Hops Squeezing and Hops Absorption – More Bitterness Please

Friday, May 10th, 2013

Should we squeeze out the hops bag or not? A recent IPA brew session called for 7 ounces of hops. The recipe is 110 IBU with a lot of late hopping.  For this brew, I did not squeeze out the hops bags and left them behind after draining the kettle. I then squeezed ...

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Brewing Water Treatment in 600 Words

Friday, April 12th, 2013

It seems that over the last few years many more home brewers have taken an interest in understanding and modifying their brewing water. And there are good reasons to do so. Depending on the beer that is brewed and the water quality, modifying the brewing water can take a beer ...

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Making Sense of Efficiency Definitions

Friday, November 30th, 2012

When using brewing calculators like Brewer's Friend brewers are inadvertently confronted with the concept of efficiency. While efficiency is an important tool in making the brewing process more predictable, there exists a lot of confusion around various definitions for efficiency. Let me clear up most of them. In brewing, just like ...

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On the relationship between Plato and specific gravity

Wednesday, October 31st, 2012

One of the most important measurements in brewing is the "sugar" content of wort and, later, beer. Sugar is in parenthesis because what is dissolved in wort is more than just sugar. It's various sugars, proteins, lipids, minerals and trace elements. The professional brewing world refers to this collection of ...

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15 Minute Boil Tested

Saturday, August 25th, 2012

Earlier this year, a fellow named Brian reached out to us for a collaboration project. He's a very cool guy, an award winning brewer, and happens to be the owner of The Brew Mentor, a home brew store in Mentor, Ohio. Brian had an idea that makes brewing easier for ...

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Summer Brewing Update

Sunday, June 17th, 2012

The first day of summer is right around the corner.  It is time for summer beers to be brewed and enjoyed. Usually this means choosing delicate aromatic hops, fruity yeasts, and shooting for a drier finish. Liquid refreshment here we come! We played around with five different batches, each overlapping the ...

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First Brew Adventure

Tuesday, May 22nd, 2012

Post by Brewer Aaron: Brewing my first batch of beer today --a hefewiezen with citra hops-- only solidified the wisdom that failure is good, especially the right kind. In this case, my first brewing experience was fraught with failures, but ones that we were set up to recover from gracefully and ...

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Myths About Electric Brewing Dispelled

Saturday, April 14th, 2012

Personally, it has been eight batches since the upgrade to electric. The electric brewery is just awesome. There have been zero leaks on my weld-less fittings and no problems with operation.   Going into the upgrade, there were a few myths I was concerned about. Let me tell you the facts:   You can ...

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How long does it take to brew a batch of beer?

Saturday, March 10th, 2012

Brewing beer can take as little as two and a half hours for a simple extract batch and up to six hours for a complex all grain recipe. It is not a good idea to rush anything in brewing. Cutting back the boil time is not feasible because that time ...

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Infected Batch Forensics

Saturday, November 12th, 2011

For the first time in many years I experienced a bad batch of home brewed beer last month. I am sharing this with the community so you can avoid my mistake. It is embarrassing! Being out the time and money for the batch and having an empty keg sucks. However, I ...

Posted in Brewing, Yeast Cultures | 9 Comments »