Keeping Notes

How do all of you keep notes? How detailed are the notes? Are they electronic or on paper?

When I started brewing I got a notebook to keep my beer recipes and notes in, also using beersmith for recipe building (but just that). It worked well for a while; I got a handful of recipes in there. I was being more meticulous than I care to about keeping the format for my recipes and notes the same, so as to maintain some level of uniformity and repeatability. I think that was my downfall, though. I stopped using the notebook, and my last year and a half, the only aspect of my beer recipes is the bare bones recipes in Beersmith. I don't back fill with tasting notes or impressions during bottling/kegging, don't note any anomalies that may have happened during brew day. It was kind of the intention I had of the notebook to do that, but I think I was keeping a more rigid format than my scatterbrained self could handle.

I need a better system, but writing down my impression about the beer is the last thing I think about when cracking open that first bottle of a batch (or pouring the first draw from a keg...). Maybe I'll go back to the notebook in a more free form way, letting beersmith keep the rigid recipe format while the notebook is just tasting impressions, unique events during brewing or fermentation, etc.

I've done 73 Batches now - All kept in outlook. It works for me - I label an all day calendar appointment as 73.Brewday: Stout and then write the specifics - recipe, temps, any Problems, changes in equipment and Results.
This makes it easy by searching on "Brewday" and all the days pop up so I can simply copy-paste and then alter the notes or make changes.
Lately I've started writing where I purchased the grains with cost and shipping charges - makes it simple to reorder.

Good thread. I never make or keep any tasting notes. Perhaps this is something I can do.

Usually I do notes during the brewing. I'll write anything and everything down. I just stash them in a notebook or a folder. I have found that I am referring back to them often. They help formulate future recipes, especially.

Tasting notes can be added to these. Except I find that I can't critique the flavor well of my own brews. They often taste similar, with only minor varying flavor differences. Nonetheless, it's a good idea!

Brewing notes I keep in Beersmith.
Tasting notes I am terrible about, have an app in my phone for it and never use it.

For beers, I use Beersmith, and print the recipe from there. I hand write notes, and try to remember to put them in Beersmith under "notes". Usually I remember, but not always!

For wines, I print out the recipe (saved in my documents on Word) and then hand write notes and observations. Since I make several of the same wines from year to year, I just pull out that folder and start another page for each year. I try very hard to make notes on the wines, due to yearly variations in the fruit. Some acid adjustments and tannin amounts change quite a bit, and it's nice to see a pattern over 10+ years.

For mead and cider, I do something similar to the wine folder.

I also make soap, so in my desk draw there is a beer folder (well, multiple folders, by year), a soap folder, a wine folder, etc. All have pretty good notes, including pH. I'm pretty anal, I guess.

I write everything about the beer with dates & times of day in a notebook. Any tasting notes,color,clarity,recipe,etc. Anything & everything. I also take pics of a glass of the beer for future reference.

Notes are the only way to improve your process. I just had a starter fail and refered to my notes and still cannot determine where I went wrong. This prompted an investigation to see why it was such an epic failure. So instead of brewing this weekend I will have my lab coat on and conduct an experiment to find the cause. It is good to get in a ritual of sorts that includes copious notes. You never know when you will have a failure like I did and need to investigate. If you have a good set of notes that are thorough and complete you will be way ahead if this ever happens to you too. I had gotten lax because "It's just a starter" and I had "done it" many times before successfully.... So I slacked on the notes and taking measurements and now I have a mystery..... That sucks and it cost money. Take notes, because you never know when you will need them.

Wheelchair Bob

^The vaery reason for taking good notes. Not just repeatability,but problem solving.

I'm still fairly new to brewing, with only 14 batches under my belt. I'm using BrewTarget for crafting recipes and printing out brew day instructions. But I also keep meticulous notes in MS Word as well, including the recipe used, comments on my brewing and fermentation process, and tasting notes once the beer is ready for consumption. Each brew is indexed and links provide easy navigation through the document. I also have handy references in the document, such as beer style color ranges and external links for things like descriptions of various yeast strains and a hop substitution guide. Typing this, I realize it all sounds kind of anal, but it has definitely helped reduce the amount of mistakes made and improved the quality of my brews.

Unionrdr, I like the idea of adding a photo of the finished product for reference.

I thought it was a good idea to have a picture file with corresponding pics of the finished brew titled with the same name as the recipe for future reference. Nice to see what it looks like for more direct comparisons. I noticed that Beersmith2 allows for a pic of your own in place of the graphic version at the upper right of the recipe. Gotta try that...

I've used a notebook from brew one.

I have become a bit slack with how much detail i record since the newness of the hobby has worm off, howeverI still have the most important bits of information recorded. ie. OG FG Mash temps ferm temps grain and or extract bill, hops and yeast used.

I've been messing with Beersmith for a while now and i think i'm ready to start using it more seriously.

I use google drive for notes that go into making a batch (it goes with their e-mail and quest for world domination). I also have web sites for wine & beer that I put pictures of the process on each batch. I tried putting links to the site to the particular batch in QR form on labels on the bottles, but they won't go small enough to not be annoying. I have a few batches waiting to be labeled so I am going to try a separate qr label pointing to my site. That way I (and others) can see what went into the making of the beverage in hand. As far as notes on tasting and how to better the next batch - google drive.

I use a three ring binder. In the front is a list of brew dates with the beer brewed, if it was dry hopped, if it was put in secondary and the bottle date with the identifying mark on the cap.

Then I use clear sheet protectors that I put a brew checklist with notes on it, such as how big of a starter, OG and FG, mash temp and time, boil time, pitching temp, fermentation temp and time, a printed out copy of the recipe and any other information goes in that sheet protector too. Tasting notes go in there too. I will often then input that info back into the brew software.

I have all the information for every beer I have brewed.

I've made it a goal to take more detailed notes on every brew. I'm going to try to keep them all in Beersmith since I already use it and want to keep everything in one place.

I too am gaining experience with BeerSmith2. I enjoy the calendar function, the tasting notes, the fermentation schedule, and the many functions. I have to save different versions of a beer as different names in order to have separate notes.
I have started putting pictures of the final product in the file also.