Something You Wish You’d Started Doing Sooner (in Home Brewing)

[BeerAndTele]

Electric

Boogie woogie woogie

 

[BeerAndTele]

For me it was the switch from extract to small batch (2.5 gal) stovetop BIAB batches. It’s easy, allowed me to brew more often, and it increased the number to ways to tweak and refine recipes.

 

[GoodTruble]

These answers, while good advice generally, may not necessarily correlate to "good advice for a new brewer." I agree with everything said above, but my advice for a new brewer is to learn the process on cheap equipment first (like stove top and a fermonster). Once you can make acceptable (not bad) beer on cheap equipment, you can decide what equipment upgrades will suit you best. But I suggest learning the simple stuff first before adding more complicated layers (even if those layers would improve beer overall, if you don't have the basics down, it won't matter).

This allows you to (1) make sure you like brewing and will keep doing it long enough to justify spending more money and (2) figure out what process/schedule/etc fits your situation and what equipment upgrades would improve your brewing experience most.

Your beer will get better with time and experience any way. Skipping straight to more expensive and complicated stuff may not speed up that timeline much.

But in keeping with the assignment, I wish I had known more about planning brews further in advance. Planning ahead can make brew days go much quicker and smoother and help you keep the types and amounts of beer you want onhand. I now usually start planning beers/brew days 3-4 months in advance.

 

[Rich1234]

Lots of good advice in this thread. One thing I might add is to use a brewing app. I've got about 20 batches under my belt and I'm making some pretty good, consistent warm fermented pressure pseudo-lagers. Brewfather guides you through your brew day and you're not wondering afterword... Did I forget step x? Also, you can add your notes right along as you go.

Also, I'd say electric brewing has made my brew day easier as well. Something to look into if you've got the $$ to get into. You certainly can throw a lot of money at this hobby if you're not careful... lol

 

[TheCache]

I'm not sure I could say that there is any one thing I wish "I had started doing sooner", but rather as I concentrated on each step of the process I found something that made that activity more efficient or more enjoyable or both and then incorporated it into the process. But there were a few key moments along the way...

To get wort out of a kettle I read discovered auto-siphon, but then somewhere along the line I wanted a fermenter that was easier to work with so I got a fermonster and ordered it with a spigot - amazing! No more autosiphon to bottling bucket.

When I wanted clearer beer I tried cold crashing and learned that suck back was really a thing so I read more and discovered cold crash guardian which solved the issue and which also led eventually to dosing bottles and bottling direct from the fermenter after the crash with guardian still attached. All of which helped control oxidation and made bottling much simpler. Also learned about gelatin somewhere in this stage.

When I wanted to brew a lager I learned about temp control and incorporated a freezer, heat mat, and ink bird controller.

When I wanted to expand my grain options I tried one partial mash brew (had been extract/steeping before that). The partial mash was so simple I immediately went all grain BIAB stovetop with 2.5 gallon batches and it was much simpler than I thought, but I had a couple years of experience with extract under my belt (over hanging over as the case may be).


When I started all-grain I wanted to save recipes and discovered brewing software and all of the details that come with that - eventually leading to mash temp, water additions, ph all new things to learn to control and use when brewing.

The point is, these were all important steps and additions in my brewing development, but I learned them when I was ready for them. If I had learned them earlier they probably would not have made much sense because I just wasn't there yet.

The journey, one step after another, is the most enjoyable part of brewing for me, even on par with relaxing with a homebrew.

 

[Steverus07]

These answers, while good advice generally, may not necessarily correlate to "good advice for a new brewer." I agree with everything said above, but my advice for a new brewer is to learn the process on cheap equipment first (like stove top and a fermonster). Once you can make acceptable (not bad) beer on cheap equipment, you can decide what equipment upgrades will suit you best. But I suggest learning the simple stuff first before adding more complicated layers (even if those layers would improve beer overall, if you don't have the basics down, it won't matter).

This allows you to (1) make sure you like brewing and will keep doing it long enough to justify spending more money and (2) figure out what process/schedule/etc fits your situation and what equipment upgrades would improve your brewing experience most.

Your beer will get better with time and experience any way. Skipping straight to more expensive and complicated stuff may not speed up that timeline much.

But in keeping with the assignment, I wish I had known more about planning brews further in advance. Planning ahead can make brew days go much quicker and smoother and help you keep the types and amounts of beer you want onhand. I now usually start planning beers/brew days 3-4 months in advance.

I love/hate this advice. I’m in the “buy once/cry once” camp generally with hobbies, so I hated that all the new brewer kits are limited volume, extract focused. That’s what I’d gotten for Christmas and it frustrates me that nearly 100% of new brewers are oriented on this experience.

But now, further down the rabbit hole, I’m starting to appreciate the advice. I can’t count the number of things I’ve gotten that on process refinement or exposure I realized we’re not the best option for me or my preferred process.

So maybe I’ll offer the advice in a different way. You don’t know what you don’t know. You can make high quality beer without more expensive stuff. Take your time with “entry-level equipment (which is whatever equipment you happen to start with)” - it may limit you in some ways but you can navigate and mitigate these limits. And figuring out what that looks like can help make sure that if you need to buy stuff, that stuff won’t subsequently require replacement to match your desires either. Brew with other people who have different stuff before you replace any stuff and you’ll better understand.

I’ve made decent beer with extracts, all grain, carboys, kegs, stainless bucket and conical fermenters. Kits, clone recipes, and my own inventions. With electric and propane. And I’m not that great a brewer - it’s just easy to make decent beer whatever your equipment if you clean well and follow the process.

 

[Jaybird]

Homebrew club!

AB_SO-FRICKING-LUTLY! I actually started the Shasta Society of Brewers (SSOB's) our local homebrew club about a year before I started my company that is now Nor Cal Brewing Solutions. Your LHBC will be invaluable to a new brewer.

Cheers
Jay

 

[DuncB]

Wish I'd dared to build the gear from Dave Lines books and get all grain brewing last century. Instead gave up malt extract brewing for 26 years, before jumping into all grain again.
What a lot of joy missed there.

 

[TheCache]

Well, have to update my statement from above. I've been doing stove top BIAB for a few years using a paint strainer bag and it was fun, but it started to tear so last week I received a bag from @wilserbrewer . OMG! I got pretty good at working with the square corners on the old bag to avoid the inevitable spill over, but using a bag with a rounded bottom is a game changer.

Had I started with a Wilser bag, I might not have a permanent mark on my stove top (gas stove, but metal catch pan) when I missed some wort spillover and cooked it onto the stove top for 60 minutes :-(

So I stand corrected, there is something I wish I had thought to do earlier, and my wife probable does too, although she is very nice about it as she quietly keeps attempting to clean off the baked on wort.

 

[TheMadKing]

Well, have to update my statement from above. I've been doing stove top BIAB for a few years using a paint strainer bag and it was fun, but it started to tear so last week I received a bag from @wilserbrewer . OMG! I got pretty good at working with the square corners on the old bag to avoid the inevitable spill over, but using a bag with a rounded bottom is a game changer.

Had I started with a Wilser bag, I might not have a permanent mark on my stove top (gas stove, but metal catch pan) when I missed some wort spillover and cooked it onto the stove top for 60 minutes :-(

So I stand corrected, there is something I wish I had thought to do earlier, and my wife probable does too, although she is very nice about it as she quietly keeps attempting to clean off the baked on wort.

A thick PBW solution left on overnight will dissolve that wort

 

[TheMadKing]

Wish I'd dared to build the gear from Dave Lines books and get all grain brewing last century. Instead gave up malt extract brewing for 26 years, before jumping into all grain again.
What a lot of joy missed there.

Same here, I extract brewed from 2008 - 2014 and I wish I had started out with all-grain. I also wish I had known about John Palmer's How to Brew when I first started. It was super valuable in helping me feel confident in all my basic process steps early on

 

[TheCache]

A thick PBW solution left on overnight will dissolve that wort

Thanks! I tried a lot of things, including some overnight soaks, but never thought of PBW. I'll give it a try.

 

[Bobby_M]

It's almost impossible for a 15+ year veteran of brewing to have a good enough memory or deep enough hindsight to remember what it's like to be completely green. The best we can really do is recall some of the things that we changed about our process that ended up making a noticeable and positive impact. I want to reiterate how important it is to get yourself social with all kinds of brewers which is best done in a club. Ask to observe a few brew days. Look for locations where the Big Brew is taking place and visit one of them. Big Brew for National Homebrew Day May 6, 2023

There's also a club finder

https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/homebrew-clubs/find-a-homebrew-club/

 

[Red over White]

Brew your favorite beer over and over until you absolutely nail it. After that it's easy.

 

[hottpeper13]

Teach a buddy to brew day is the first Sat. in Nov. Last year we had 50+ mph wind and rain. Thank me for having gone electric in the basement where the weather was fine. Still managed to get 8 grilled pizzas and a 6 gal batch done outside with a couple guys holding down the screwed to the deck canopy.
Find one or host one,I've done it for the past 5 yrs. Pizza and beer has to be the best combo ever!

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

perhaps related to #45: https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/aha-events/learn-to-homebrew-day/.

Fore me, before 2020, these two events (Learn How To Day, Big Brew for National Homebrew Day) were a great way to meet local home brewers, find clubs, etc. I didn't try to participate in 2022.

Consider giving these local events a fresh look in 2023.

 

[Clint Yeastwood]

If you're sure you're going to keep brewing, buy the good stuff the first time around. Not necessarily the expensive stuff, but the stuff that works and will not fall apart right away. Of course, it tends to be more expensive.

Start with kegging, not bottling. I guess some guys don't mind all the extra work, but kegging is easier and just plain better. I will never bottle again.

Question standard practices vigorously and get information from people who know the truth. A bunch of standard practices have turned out to be wastes of time.

Write your own recipes and learn how ingredients and practices affect beer. Why brew what you can buy?

 

[OakIslandBrewery]

It's almost impossible for a 15+ year veteran of brewing to have a good enough memory or deep enough hindsight to remember what it's like to be completely green. The best we can really do is recall some of the things that we changed about our process that ended up making a noticeable and positive impact. I want to reiterate how important it is to get yourself social with all kinds of brewers which is best done in a club. Ask to observe a few brew days. Look for locations where the Big Brew is taking place and visit one of them. Big Brew for National Homebrew Day May 6, 2023

There's also a club finder

https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/homebrew-clubs/find-a-homebrew-club/

I couldn't agree more with joining a club. I've learned so much for the local clubs here and even gained the confidence to start all grain brewing. I've been all grain for 20+ years now, before that was extract then partial mashing.

I've mention in numerous threads I started brewing when there was much available for home brewers let alone people brewing their own beer. It was very primitive but put down the foundation to expand, learn and seek out others who brewed. That first time was almost forty years ago now (which makes me sound old?) but I keep brewing, learning with each brew and learning from a whole bunch of others that brew and new folks just learning themselves. It's an evolving hobby in many different ways.

 

[Zenmeister]

Just starting out...three things really:

1. Learn as much as you can. I recommend Palmers book (How to brew) and Daniels book (Making great beers.) I got them early on and reference them frequently to this day, but also use this forum and brew clubs for knowledge, and of course a local homebrew shop if you have one nearby.
2. Sanitation/Cleaning: Make sure, before your brew day that everything is cleaned and sanitized, making doubly sure everything on the cold side is doubly sanitized, with Star San, or something similar. You can never recover a spoiled beer, especially one that has all sorts of biological growth spurting up from it. Expect that cleaning is as much a part of brewing as boiling the wort.
3. Oxygen Control: O2 will ruin a beer, and gives it that lovely "wet cardboard taste". And it doesn't take a lot to ruin it. So to start, do the little things right that you can control right now: Do not transfer to a Secondary fermenter. EVER! It does no good and there is now way you can do it without picking up additional O2. Try to do everything possible to keep your beer calm and quiet, i.e. no splashing or moving around too much.
   If you are just starting out, you will likely not have all the equipment (or know how to use it) to control O2, but you can still make excellent drinkable beer by being aware of O2, and mitigating it. Get the expensive stuff later when you decide to stay with this hobby.

These are things you can/should do now, without buying a lot of expensive gear. (Trust me...I have LOTS of expensive gear now...) Finally, remember the motto of the HomeBrewTalk forum: RDWHAHB! *
Happy Brewing!

*Relax, Don't Worry, Have A Home Brew!

 

[mattdee1]

There are lots of things I learned along the way that really helped/improved my brewing but there aren't very many where I find myself really wishing I had started doing them sooner. I say this because if you jump too quickly into doing everything by "best practices" then you don't get the benefit of seeing first hand how NOT doing best practices impacts your results. For me, a great example of this would be building my own water profiles from RO rather than using untreated tap water. I developed lots of experience with the latter, was dissatisfied with it, and made the change to RO. I'm glad I have that firsthand experience to see the improvements rather than going directly to RO and taking the benefits on faith because I read about them on the internet. Maybe I'm just weird like that.

If I had to pick something for this thread, it would be the management of oxygen exposure on the cold side. Having a fermentor that can hold pressure, using fermentation CO2 to purge kegs, doing closed transfers, etc. I'm still glad that I have firsthand experience ruining hoppy beers with open transfers, but maybe I didn't need to ruin dozens of them before making this particular change. Hops are expensive!