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Over the years, I have come to understand that the basic guidelines of beer quality recipes design are often confusing and rarely properly articulated. In the week we’re moving to look at ways to design a great beer dish at home employing a tried and correct process. What follows is surely what I think about an overview of the essence of beer recipe design. Commencing a New Menu When I develop a new beer formula, I typically start by choosing a target beer type. Creativity and interpretation, but by starting with a beer style, you establish the baseline for the beer you are going to brew. A good starting reference is the style guidelines. Organized by the Beer Judge Certification Program, the style guideline provides detailed specifications and suggested ingredients for nearly 100 different styles of beer. So, this is a good place to start, how to brew beer at home. These guidelines also provide ranges for average color, original and bitterness gravity for the beer which can help you achieve the appropriate balance for the beer. Choosing the Ingredients The next step in designing the beer is to pick appropriate ingredients. Beer is made from yeast, water, malt and hops. Before you jump to doing detailed design, do a bit of research to determine what ingredients in each category are typically used your target beer style, and in roughly what proportions. For proportions, I prefer to work initially in percentages such as 80% pale malt, 15% caramel malt and 5% chocolate malt this makes it easier to scale things later on. Often does not have detailed breakouts of proportions, though the style guide provides some information on typical ingredients used. One must be careful when using someone else recipe as often they are far from the actual beer style, although our recipes page also provides some great examples, as do a number of other online recipe web sites. Another great resource is brewing books - one of my favorites Designing Great Beers, which has detailed analysis of percentages of ingredients used in award winning and commercial beer examples. Finally, you can often find articles or messages for a particular beer style using a simple search or search on a discussion forum. The goal of all of your research is to determine ingredients appropriate to the style. Using the wrong ingredients. Alternatively, selecting the wrong proportions will result in a beer with the wrong flavor and balance. You will rarely go wrong using ingredients that are authentic to the style. Brewing by the Numbers Once you have your ingredients selected, and have them apportioned in roughly the correct way it’s time to actually enter the beer into a spreadsheet or program, and run the numbers. If you don’t have the recipe properly adjusted and balanced for your equipment and your settings you will likely end up way off your target style, although this is an important step, which many beginning brewers skip. Brewing Techniques After you have the proper ingredients and have balanced the recipe by the numbers, the final step is to look at the techniques needed to brew this style of beer. Different styles definitely require application of a variety of brewing techniques. Some of the techniques to consider include: Hop Techniques - A variety of hop techniques are available, most of which are covered in our article on hop techniques. Examples include first wort hopping, dry hopping, late hop additions, bittering hops, and use of a hop back. Different beer styles require different methods to achieve the appropriate balance. Mash Techniques - For all grain and partial mash brewers, adjusting your mash temperature is critical to achieving the appropriate body for your beer. Lower mash temperature during the main conversion step will result in a lower body beer and higher mash temperatures result in more body. If appropriate to the style, in addition, advanced brewers may want to consider advanced techniques like decoration mashing. Aging, Fermenting and Layering - The temperature for fermenting your beer should be appropriate for the beer and yeast you are using. Yeast manufacturers as well as most brewing software publish appropriate temperature ranges for fermentation of each yeast. Aging and layering should also match your target style. Beer design is clearly one part art, and one part science which is what makes it an enjoyable and interesting hobby. Select quality ingredients, run the numbers and follow good brewing techniques you can make fantastic beer at home using your own recipes, if you do your homework. Visit us for more information at: course.craftbeerathome.com.
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