homebrewing

Sweet red peppers, or capsicums, have a lovely and unique mild spiciness that lifts any meal, so let’s put it in beer. Firstly, it’s important to know that green peppers are actually immature, so they won’t have developed the full depth of flavor we want. Even though they’re usually a little...

There is a strong trend these days toward hot side temperature control, whether merely to maintain stable mash temperatures or to permit automatic temperature ramping, as for step mashes or for mashout. The majority of systems seen use modern electronics combined with electric heating elements...

Few things are as satisfying as tasting a newly opened homebrew and having it meet your expectations. Even more satisfying is when that beer is from the somewhat unpredictable realm of sour beers. Not all sour beers have to be left up to chance in order to achieve predictable results however...

Many all-grain brewers seem to be put off when anything beyond a single infusion comes up in a recipe. Terms like “triple decoction” conjure up images of steampunk laboratories, mad scientists, and hump-backed henchman. Cereal mashing seems to get the same response, which is understandable as...

Gruit…what is it? Well for those of you who are unfamiliar with this term, it represents an entire forgotten past of brewing. For thousands of years humans have been brewing with whatever they could get their hands on. Before the 14th-16th century that included an extremely wide variety of...

In part one, I gave an overview of all the brewing systems that are reviewed in this second part. Blichmann BrewEasy 5-Gallon 240V Blichmann BrewEasy The BrewEasy system follows the “some assembly required” concept. Arriving in multiple boxes, it took several hours as I jumped back and forth...

As an entry level brewer I did little more than buy a Whitelabs vial, bring it to 70ish degrees, gave it a good shake and pitched it into a carboy full of cool wort. Voila! It worked. Eventually, curiosity, evolution, the desire for better beer, or whatever we are calling it today, took over and...

Whether you love the bitter fruit and flower flavors of the American Cascade hop, the double bitterness punch of Centennial, or the herbal, piney goodness of Northern Brewer, hop-heads around the world have plenty of options when it comes to their favorite flowers. Most novice brewers are...

Beer! That delicious and refreshing beverage. When you drink a beer at home or in a bar, it is usually served cold. But does beer really taste better cold? Does temperature matter? Well, yes…yes it does. From grains to glass, temperature matters. If you brew extract, or if you brew all-grain...

What is a Pseudo Lager? For the purposes of this article it will refer to the creation of a lager-like beer with greater flexibility by using an ale yeast. Defining a Pseudo Lager beyond this can get tricky; technically ‘lager’ simply refers to an extended aging of the beer at cooler...

Thanks to El Nino and the mild winter, Spring is just a few drinks away. With Spring comes new growth, and with new growth comes new brewing ingredients. So grab your axe, let’s add some legitimacy to that lumberjack beard you’ve been sporting and let’s make a spruce beer! Ok, so maybe the axe...

For most homebrewers, the process begins and ends in their brewing area, and whatever goes into their beer comes from their friendly neighborhood homebrew supply shop or their favorite online retailer. While there is nothing wrong with that-- it’s a system that serves countless happy homebrewers...

Hello everyone, and welcome to our first "product spotlight". In these articles we are looking to shine the light on some of the new or up and coming products available to us homebrewers. This spotlight features HOPTOPs, a new product which is an airlock created to fit on mason jars. Let's dig...

Brewing Space can be limited in apartments. When I first started homebrewing two years ago, I was browsing all sorts of brewing websites doing my research before I bought any equipment. Almost every picture I saw showed three-tier stands in nice big garages, or fancy basement electric breweries...

The enlightened among us understand the addictive and magical nuances present in our favorite passion: orchestrating processes to create utopian elixir—also known as homebrewing. Homebrewing was effectively legalized on a federal basis on July 1, 1979. President Carter had signed H.R. Bill 1337...

Italy continues to be known more as an interesting beer country and a home to many popular microbreweries. Less known maybe is the fact that Italy is also home to a flourishing homebrewing community. The sudden growth of Italy's craft beer industry, and it's homebrewing community, was unheard of...

Is homebrewing ever easy? In short, yes and no. When I first started thinking about brewing beer I felt unsure at first if I had the skills it would take to be successful. It seemed that somehow I had adopted the assumption that brewing beer was simply too hard. I thought that the brewing...

Its inspiring to see how others are executing their vision of brewing. Brewing is unique in that there is no one way to brew, hence all the varying styles, regions, ingredients and recipes. Brewing is what you want it to be. Some of us a bucket brewers and will never have to move on. Through...

How to Order a Beer Around the World Beer is one of the oldest and most universal drinks of the world, being made for thousands of years by many cultures. Its not terribly surprising then to see the abundance of styles presented in front of us when we head to our craft beer bars and shops. Its...

Over the past year my brewing experience has flourished to new heights. I went from a 2-year brewing hiatus to completely rebuilding my brewing system and process within a few months. I went from a minimally active brew club member to an Officer of Education in a new club. And I went from...