Whats should be the next step in my home brewing education?

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mad32brewing

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Hey everyone, so I kind of hit a fork in the road when it comes to my home brewing knowledge and I really have no idea what and where I should go next. So I have been brewing for about 6 months, where I have made 7 beers, 6 of them have been all-grain BIAB, and now and I feel like I have finally gotten down all the basics of the brewing process(of course my efficiency is not perfect, but I normally come within .03 of my target initial gravity and .02 of my final gravity). I feel pretty confident when it comes to understanding all the basic elements when it comes to the brewing process. This includes sustaining mash temp, understanding my setup/knowing its boil-off ratio and grain absorption, chilling the wort properly, SANITATION of course, temp control, and even the bottling process. But now I just feel stuck, not knowing what I should do next. I would love to know how to make my own recipe because I have only brewed clones to this point. I am not saying that brewing a clone is boring, but I just want to start making the beers I brew my own. There are so many books, forums, websites, and youtube videos out there that I dont know what to choose. What do you guys think I should next? What area should I focus on, hops, grains, water chemistry? So please, if anybody has some advice I would love to hear it.
 
Also pick up Amazon.com

Proper yeast wrangling/knowledge will do a lot for your beers. Also reading up as to what the different yeast strains will give your beer will take it to another level. Even if you settle on just a couple of yeast strains for almost (if not almost) all your brews, know what they can/will do for the recipe. I use Wyeast strains since they have a solid amount of information for each of them. When I started (it might be different now) dry yeast has a fraction of the information available.

After the above yeast book, look at getting the rest in the series. Especially Malt and maybe Water. I use just a few strains of hops, so I've learned them very well. That's another thing that will help you in your education. Use a small set of hops so that you can really learn what they can give you. If you flip all over the place, you'll have a harder time learning what a set few will give. I also avoid more than two hop varieties in any recipe. At least for the flavor and aroma additions. Learning how these interact will also give you a bigger appreciation. I cringe every time I see more than two hops listed in a recipe.

VikeMan's book recommendation can help you to formulate your own recipes. Depending on how good a cook you are, you should be able to look at the information on different malts and hops and get a good idea of what you'll get. At least I was able to. I've been making my own recipes since batch #3. Then again, I've also been cooking (with rarely using a recipe) for over 40 years now.

Don't be afraid to formulate a recipe and try it out. Worst case, you'll learn what doesn't work. Pick apart the clone recipes to figure out how all the ingredients combine to get the end result. That SHOULD help you along in making your own recipes.

As Kirkwooder mentioned, SMaSH recipes can do a lot in your edumication. ;) I have one that is a staple.

BTW, there's also more than one method for hop additions in the boil. You don't HAVE to do the 60 minute addition. Just be prepared to use a LOT more hops.

If you don't already have a recipe formulation software package, get one. I've been using BeerSmith, but if you have something else (that works as well) then just use it. You should be able to put in all the ingredients and it will tell you what you'll get. Well, more than just "you've got BEER!".
 
There are a few ways to go to improve your beers. The first is to see if you can get unbiased evaluation of what problems your beers may be having. It's hard to do yourself early on. Try joining a homebrew club that has certified BJCP judges and ask if they'd run a scoresheet on your beer. That will help narrow things down. Without that...

Yeast pitch rates. Get yourself a stirplate and a 2 liter flask (or a 5 liter if you want to make lagers). Build the yeast per yeast calculators in beersmith or brewfather.

Fermentation temp profiles, Cold starts, ramps, warm finishes for cleanup.

Fermentation and packaging oxygen avoidance. This is a huge problem many newer brewers don't know they have but oxygen destroys beer so easily.

Those things are so important that I'd get going on them before you worry about making up your own recipes. If you have yeast or oxygen problems, you won't even be able to give your recipes a fair evaluation.
 
+1 on yeast starters. I use my 3L flask the most. Even though I also have a 2L and 5L flask. I also do multiple starter steps when needed.
This is covered in the Yeast book (I linked to it before).
Get a pure O2 infusion system for your wort (before you pitch the yeast in). Yeast need O2 to build healthy cell walls. Good O2 levels help them do that and make them less stressed. Less stress on the yeast means they go full active (or ape-****) faster (reduced lag time). I typically go from pitch to 'ape-****' in a few hours.

For some reference, using the 'shake' method of the fermenter has a maximum O2 infusion level of 8ppm. That could be "OK" for low OG brews. But anything bigger needs more O2 than that. Plus you're spending XX minutes shaking and/or stirring your wort (anyone have a bad back?) when you can avoid it completely. You can get the same (or more) O2 into your wort through a sintered stone (on a stainless wand) from the O2 bottle (get a proper regulator that reads L/m) in a LOT less time. I alter the infusion level (L/m), and time, depending on the OG of the batch.

Also start looking into fermenting in vessels that seal up completely. NOT buckets or carboys, but vessels that can also hold pressure. With that, you can [later] experiment with fermenting under pressure. You can also purge the head space with CO2 to help your fermentation stay good longer. Look at kegging as well, instead of bottling. You can still bottle from keg (there's at least a few methods for that) so you can give your beer to others to take home (or bring to them). You can also can your beer at home (Cannular system).

Plenty of options out there. You just need to figure out what your budget level will be (for the week/month/year) and get what makes sense. Learning would be my first choice. But also get gear that makes your brew day easier AND gives you a better end product. Most of what I've done, or bought/made, has been with that goal.

BTW, for storing something with purged headspace in a sealed vessel reference. I brewed an English barleywine in 2013. I put it into an aging vessel in 2014 (on some oak). It's still in there today. We pulled a sample about a month ago. Still good. If anything, the extra time on the oak has made it better. I'll be kegging it soon so that it can go on tap (probably half under beer gas (nitro/CO2 mix) and half under lower pressure CO2.
 
skip this one if, for you, BJCP is a "four letter" word.

BJCP guidelines contain a Commercial Examples section. Clone recipes may be available for study. The guidelines also contain a Style Comparison section.
 
VikeMan said:
"Designing Great Beers" is an excellent book.
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Second this! I've actually be re-reading bits of it lately, just for fun.

OP: Grab yourself a copy of BeerSmith. I've had a "one time basic" license since like, 2013, and there's only been on "major" update in that period. I'm not active across a sufficient number of platforms to make use of the extra cloud storage, either. But hey, $15 a year isn't bad either. Point being, this is a ridiculously fun program to mess around with. Most of the beers I make now come into existence just by mucking around in BeerSmith, seeing what this-or-that tweak could lead to. When I have something that sounds good, I try brewing it. To me, that's the most enjoyable part of brewing.

Beyond that, when I got to the point you're at, I started making SMASH-like recipes. Started with an IPA-like recipe, and then would change one thing from batch to batch: base or characters malt, hops, yeast, whatever. That really helps learn how a particular ingredient tastes, or works with others. From there, I started messing with process changes (boil length, mash temps or steps--even a few legitimate decoction mashes, which are way too much work for me, I learned--hopping rates or times or methods, etc).

Along the way, I've collected quite a few books, mostly from Brewer's Publications, that have been enlightening, if nothing else. Daniels' Designing Great Beers and Palmer's How To Brew have become go-to references for me, and I quite like the various style guides. They're great for inspiration, if nothing else.
 
Figure our what commercial beers or styles you really like, then brew a similar or clone homebrew version and have experienced drinkers over for blind taste tests comparing your brew to the commercial version. What do you like about your version? What needs to be changed/improved? Keep rebrewing until you get it dialed in and then move on to the next style of beer you like.
 
mad32brewing said:
I would love to know how to make my own recipe because I have only brewed clones to this point.
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sounds like you answered you're own question! you'd get A LOT of different opinions, i'd say effec, bulk grain buying from someone local if possible, or maybe malting your own to get costs down? but my views aren't popular!

Alton Brown once said of spices that blending spices from the same family is easier, so you're doing good with all barley!
 
I was thinking more about expanding my knowledge of the brewing process as a whole. Like what book and course do you think I should get to better understand how to make my own recipes and really dial in the craft.
 
mad32brewing said:
I was thinking more about expanding my knowledge of the brewing process as a whole. Like what book and course do you think I should get to better understand how to make my own recipes and really dial in the craft.
Click to expand...


i'd say look at more recipies that give %'s instead of weights...buy a lot of different malts try them yourself. brewin' beer ain't rocket science, it's actually easy. and if you're trying to be a BIG BAD drug dealer just toss some **** in a pot, shove your balls in their face! if your trying to win awards with beer, self confidence is first and foremost. nobody respects a god that isn't confident!
 
There's nothing like empiricism for learning how to brew: Try, evaluate, tweak, repeat. But doing that in a vacuum, totally blind, is pointless when there is so much reference material out there to use as a baseline.

You create recipes to produce something that you envision in your imagination. But your imagination isn't completely spontaneous. It comes up with ideas based on what it's already aware of. So, how aware are you already of the world of beer styles? And based on that awareness, what do you want to brew?

The books Brewing Classic Styles and Designing Great Beers are excellent in this regard. They will teach you a little about the world of beer styles. Some you'll recognize and be able to pinpoint an example you've already sampled. Others you've heard of but never tried. Still others will be completely unfamiliar.

Start by reviewing (and brewing) successful recipes in books like these, and also look up how others have explored the styles. You will see patterns emerge, but you'll also see the wide range of variation present. You'll want to push some boundaries, but maybe you'll also want to create your own classic versions. Sky's the limit.

Along the way, you will learn about grain, hops, water, and yeast - because all of those are key to brewing the various styles. Each one is handled uniquely in each style or national brewing tradition. That's where the depth of one's brewing education is really formed, not just coming up with random recipes, but manipulating ingredients and techniques in order to create something specific from the imagination.
 
after the last post and mine. remember don't be too worried about slapping ͲϢ on it and calling it your own! styles were invented by people trying to stand out from the crowd!
 
Thanks for the advice. I definitely need to brew and drink a lot more beer. I am trying to find some other beer people to try my beers to actually get some good input. The only people that get to taste my beer right now, due to covid and all of that, has been my dad, who like most dads are what some might call an experienced drinker and my college roommates.
 
madscientist451 said:
Figure our what commercial beers or styles you really like, then brew a similar or clone homebrew version
Click to expand...
Excellent advice. Go down to Total Wine and More or Bevmo or whatever bottle shop you can and purchase a number of representative samples of the beer you want to produce. Research those clone recipes online for starters. Then come up with a composite batch which you can work on using Brewer's Friend. It's a lot of fun getting your recipe's balanced out, and you can make incremental changes with each new batch until you get what you like!
 
3 Dawg Night said:
Adding to the discussion, what do you guys think about brewing a bunch of different styles vs. focusing on a handful of styles in the beginning?
Click to expand...

I'd say it depends on your goals. If you want to dial in your process, including consistency, repeat the same style(s). If you want to explore ingredients and their properties, brew a bunch of styles.
 
Agree it's about goals. One approach is to pick a relatively simple style like a blonde ale and brew it several times only changing a single variable. Brew one batch and split it across smaller fermenters using either different yeast or different temperatures. That kind of experience taught me more than any book could.
 
3 Dawg Night said:
what do you guys think about brewing a bunch of different styles vs. focusing on a handful of styles in the beginning?
Click to expand...
Starting out, there are a number of techniques that one must do well to make enjoyable beer. How To Brew, 4e (2017), chapter 1 lists five of them for extract brewers. Let's add oxygen ingress management. For BIAB, add mash temperature control (not hard, wrap the kettle in insulation), water adjustments for proper mashing (not hard assuming low mineral water) and water adjustments for flavor (again, not hard assuming low mineral water).

After that, either approach (bunch of styles vs limited styles) will produce enjoyable beer and allow for further experimentation with techniques / ingredients.
 
mad32brewing said:
Hey everyone, so I kind of hit a fork in the road when it comes to my home brewing knowledge and I really have no idea what and where I should go next. So I have been brewing for about 6 months, where I have made 7 beers, 6 of them have been all-grain BIAB, and now and I feel like I have finally gotten down all the basics of the brewing process(of course my efficiency is not perfect, but I normally come within .03 of my target initial gravity and .02 of my final gravity). I feel pretty confident when it comes to understanding all the basic elements when it comes to the brewing process. This includes sustaining mash temp, understanding my setup/knowing its boil-off ratio and grain absorption, chilling the wort properly, SANITATION of course, temp control, and even the bottling process. But now I just feel stuck, not knowing what I should do next. I would love to know how to make my own recipe because I have only brewed clones to this point. I am not saying that brewing a clone is boring, but I just want to start making the beers I brew my own. There are so many books, forums, websites, and youtube videos out there that I dont know what to choose. What do you guys think I should next? What area should I focus on, hops, grains, water chemistry? So please, if anybody has some advice I would love to hear it.
Click to expand...
Great thread. I'm at your stage. Ive found Brewfather a step in the right direction to designing your own beer. But what is your own beer? I like the idea of going to style with Hefe Weizens and big Belgium beers. So not really inventing anything new. Go to what works i think.
 
First, I apologies for any repeats as there are a lot of replies with a lot of great info that I am too lazy to review prior to posting :).

I started brewing a couple years ago so just recently went through the accelerated learning period you are experiencing. My thoughts on how to keep growing:
  1. Learn the differences between all the malts, adjunct grains, and sugars; understand how the malts are made (kilned, drum roasted, stewed, etc) and the types of flavors they will deliver. Not just between the categories of Base, Kilned, Crystal, Roasted, Adjuncts, but within them as well. For example, Vienna vs Munich. Amber vs Victory. Crystal vs Caramunich, Special B vs Crystal.
  2. Avoid building kitchen sink beers. The great beers of the world usually have very simple grain bills. You don't need to go SMASH, but keeping your recipe's simple will usually lead to a better beer, and also one where you can isolate out the flavors and learn how different grains and hops impact flavor.
  3. You did not mention water chemistry. Learn your water chemistry and how to adjust it to hit mash PH and target beer profiles
  4. Evaluate your process for oxygen exposure and make changes - cold side is most important, but hot side may help as well.
  5. While you know your process and can come close to hitting your target OG, it sounds like you don't know how to determine the amount of sugars in your preboil wort and make adjustments so that you hit your OG every time. Learn how to count points and make adjustments.
  6. Look into kegging if you have the space and $. I found it so much easier than bottling. Also, it makes it easier to put in place practices to lower post fermentation oxygen exposure
As far as books to read, start with these two and they will make you so much better.
  • How to Brew by John Palmer. There is no better book than this. It has everything. It is up to date. It goes deep into everything but is still easy to understand.
  • Brewing Better Beer by Gordon Strong. Not a another how to book, rather a book about tips to make you better.
  • If you like Belgian Beers, then read Brew like a Monk. It's a fun read.
Finally, there is so much great info on the internet, just search for whatever you want to learn about. Here are a few links to get you started:
  • Start with this article - very important about darker malts. Avoiding the Harsh Zone - Brew Your Own
  • Explore Braukaiser's site. This is the nirvana of data driven brewing analysis - http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Braukaiser.com
  • Explore Brulosophy - Brülosophy BTW, I just opened up Pandora's box, so I must qualify. This site will probably not make you a better brewer, but it will provide some great entertainment. Brulosophy is a fun site where they do one on one homebrewing experiments to test if a single variable does in fact have an impact on the outcome of a beer. While they use a statistical approach to evaluate the results, their process is not perfect and the way they write their conclusions could lead to a brewer doing something that has not actually been scientifically proven. That said, like the authors of the site's mind set, just take the conclusions for what they are - interesting, fun, make you feel better when you screw up or implementing a process change that is just too difficult, provide answers to experiments that you would like to do at home, data that you can choose to accept or ignore.
Hope this helps - enjoy your journey. The learning is the most fun part of the brewing.
 
Wolffie said:
I was warned of Trojan only on this selection by (Malwarebytes program I run??)
Click to expand...
It's plausible that the web site is fine and you were involved in a MITM attack. I asked the forum admins to change the link (back) to https. That will help prevent future MITM attacks.

ETA: Links in #9 & #30 have been updated. Thanks!
 
Last edited:
Kent88 said:
this is a browser extension I personally use
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Good choice. There are others.

Any idea when the software that HBT uses will start recommending https URLs when typing/editing posts? The software seems to want to "improve" the link in a number of situations, so asking about https (vs http) would seem to be another way to avoid third party interference with content.
 
If you're interested in challenging yourself and learning as well as recipe design. Try putting together a recipe by hand, that is, not using a recipe calculator. Try to find the formulas and add up the gravity points, ABV, ibu, srm etc yourself. Then take your calculations and match with a recipe calculator to see how close you are.

If you're good with excel you can even create your own recipe calculator as I did.

Either way you'll learn all the ins and outs of recipe making by pulling back the curtains and looking in depth at it.

It's actually how I started out....
 
If you have down time to listen to podcasts, I learned SO much from listening to the various shows of The Brewing Network over the years. Check out Brew Strong, Brewing With Style and Dr. Homebrew. Some great content is in older shows and might be a bit outdated, but much of it is still useful. The Session used to have more homebrew information, but has favored focusing on commercial craft beer lately. If you like your humor inappropriate and your homebrewing information laced with sophomoric humor, go back and check out The Session from 2-3 years ago and before.
 

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