in TBN/Celebrity mode and had packaged answers for everything. The morebeer stuff is largely before anyone outside of California had every heard of him, a lot of it was around when he won his first ninkasi. I think he gets into more detail because he wasn't used to answering the same questions over and over yet.
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Gordon Strong is a damn good homebrewer, and he has the awards to prove it. I will not belittle him in that respect. We all want to be that good, or consistent, or competitively successful. It is an admirable achievement winning the Ninkasi award, let alone doing it three times. I will not detract from his accomplishments. His credentials are impeccable in that area.

However, if you have ever met Gordon Strong or had a beer judged by him, you will understand what I am about to say. His book is written exacly like he writes up a BJCP scoresheet. Lots of "I LOVE ME AND I AM THE BEST JUDGE AND HOMEBREWER EVER AND YOU ARE NOT" language with not a lot of useful information to be had about improving your beer. So, if you get his book and if you can get by the man's ego, filter out everything he's said he's done, and get to the brass tacks, nuts and bolts of what he is saying, you will find that the 20-30 pages left of his book a great tool. If you can't, then you will find his book 300+ pages difficult to understand, confusing, contradictory, and counter intuitive. Is it worth the money, that's your call.

Some day, when you try to have a conversation with the two of them (Gordon and Gordon's EGO), you will quickly find out exactly how much more he knows about the subject of homebrewing and judging than you, Charlie P, Greg N, Michael J, Stan H, Jamail Z, all other BJCP judges combined, etc. and if you don't, not to worry, it just means that he has not got around to telling you in the first 5-10 seconds but he will tell you. Just how big of an ego you ask? Well, I'll have to bring attention to the fact that he is the head of the BJCP. He wrote the qualifications for GM V certification in such a way that he and only he could be rated as GM V with all others ranked below him. He loves to call peoples' attention to that little tidbit of information to show how great a BJCP judge he is. You know, the FACT that HE is the only GM V rated judge is one of the first things he wrote in his book. Now if that isn't an ego out of control, I don't know what is.

Kev

BTW, Gordon Strong is the Gilderoy Lockhart of Homebrewing! (A Harry Potter reference for those who don't know)
 
Wow, that was the most astonishingly vitriolic ad hominem thread necro rant I've seen in a while, and the fact that you threw in a Harry Potter reference at the end made it just pitch perfect. :drunk:
 
Kevminator said:
Gordon Strong is a damn good homebrewer, and he has the awards to prove it. I will not belittle him in that respect. We all want to be that good, or consistent, or competitively successful. It is an admirable achievement winning the Ninkasi award, let alone doing it three times. I will not detract from his accomplishments. His credentials are impeccable in that area.

However, if you have ever met Gordon Strong or had a beer judged by him, you will understand what I am about to say. His book is written exacly like he writes up a BJCP scoresheet. Lots of "I LOVE ME AND I AM THE BEST JUDGE AND HOMEBREWER EVER AND YOU ARE NOT" language with not a lot of useful information to be had about improving your beer. So, if you get his book and if you can get by the man's ego, filter out everything he's said he's done, and get to the brass tacks, nuts and bolts of what he is saying, you will find that the 20-30 pages left of his book a great tool. If you can't, then you will find his book 300+ pages difficult to understand, confusing, contradictory, and counter intuitive. Is it worth the money, that's your call.

Some day, when you try to have a conversation with the two of them (Gordon and Gordon's EGO), you will quickly find out exactly how much more he knows about the subject of homebrewing and judging than you, Charlie P, Greg N, Michael J, Stan H, Jamail Z, all other BJCP judges combined, etc. and if you don't, not to worry, it just means that he has not got around to telling you in the first 5-10 seconds but he will tell you. Just how big of an ego you ask? Well, I'll have to bring attention to the fact that he is the head of the BJCP. He wrote the qualifications for GM V certification in such a way that he and only he could be rated as GM V with all others ranked below him. He loves to call peoples' attention to that little tidbit of information to show how great a BJCP judge he is. You know, the FACT that HE is the only GM V rated judge is one of the first things he wrote in his book. Now if that isn't an ego out of control, I don't know what is.

Kev

BTW, Gordon Strong is the Gilderoy Lockhart of Homebrewing! (A Harry Potter reference for those who don't know)
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Well, you can back up your process and technique two ways, scientifically or through results. His book is results oriented as proof of concept.

Just read the intro before buying. You get a sense of the writing and what its all about.

Its not a fun read, you will feel like you are being lectured at but it will help you make better beer. Put aside your own ego and read it
 
I bought and read his book. Maybe I'm not sensitive to that kind of thing but I wasn't put out at all by the contents or style. The "how to drink a lot and not die" section at the end was a little weird, but besides that I thought the book presented lots of useful ideas and information.
 
Gordon's is one of my newer books, but it has more place markers and the pages are more tattered than any other I own.
 
I have read Strong's book and found it to be very informative and educational and I picked up a lot of useful information that has improved my final product as an all grain brewer. That being said I find Strong to be a little rigid and , excuse the expression, a little stuck on himself in some cases but obviously very knowledgeable. I definitely recommend the book!

Also mentioned was Yeast and I highly recommend this book to any style of brewer, yeast seems to be the most misunderstood ingredient we use and this book helps explain all aspects of using yeast in a very straightforward manner and why it is the most important consideration in the process of brewing beer.
 
SC_Ryan said:
That fact that he bumped a one year old thread for his diatribe is amusing as well.
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AND he joined in 2005 and now has five posts! He came here to hunt the guy down. More to this story somewhere.
 
Maybe he's just a lurker who decided he had something he wanted to say? Maybe he does have an ax to grind. Who knows. Can anybody dispute the allegations? I think that's the more interesting question...
 
I am half way threw the book it has been great I have just started AG and learning a lot of good things from this book I didnt know or think about. Its well worth giving a read.
 

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