When I interview top brewers both for the blog and BeerSmith podcast, time and time again they mention the importance of being able to judge beer to become a better brewer.  Knowing how to spot and correct the flaws in a beer is a critical skill if you want to compete or just make better beer for home consumption.  This week we take a tiny peek into the surprisingly complex world of beer tasting.

Why Beer Judging Matters?

For top beer competitors, judging beer is everything – as certified beer judges ultimately determine which brews make it to the winner’s circle.  However even for the average brewer who does not want to compete, knowing how to evaluate a beer is the key to making it better.  If you can’t make an objective evaluation of your beer including its strengths and flaws, you have no basis for improving it.

The Beer Judge Certification Program and Style Guideline

The BJCP (at bjcp.org) runs a program to “promote beer literacy and the appreciation of real beer, and to recognize beer tasting and evaluation skills”, and has about 3,900 active beer judges that evaluate beer competitions at all levels here in the United States, and also in many countries abroad.  BJCP has a multi-level certification program which I’ve covered before in interviews with Gordon Strong both on the blog and podcast.  If you are interested in becoming a judge I recommend visiting their site.

They also publish the very popular BJCP Beer Style Guide which is included in my BeerSmith software – it provides guidelines for various beer styles.  These style guidelines can be very useful for judging a particular beer as they provide specific guidance on taste, appearance, color, bitterness, and gravity for the finished beer.

Finally the BJCP provides scoresheets in the competition center that can be very useful as a guide for judging your own beer at home.  The scoresheet is very useful, even if you have never judged a beer before as it provides a framework for evaluating the beer and also explains many of the technical terms.

Judging Your Own Beer

Here’s the process I use for evaluating a beer for the first time.  It follows closely with the BJCP score sheet, so I recommend you print a copy of it and follow along as you read this.

• I start by filling in the scoresheet header – including the information about the beer, dates, etc…  I often will print out the relevant section of the BJCP style guide as well if I’m targeting a particular style since this provides excellent guidance on what the beer should be.
• Evaluate the bottle and external appearance – look for rings around the bottle neck (could be contamination) as well as the condition of sediment.
• I open the beer and pour a few ounces into the glass and try to immediately evaluate the aroma of the freshly poured beer.  Many aromas are fleeting, so you want to capture them up front.  I use the aroma section of the scoresheet to capture these.
• Next we look at appearance which includes color, clarity, head retention, proper carbonation and texture.
• Taste the beer, and focus on developing your initial overall impression from the first sip.  You will usually let this sit for a few seconds before swallowing and note the finish (taste as you swallow it) as well as any aftertastes.  For flavor we’re looking at malt, hops, fermentation character, finish/aftertaste and any other relevant flavors for the style.  At this point I will also often scan the description definitions that are on the left side of the BJCP scoresheet.  This contains a list of some 17 taste terms such as Metallic, Phenolic, Grassy, Astringent, etc.. many of which are undesirable and indicative of a problem.  However in some cases the flavors may be appropriate – for example many English Ales have an estery (fruity) flavor from the yeast used.
• Move on to mouthfeel (taking additional sips if needed) and evaluate the body, carbonation, warmth, creaminess, astringency and overall palate sensation of the beer.
• Finally comment on the overall impression of the beer – including any notes for possible improvement.  Do you like the beer?  Would you enjoy drinking another pint of it?  How could it be improved in the next batch?
• If you are scoring someone else’s beer, its best to try to be positive in your comments (even if the beer is pretty bad).  Here the checkboxes and numerical scores can be very useful in noting major flaws in the beer, and you can still phrase your comments in a positive way “You could improve this beer by xxx” rather than “This really stinks”.

Surprisingly, sitting down and objectively scoring a beer only takes a few minutes.  Yet if you do it properly you now have a guideline for how to improve the next batch.  Many obvious flaws in a beer have a simple solution as outlined in my troubleshooting article.  Others can be solved by adjusting the grain bill, changing the hop schedule or variety, or adjusting your carbonation.

Finally I should mention that I’ve only just touched on the basics of this complex topic.  If you want to learn more I suggest visiting the BJCP website or reading Randy Mosher’s recent book on Tasting Beer (Amazon Affiliate Link).  Have a great week, and don’t hesitate to subscribe to my newsletter or podcast for more free brewing info.

• Judging Beer with Grandmaster Gordon Strong – BSHB Podcast #6
• New BJCP 2008 Style Guide and BeerSmith Batch Sparging Release
• Grandmaster Beer Judge and BJCP President Gordon Strong
• India Pale Ale and Carrot Cake – BeerSmith Podcast #18
• Porter Beer Recipes with Gordon Strong – BeerSmith Podcast 26

I was shocked at the reaction to the first set of beer quotes we published last year, which attracted 10′s of thousands of readers.  If you enjoyed our first set of Beer Quotes, you will also enjoy these…

• Drunkenness does not create vice; it merely brings it into view. - Seneca

• The good Lord has changed water into wine, so how can drinking beer be a sin? - Sign near a Belgian Monastary

• A man can hide all things, excepting twain – That he is drunk, and that he is in love. - Antiphanes

• I work until beer o’clock. - Stephen King

• He that drinketh strong beer and goes to bed right mellow, lives as he ought to live and dies a hearty fellow. - Anonymous

• Tis hard to tell which is best: music, food, beer or rest. - Anonymous

• Beer… Now there’s a temporary solution. - Homer Simpson

• Work is the curse of the drinking classes. - Oscar Wilde

• Beauty lies in the hands of the beerholder. - Anonymous

• Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day. – Anonymous

• There are more old drunks than old doctors. - Anonymous

• A good local pub has much in common with a church, except that a pub is warmer, and there’s more conversation. - Anonymous

• They who drink beer will think beer. - Washington Irving

• All right, brain, I don’t like you and you don’t like me – so let’s just do this and I’ll get back to killing you with beer. - Homer Simpson

• When I heated my home with oil, I used an average of 800 gallons a year. I have found that I can keep comfortably warm for an entire winter with slightly over half that quantity of beer. - Dave Barry

I hope you enjoyed this collection of quotes on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog.  Please subscribe for great home brewing content on a regular basis, and check out our home brewing software package called BeerSmith if you are interested in brewing your own beer.

• Famous Beer Quotes
• An Interview with Brewing Author Randy Mosher
• Seasonal Beer Brewing
• Beer Bloggers and 365 Beers-BSHB Podcast Episode 2
• Counting Calories in your Homebrewed Beer

Here’s a list of some beer quotes from around the world – I hope you enjoy!

• The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind - Humphrey Bogart

• Always do sober what you said you would do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut. - Ernest Hemingway

• Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. - Benjamin Franklin

• He is a wise man who invented beer. - Plato

• I feel sorry for people who don’t drink. When they wake up in the morning, that’s as good as they’re going to feel all day. - Frank Sinatra

• Give me a woman who loves beer and I will conquer the world. - Kaiser Wilhelm

• I would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet beer. - Homer Simpson

• Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza. - Dave Berry

• 24 hours in a day, 24 beers in a case. Coincidence? - Stephen Wright

• Everybody has to believe in something…..I believe I’ll have another drink. - W.C. Fields

• May your glass be ever full. May the roof over your head be always strong. And may you be in heaven half an hour before the devil knows you’re dead. - Irish Toast

• You can’t be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline – it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer. - Frank Zappa

• I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts, and beer. - Abraham Lincoln

• An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.- Earnest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls

• Always remember that I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me. - Winston Churchill

• Ah, beer. The cause of and the solution to all of life’s problems. - Homer Simpson

• Beer makes you feel the way you ought to feel without beer. - Henry Lawson

• I would give all my fame for a pot of ale and safety. - Shakespeare, Henry V

• God made yeast, as well as dough, and loves fermentation just as dearly as he loves vegetation. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
  

Thanks for joining us on the BeerSmith blog – happy brewing and happy 4th of July!

• More Famous Beer Quotes
• Apparent and Real Attenuation for Beer Brewers – Part 1
• Counting Calories in your Homebrewed Beer
• BeerSmith 2.0 – A First Look
• One Year of The BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog

Why do we brew?  A thread from our discussion forum some time back about “why we brew” got me thinking about the advantages that home brewing as a hobby bestows.

Intrinsic Rewards- Brewing beer has its own intrinsic value. There is something people find inherently rewarding the creative process. Its not just any beer, its your beer that you designed and created with your own two hands.  In a sense, the ability to do something new, unusual, challenging and rewarding is the basis for all hobbies including this one.

Limited Time Needed – Brewing is a great hobby for busy people, as it really does not take that much work to brew a batch of beer.  Extract brewing consumes perhaps a few hours of time spread out over several weeks, and even all grain brewing adds only a few hours of additional work.  You can adjust the amount of time as needed to match your schedule.

Quality over Quantity – Home brewed beer is hand crafted, which means the home brewer can use ingredients and techniques that are commercially infeasible for the big breweries. In home brewing, all malt full bodied beer is the standard, and cheap additives are the exception.

Imagination Unleashed – Brewing beer opens up a world of possibilities. Home brewers can experiment with ingredients, styles and techniques spanning the entire world. The possibilities are limited only by the brewer’s imagination.

Reduced Hangovers – Home brewed beer contains a large quantity of yeast with Vitamin B. Vitamin B reduces the effects of a hangover naturally. Commercial beers are filtered and pasteurized, both of which strip the vitamin B from the beer and lead to hangovers.

The Cost Advantage – Though the malt and hops shortage have temporarily raised the price of home brewing, penny pinching all grain home brewers can still brew 5 gallons of beer for less than the cost of comparable commercial beer. Over time, I’m confident prices will come back down as the market balances supply with demand.

The Social Aspect – Home brewing is inherently a social hobby. Brewers are passionate about their beer, and the home brewing community is vibrant and growing. In addition, you may find your neighbors are fond of your latest creation and start dropping by more often to sample your beer. The internet and Web 2.0 sites like BrewPoll have made sharing the hobby even easier.

Health Benefits – A number of medical studies indicate that alcohol, properly used in moderation at 1-2 drinks per day can provide a number of health benefits.  Obviously drinking too much can have a huge negative effect, so we recommend drinking in moderation always.  In addition, dark beers provide many of the same benefits as dark wines with regards to high flavinoid content to promote a healthy heart. All natural ingredients including a solid dose of brewer’s yeast provide secondary health benefits. A recent article by Charlie Papazian points out that a 12 oz glass of beer has less calories than 12 ounces of juice, milk or soda.

The Challenge – Making commercial quality beer at home using recipes you developed is a challenge. However the challenge is part of the charm. There is a wonder in sharing a beer you created by hand with friends that is made even better if it is a difficult style or complex technique. Pushing the limits of the hobby to create the perfect brew is part of the fun.

Unlimited Variety – Home brewing takes us outside the narrow limits of popular commercial beer, and exposes the home brewer to a world of beer styles and possibilities. Home brewed beer gives you the opportunity to explore German, English, Belgian and other styles that an average drinker would rarely be able to access.

If you would like to add your own thoughs on “why you brew”, feel free to leave a comment below.  Thank you for joining us on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog. As always your comments and thoughts are appreciated.  If you have not done so, please consider subscribing for regular email or RSS delivery.

• An Interview White Labs Yeast President Chris White
• The Beer Gun and Counter Pressure Fillers: Bottling Beer
• Partial Mashing
• Brewing on a Budget with Chris Graham – BSHB Podcast 19
• Schwarzbier Recipes – German Black Beer

When brewing beer, its critical to quickly cool your brew before adding yeast to minimize the chance of infection.  Today we look at the advantages of rapidly cooling your wort after boiling, and also how to build a simple immersion chiller using copper tubing purchased from your local hardware store.

Rapidly cooling your wort after boiling can significantly improve your finished beer’s clarity and flavor.

Some of the advantages include:

• Reducing the chance of infection – your wort is vulnerable to bacterial infection when it is warm and has no yeast added. You want to minimize the chance of infection by cooling rapidly and pitching the yeast as soon as practical.
• Improved clarity – When you rapidly cool hot wort, many of the heavy proteins and tannins will no longer be soluble and will fall out of the wort. Siphoning the wort off of this “cold break” will result in a improved clarity and improve taste as well.
• Reduction of volatile compounds – Dimethyl Sulfide (DMS) which gives beer a strong “”sweet corn” flavor can continue to break down after boiling and may be carried forward into the finished beer unless you rapidly cool the beer (Ref: Brewers Handbook by Goldhammer).

Quickly cooling 5-10 gallons of boiling hot wort does present some problems for the home brewer.  Ideally you would like to reach fermentation temperature as quickly as possible, though something in the 10-20 minute range is acceptable.  Commercial brewers use elaborate two-stage heat exchangers with a glycol coolant to achieve the final fermentation temperature.

Home brewers often choose something a bit less elaborate.  Some popular wort cooling systems include:

Ice Bath

Often beginners immerse their entire boiling pot into a tub full of ice water.  This can be an effective method, but it typically takes longer than the methods listed below, since heat can only be transferred through the hot pot itself.

Immersion Chillers

The simplest solution for most homebrewers, an immersion chiller (pictured above) is a coil of 30-50 feet of copper tubing that is immersed in the hot wort in the pot.  The tubing is connected to a sink or garden hose and cool water is continuously run through the chiller to cool the wort.  Since 50 feet of copper tubing has a large surface area, 5-10 gallons of wort can be chilled rapidly using this method.

Immersion chillers may also include a second stage, consisting of an additional coil before the main coil that is immersed in a ice water bath to lower the temperature of the water as it goes into the wort.  A two stage immersion chiller cools even more quickly and helps in cases where the tap water going into the chiller might be at or near the desired fermentation temperature.

Immersion chillers are also very easy to make, as described below, and also easy to clean since the outside of the coil simply needs to be wiped down and washed after use.

Counter-flow Chillers

A counter-flow chiller is a coil that contains two tubes of different diameters, one placed inside of the other.  Cold water is pumped through the outer tube while the wort is siphoned or pumped in the opposite direction in the inner tube.   Counter-flow chillers are extremely efficient and can cool wort very quickly.

The only downside for homebrewers is that they can be more difficult to clean and sterilize.  As soon as you finish using a counter-flow chiller, you need to flush it rapidly with hot water and run cleaning fluid through it.  Also it is a bit harder to construct a counter-flow chiller at home.

Building an Immersion Chiller

An immersion chiller (shown in the picture above) is simple for the average brewer to construct and maintain.  The basic materials can be bought at the local hardware store and assembled in about 30 minutes.

Materials Needed:

• 50 feet of 3/8″ outer diameter copper tubing
• 20 feet of 3/8″ inner diameter plastic tubing
• 4-6 3/8″ hose clamps
• Garden hose adapter (female)
• Compression fittings/adapters to mate garden hose adapter to the 3/8″ copper tubing

Start by making a large diameter coil from the copper tubing.  Make the coil small enough to fit in your boil pot.  The best way to form the coil is to wrap the tubing around a large coffee can, bottom of a corney keg, or other large cylinder.

Leave both ends of the copper tubing sticking up above the height of your pot, and bend them 90 degrees so they extend horizontally over the edges.  On one end, attach the fittings to the garden hose adapter, and to the other attach your plastic hose with clamps.  Attach the garden hose and run water through it to check for leaks.

For a two stage cooler, attach a second smaller coil to one end and place the garden hose fitting on it.  Join the two coils with a length of plastic tubing.  When operating, place the first coil into a cold bath of ice water and the second into your wort.  This will cool the water going into the wort, making your system more efficient.

I hope you enjoyed this week’s article on wort chilling.  Thank you for joining us on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog.  Subscribe for weekly delivery or visit our BrewPoll news site to see other brewing and beer news.  Have a great brewing week!

• Ten Top Tips for Home Brewing Beer
• 6 Tips for Crystal Clear Home Brewed Beer
• RIMS and HERMS – Recirculating Infusion Mash Systems for Beer
• How to Brew Beer – 5 Steps for Making Beer at Home – Part 2
• Using a Hop Back for Homebrewed Beer

I started brewing in the 1980′s, which was the modern equivalent of the wild west days of home brewing. We simply did not have either the technical knowledge or access to the high quality ingredients that brewers have today.

Yeast, in particular, was one ingredient that improved dramatically in the last 20 years. When I started, the only yeast available was dry packet “bread-style” yeast. It came in two flavors – ale and lager. The quality of these two yeast strains was questionable, resulting in significant variation in flavor and character.

In the early 1990′s Wyeast and White Labs introduced high quality liquid yeasts to the US homebrewing market. Companies like SafeAle also brought high quality dry yeasts into the picture. This revolutionized homebrewing in a way that is difficult to explain today.

Brewing Yeast

Brewing yeast is a single cell microorganism (technically a fungi), and both ale and lager yeasts are members of the family Saccharymyces Cerevisiae. Lager yeast was earlier classified as S. Uvarum, but a recent reclassification put it in the S. Cerevisiae family. Ales are traditionally called “top fermenting” for the yeast layer that forms at the top of the fermenter, while lagers are called “bottom fermenting”

Ale yeasts ferment in the range 10-25C and produce beers high in esters and often lower in attenuation, both distinctive characteristic of ales. Ale yeast strains are often mixed together to aid in attenuation and flocculation. Lagers ferment in the range from 7-15C and produce a cleaner beer with lower esters.

The Fermentation Life Cycle

Yeast goes through four overlapping phases when fermenting beer into wort. After pitching, yeast starts in the “Lag Phase”. During the lag phase, the yeast strives to reproduce as fast as possible. The key ingredient during this phase is Glycogen, an sugar stored internally in the yeast, which is broken into glucose to fuel yeast reproduction. If an insufficient amount of yeast is pitched (or the yeast itself is low in glycogen), you will get an excess of dicytl (buttery or butterscotch flavor) in your finished beer. A properly sized Yeast Starter is critical.

The lag phase is followed quickly by the respiration (also called the growth) phase. In this phase the cells grow logarithmically (usually one to three doublings) by cellular division. In this phase the critical ingredients are oxygen and a variety of yeast nutrients. The cells will continue to grow until the oxygen or nutrients have been depleted.

Once all of the oxygen has been scrubbed from the wort, the fermentation phase begins. Yeast cells convert simple sugars into carbon dioxide, alcohol and beer flavors. As the sugars are consumed, the gravity of the beer will rapidly drop. Fermentation normally takes 3-7 days.

Sedimentation is the final phase of fermentation. Yeast will begin to form into clumps and settle to the bottom of the fermenter in a process called flocculation. In this phase, yeast will also store the glycogen needed for future reproduction as it prepares to enter a dormant state. Some yeasts will settle (flocculate) much more rapidly than others, so settling can take from days to weeks depending on the yeast variety.

Understanding Yeast Characteristics

Selecting a yeast appropriate for a given beer involves some knowledge of key yeast characteristics:

• Attenuation: Refers to the percentage of sugars converted to alcohol and CO2. A high attenuation yeast will result in a clean, dry finish. Low attenuation yeasts typically leave ester, malt and other flavors behind leaving a more full bodied complex beer flavor.
• Flocculation: Flocculation refers to the ability of yeast to form clumps (flocs) at the end of fermentation and rapidly sediment (or be skimmed) from the finished beer. Low flocculation yeast is often called “powdery” yeast. High flocculation yeasts tend to fall out of the beer before completing fermentation, leaving a more complex, higher gravity beer. Low flocculation yeasts such as lagers will completely ferment, leaving a cleaner finish but it can then be difficult to separate the yeast from the beer.
• Temperature Range: Different yeast strains have differing temperature tolerances. Ales ferment at a higher temperature. Higher temperature fermentation is associated with higher ester production, and lower temperature with clean dry flavors.
• Alcohol Tolerance : Many yeasts are sensitive to alcohol content, and will have trouble fermenting very high original gravity wort. Champagne, Wine, or other alcohol tolerant yeasts are frequently used either for primary fermentation or as a second yeast addition to assure full fermentation of very high gravity beers such as barley wine.
• Beer Flavor: Individual yeast strains can add widely varying flavor profiles to your beer. A good example is Hefe-Weizen, where a significant majority of the clove and banana beer flavor comes directly from the yeast. Matching the yeast strain to the style of beer is a the best way to provide proper flavoring.

An Examples of Yeast in Beer Design

In most cases, brewers tend to select the Wyeast or White Labs yeast that matches their beer style. Lets look at a few examples where varying from the script might pay off: One example is brewing an Irish Stout. Irish stout has a very dry roasted character derived from roasted barley.

A traditional yeast choice might be an Irish Ale yeast such as White labs WLP004. However, looking at WLP004, it has a modest attenuation of 71.5%, which will produce a more fruity finish. One could experiment by picking WLP007, “Dry English Ale” yeast. This yeast has a much higher attenuation (75%) and will leave a drier finish on the beer, while still retaining some of the English esters needed for the stout.

At the other extreme, I know several brewers that use a single strain, White Labs California Ale WLP001 for just about every beer they brew. Their justification is that this yeast is relatively flavor neutral for an ale yeast, has a very high attenuation and leaves a clean finish on any beer. It ferments rapidly and flocculates quickly from the beer minimizing storage time needed. Personally I don’t subscribe to this “one size fits all” approach, but a number of brewers have demonstrated great success with it.

The above are just examples, but the key to great beer design is to understand the ingredients you are working with. Knowledge of the characteristics of yeast, and its significant effect on your beer will help you to become a better brewer.

Thanks again for visiting the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog. Click on the BrewPoll icon below if you enjoyed this article and subscribe for regular delivery. A thumbs up on Stumbleupon is also greatly appreciated.

• Apparent and Real Attenuation for Beer Brewers – Part 2
• Brewing Fruit Beers at Home Part 2 of 2
• 6 Tips for Crystal Clear Home Brewed Beer
• Making Full Bodied Beer at Home
• An Interview White Labs Yeast President Chris White

Nothing goes better with a cold homebrewed beer than a big soft pretzel fresh from the oven! Today we’re going to set homebrewing aside and look instead at a recipe for large, Bavarian beer pretzels . Below is a recipe I’ve used for years to create delicious pretzels at home:

Soft Pretzel Recipe – makes one dozen large pretzels:

• 1 packet active dry bread yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 2 tablespoons soft butter or margarine
• 2 3/4 cups bread flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 5 teaspoons baking soda (for glazing)
• Coarse salt (if desired)

Instructions:

• In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 cup warm water and packet of yeast.
• Mix in 1-1/2 cups of flower, the 2 tblsp margarine, 1/2 tsp salt and tblsp sugar. Beat the entire mixture for 3 minutes to mix well.
• Slowly mix in the remaining 1-1/4 cups of flour, and knead dough until all of the flour is mixed in and dough loses its stickiness.
• Set aside in bowl, and let it rise until dough reaches approximately double its original size.
• Divide dough into twelve approximately equal pieces. Using your palms, roll each piece into 18″ lengths about pencil thickness. Loop and twist the lengths into pretzel shapes and place on a greased baking sheet. Allow pretzels to rise again until they approximately double in girth.
• Preheat oven to 475 degrees, and ready a boiling solution of 4 cups of water, and the 5 tsp of baking soda in a shallow non-aluminum (note – aluminum may react with baking soda).
• With a plastic spatula, carefully lift each pretzel from the sheet and lower it into the boiling baking soda solution for 15-20 seconds. This will glaze the pretzels once you bake them.
• Sprinkle the pretzels with coarse salt (if desired, they’re great without salt as well), and bake approximately 7-10 minutes until browned. Serve warm, topped with mustard or cheese, and a pint of your favorite beer.

There is nothing more wonderful than a fresh hot pretzel with a nice cold homebrew! Thanks again for joining us on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog. Have a great day and happy brewing.

• One Year of The BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog
• Brewing Water – Hard or Soft?
• Mashing for All Grain Beer Brewing
• Brewing a Kolsch Beer Recipe: Beer Styles
• Brewing Beer with Honey

Beer spans an endless array of colors. The deep black color and white foam of an Irish Stout, deep copper of a Pale Ale and cloudy light color of a Bavarian Wheat are all within the rainbow we call beer. Today we’ll look at beer color, how its measured, color limitations, and how to estimate the color of a beer recipe.

The History of Beer Color

The system used to characterize beer color has its origins in the late 1800′s. The original lovibond system was created by J.W. Lovibond in 1883, and used colored slides that were compared to the beer color to determine approximate value. For decades, beer was compared to colored glass standards to determine the Lovibond color, and we still use the term “Degrees Lovibond” extensively today to describe the color of grains.

Over time, limitations of the Lovibond were recognized, not the least of which was that it depended upon a person’s vision – which naturally has variations in color perception from person to person. By the mid-20′th century, light spectrophotometer technology was developed. In 1950 the ASBC adopted the Standard Reference Method (SRM) color system. Separately the Europeans developed another visual system called the European Brewing Convention (EBC). It originally used visual comparison, but some 25 years later changed to use a spectrophotometer in a slightly different way than SRM.

Measuring Beer Color

The SRM color of beer is measured using a ½” glass cuvette measured by a spectrophotometer at a light wavelength of 430nm. The SRM color is approximately 10 times the amount of absorbance, which is measured on a logarithmic scale. The SRM color is approximately equal to the old lovibond scale in most cases. The other common method, called the European Brewing Convention (EBC) is measured at the same wavelength but in a smaller 1 cm cuvette. In practice the EBC color is approximately 1.97 times the SRM color. (EBC = 1.97 * SRM) [Ref: Daniels]

If you don’t have a spectrophotometer handy in your personal laboratory, a number of tools are available to help you measure the color of your beer. The most popular and easy to use is a beer reference color card, such as the Davidson guide, to do a visual comparison of your beer against standard reference colors. I recommend purchasing such a guide from your local store. I don’t recommend printing an online color card, as the variations in printer color will spoil your measurements.

Another method involves diluting your beer with distilled water and comparing it to known color standards such as mass produced commercial beer. Ray Daniels describes this method in detail in his chapter on beer color from his book Designing Great Beers, if you are a truly dedicated brewer. For my money, a nice beer color card is easier to use.

Estimating Beer Color for a Recipe

As a home brewer, I’m very interested in how to estimate the color of my beer for a given recipe in advance of brewing. In practice, good home brewing software like BeerSmith will automatically estimate the color of your recipe as you build it, but I think it is still useful to know what is going on under the hood.

A first iteration at estimating beer color involved simply calculating the Malt Color Units (MCUs) of a recipe.

• MCU = (Weight of grain in lbs) * (Color of grain in degrees lovibond) / (volume in gallons)

For multiple grain additions, you can simply calculate the MCU for each addition and add them together. MCU provides a good estimate of SRM color for light beers, but starts to diverge as beer color exceeds 6-8 SRM, because light absorbance is logarithmic and not linear. For a more accurate estimate that holds for darker beers up to about 50 SRM, we turn to the Morey equation:

• SRM color = 1.4922 * (MCU ** 0.6859)

The Morey equation provides an excellent estimate of beer color throughout the range from 1-50 SRM, and is the one used by most brewers today.

Limitations of Beer Color and Color Estimates

No matter how accurately your color estimate or measurement is, you need to recognize that all existing beer color systems have very real limitations. The SRM color system, for instance, is measured from the absorbance of a single wavelength of light. It can’t tell the difference between similarly colored red beers and amber beer, for example. The subtle hues of red and brown may look identical at the 430nm wavelength.

In fact, it is not possible to specify the precise color of a beer with a single “beer darkness number” such as SRM. The subtle variations in red, brown, gold, copper and straw can’t be captured in a single dimension beer color system. Irish Red is a good example – if you do an estimate of the color for an Irish Red you will likely get something that does not look very red at all on the color card. Yet the addition of a tiny amount of roasted barley gives it the distinctive red hue that the SRM system simply can’t capture.

Extract brewers need to be aware that liquid extracts in particular tend to get darker as they age, and also that extracts will darken in a process called carmelization as they boil. I wrote an article on how to use late extract additions to reduce this effect. The net result of the aging and boiling effect is that many extract beers come out substantially darker than an estimate would indicate.

In practice, these issues are not a problem for the average home brewer, but commercial breweries often use coloring agents, mixing of batches and other techniques to achieve very precise color matching from batch to batch. For a home brewer, it is enough to know that a color estimate has limitations.

Thanks again for your continued support of the blog. I’m happy to see that the subscription and number of visits to the site continue to grow. Please leave a comment, subscribe, or drop a guest vote on BrewPoll using the icon below if you enjoyed today’s article.

• Parti-Gyle Brewing – Two Beers from One Mash
• Brewhouse Efficiency for All Grain Beer Brewing
• Calculating Hop Bitterness: How much Hops to Use?
• Malt Extract Beer Brewing
• Irish Red Ale Recipes

Editors Note: This article is part 2 of our 4 part series on surviving the ongoing hop shortage. Our first article was on Growing Hops at Home.

With hop prices pushing $5 US per ounce and the hops crisis likely to get worse before it gets better, caring for your precious hops supply is more important than ever. Today we’re going to look at the best way to store and preserve your hops and also some of the effects of hop aging.

Hop Aging and the Enemies of Hops

All hops will age over time. Precious hop oils including both aromatic and bittering oils tend to break down over time, and old hops will lose aroma, flavor and bitterness as they age. Stale hops will take on a cheesy or skunky flavor that can ruin your beer. Hops have three main enemies: heat, light and oxygen.

Heat accelerates the chemical breakdown of hops including both aromatic oils and the precious alpha acids that provide most of the bitterness in beer. The relationship between temperature and hop bitterness is exponential – it is cut in half for every 15 degrees C (27 F) of lowered temperature. Hops stored at 75F will degrade almost 4 times as fast as hops stored in a freezer. To slow the aging of your hops, always store them in the freezer at a temperature between 30F and -5F (-1 to -21 degrees C).

Light is also a natural enemy of hops. Hop cones are susceptible to breakdown from sunlight from the first minute they are picked, so hop growers go to great lengths to make sure that hops are not exposed to sunlight after picking. Hop cones exposed to light will break down rapidly, leaving off flavors in your beer. When possible, store your hops in a dark place and avoid exposure to sunlight.

Oxygen is also an enemy of hops because hop oils and alpha acids will oxidize. Oxidized alpha acids lose their bitterness, and old hops will take on a “cheesy” aroma. A plastic/poly bag is the worst storage vessel for your hops because plastic bags are still permeable to air. You can smell the hops right through a typical plastic bag, which is an indicator that it is not much of an oxygen barrier.

An oxygen barrier bag or an airtight jar make a much better container, though these still typically contain some air. The best container is a vacuum sealed oxygen barrier such as a vacuum packed foil pouch, typically made from a layer of food grade plastic and layer of mylar.

Note that whole hops degrade faster because of the larger surface area exposed to air. Most hop processors will at some point pelletize their aging hops because the highly compressed pellets age more slowly than whole hops. Pellets also take less space and are easier to vacuum pack, which is why they are often used in homebrewing and microbrewing.

Hop Storage Index: How Long Can I Store My Hops?

The speed of aging varies by hop variety. The aging rate for a particular variety is measures using the Hop Storage Index (HSI), which is the amount of hops alpha acid potential lost in 6 months when the hops are stored at a constant temperature of 68 F (20 C). Hops will last over three times as long as their HSI would indicate if frozen and stored properly.

For example a hops with a starting alpha of 10% and HSI of 25% stored for 6 months would lose 25% of its alpha potential, resulting in an new alpha rating of 7.5% if stored at 68F. The same hops stored for 6 months at 28F (-2C) would only lose 10% of its alpha acids leaving it at 9% alpha content. To see sample HSI ratings for various hop varieties, visit our Hops Listing and click on the hop variety of interest. The HSI is on the detailed page for each hops near the bottom.

The HSI does not tell the whole story however. Hops will age at a much slower rate if stored in cold temperature and in a proper container. BeerSmith has a Hop Aging tool (Tools menu) you can use to calculate a particular variation of hop packaging, temperature and age, and also has the HSI in its hops database so you can just pick a hop variety, set your storage conditions and calculate the resulting alpha.

Which brings us to the final question – how long can you store your hops without ill flavor effects? It turns out the aromatic hop oils are the most susceptible to aging, so if you are looking for a burst of aromatics with hops added at the end of the boil or for dry hopping, choose fresh hops. If properly stored, many varieties can be kept for several years.

You can use the HSI or detailed hop aging tool as a guide as follows: Hops are considered “bad” by commercial growers when they drop below 50% of their original alpha acid content. At this point, the hops typically take on a “cheesy” aroma, and should be discarded. I will note that even “poor” HSI hops with 50% HSI will last the better part of a year if stored properly in a freezer and oxygen barrier bag.

Hops are a precious commodity, and likely to become more scarce until the 2008 crop is harvested and processed. Please remember to keep your hops away from light, in the freezer, and in an oxygen barrier container.

Thanks for joining us again this week on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog. Join us next week for another article on hop crisis survival strategies. Please give us a guest vote on BrewPoll if you enjoyed this article, and don’t hesitate to subscribe for regular weekly delivery.

• Brewing Hops: 10 Tips for Surviving the Hops Shortage
• Using a Hop Back for Homebrewed Beer
• Dry Hopping: Enhanced Hops Aroma
• Ten Top Tips for Home Brewing Beer
• Best Hop Techniques for Homebrewing

A bright, sparkling clear beer is highly prized by beer drinkers, yet clear beer can be elusive for the average home brewer. Commercial brewers use fining agents, filtering, and pasteurization techniques to keep their beer crystal clear. While filtering is sometimes used by advanced brewers, much simpler techniques can help improve your clarify. Using a few simple tips, it is not difficult at all for home brewers to match the clarity of commercial beer.

Before we jump into the tips, lets take a quick look at the main causes of cloudiness in beer. Cloudiness generally comes from one of three sources: tannins, proteins and yeast. Tannins are naturally occurring elements of the barley grain husk that is extracted along with sugars during the mashing process. Proteins come both from dark grains and also from certain non-barley grains including wheat, oats and flaked barley.

Proteins enhance the head retention and body of the beer, but also hurt the clarity of the beer. It is a delicate balance to achieve a full bodied beer without excessive protein. Finally yeast itself is present in the beer during fermentation and will remain suspended in the beer for some time. Most yeast will eventually precipitate to the bottom of the beer, but it takes considerable time for many yeast strains. Tannins, proteins and yeast also contribute “young” off flavors to the beer, so the quicker you can clear your beer the sooner you can enjoy it!

1. Select Lower Protein Grains

Proteins enhance the body of your beer, but can hurt clarity. Save high protein adjuncts like wheat, flaked barley and very dark malts for wheat and dark beers where clarity is not a significant consideration. If you are brewing a light beer where clarity matters, choose two row pale malt or pale malt extract base and add only enough high protein darker malts to achieve the desired color and body.

2. Use Irish Moss at the End of the Boil

A few pinches of Irish Moss at the end of the boil can aid the clarity of your finished beer considerably. Irish Moss is a charged adjunct that actually helps tannins and proteins in the hot wort coagulate and quickly fall to the bottom of the boil pot while cooling the beer. If you drop a small amount of Irish Moss in your brew you can actually see the proteins and tannins coagulate into little lumps at the end of the boil.

3. Cool your Wort Quickly

Use an immersion or counter-flow chiller to cool your beer as quickly as possible. If you take your wort from boiling to fermentation temperature quickly, the tannins and proteins will form clumps, fall out, and form a thick layer of trub at the bottom of your boiler. The quicker you can cool the wort, the more dramatic the effect. The less tannins and suspended proteins, the clearer your beer will be. Ideally you would like to cool a boiling 5 gallon batch to room temperature in 15 minutes or less.

4. Choose a Yeast High in Flocculation

Flocculation is defined simply as the rate at which a particular yeast strain will fall out of the beer once fermentation is complete. If you choose a yeast strain with a high flocculation rating, it will clear much more quickly than one with a low flocculation rate. Flocculation should not be your only consideration, but if you have a choice, pick a yeast strain that both matches the style of your beer and has medium to high flocculation.

5. Add a Fining Agent

A number of fining agents can be added to the finished beer that will aid in clearing the beer quickly. These agents work by attaching themselves to the yeast, tannins and proteins to help them precipitate to the bottom of your fermenter or bottle more quickly. One easily obtained ingredient is clear, plain gelatin from the grocery store. Dissolve it in a few cups of warm sterile water and add it to your secondary fermenter a few days before bottling. Another personal favorite of mine is polyclar. Mix it with a little water and add it to your secondary fermenter a few days before bottling or kegging.

6. Cold Store (Lager) your Beer

Storing beer under refrigeration, called laagering, helps to clear beer rapidly. At lower temperatures it is more difficult for the yeast, tannins and proteins to remain suspended. Cold stored beer will clear much more rapidly than beer stored at room temperature. Note that if you are bottling or naturally carbonating a keg, you need to wait for the beer to become fully carbonated before laagering. Otherwise laagering may slow or kill the yeast resulting in a poorly carbonated beer.

I hope these tips help you fight cloudy beer and enjoy your homebrew a little bit more. Please add a comment or subscribe if you enjoyed this article. Visit BrewPoll to vote on this article (guests can vote too!).

• Fining Agents – Improving Beer Clarity
• Apparent and Real Attenuation for Beer Brewers – Part 2
• Ten Top Tips for Home Brewing Beer
• Chilling Your Brew: Building an Immersion Chiller
• Filtering Home Brewed Beer

We’re pleased to announce the launch of the BrewPoll Home Brewing and Craft Beer News Site. After launching into the Web 2.0 with BrewWiki a few years ago and our BeerSmith blog the last few months, we’ve been fascinated with the way that many new social sites are able to find and promote the “best of the web”.

Home brewing and craft beer is no exception – in fact there are over 200 active beer and brewing blogs boasting over 20,000 articles. The web has become unimaginably large – a search of simple terms like “Home Brewing” brings up 1.8 million web sites.

How can the average homebrewer cut through the chaff? Sites like Digg.com, Slashdot and Newsvine are increasingly important sources of interesting (non-brewing) news and help readers zone in on quality content.

The concept behind all of these sites is that users can submit news articles to the site, and then vote on which articles they like best. The most popular articles are promoted to the front page. Digg, the largest, boasts millions of visitors each day. Unfortunately many social sites have little or no homebrewing presence.

We loved the concept behind sites like Digg, but could not find a suitable site dedicated to home brewing or craft beer. The time seemed right to create a Web 2.0 news site dedicated to homebrewing and craft beer. Here it is:

• http://www.brewpoll.com – BrewPoll Home Brewing and Craft Beer News Site

Anyone can vote on front page or upcoming stories by clicking on the “vote” count next to each story. The most popular posts from the upcoming stories page will be promoted to the front page for all to enjoy. Registered users may submit new stories via the “submit a new story” tab.

How can you Help?

We’ve seeded the site with just a few articles from our blog and the web. Visit the BrewPoll web site and vote for some upcoming stories or submit your favorite stories or web sites. We’re also looking for a few highly motivated volunteer moderators to help keep the spam down on the site.

We hope BrewPoll will help bring some of the “best of” sites to home brewers and craft beer fans. Let us know what you think about BrewPoll by leaving a comment or dropping us an email. If you want to add a voting button to your blog or site like the one on the right, visit this post on our discussion forum.

• BrewPoll Home Brewing and Craft Beer News Site

• BrewPoll Home Brewing and Craft Beer News Site
• Home Brewing Social Sites: Beer and Web 2.0
• The BeerSmith Homebrewing Blog – Third Anniversary
• An Interview with Al from Hop Talk
• Adventures in Homebrewing

Given the hop shortage of 2008 we featured in an earlier article, it was great to hear that Samuel Adams will be offering 20,000 pounds of Tettnang and East Kent Goldings hops pellets for sale to microbreweries at cost. Though the 88 pound boxes are above the reach of most homebrewers, the sale is welcome news to the community. Microbreweries and homebrewers have had to bear the brunt of the hop shortage, as most large breweries have long term contracts with hop growers. We hope Sam Adams generosity will help reduce the pressure on microbreweries and brewpubs. For more details on the hop offer, visit the Samuel Adams web site.

• Homebrew Crisis: Where Have All The Brewing Hops Gone?
• New BeerSmith Retail CDs
• 5 Ways to Save Money Home Brewing
• Keg Line Length Balancing – The Science of Draft Beer
• The Beer Gun and Counter Pressure Fillers: Bottling Beer

Porter is a English beer style that has become very popular in the United States. This week we will look at the origins of Porter, how to brew Porter at home and provide a collection of sample recipes. When I started brewing back in the 1980′s, the microbrewery revolution was still in its infancy, and it was difficult to find anything beyond the classic American lager in the stores. Yet dark beers were a passion of mine, and Porter was a perennial favorites.

History

Porter is first mentioned in writings in the early 1700′s, and the name Porter is derived from its popularity with London’s river and street porters. There are many stories surrounding the origins of Porter, such as one about it being a blend of three other beers, but more likely Porter was derived from strong brown ales of the period. Original porters were substantially stronger than modern versions. Wikipedia mentions that hydrometer measurements on 18th century Porters indicate original gravities near 1.071, or 6.6% ABV – about twice the alcohol of a modern beer.

Taxes during the Napoleonic wars drove the alcohol content down to modern levels. Porter was also the first large scale beer to be entirely aged before delivery, often remaining in vats or casks for 18 months before shipment to pubs. As the 1800′s started, breweries mixed aged porter with new porter to reduce storage times. Stouts started as a stronger, darker version of Porter, with most including the name “Stout Porter”. Eventually the “Porter” tag was dropped giving the modern style of “Stouts”. (Re: Wikipedia)

In another interesting side note, Porter’s popularity was so high that it was stored in huge vats in the late 1700′s, and there was an arms race of sorts between major breweries to see who could build the largest vas. According to Ray Daniels book (below), the largest vats approached 20,000 barrels (860,000 gallons) at the end of the 1700s. This compares to the largest in the world today which clocks in at around 1600 barrels, less than 1/10th the size. In October of 1814, a huge vat at the Meux brewery ruptured and reportedly wiped out an adjacent tank and devastated the neighborhood in a 5 block radius. In the ensuing chaos at least 8 people were killed.

Designing a Porter Recipe

Designing Porter recipes can be a lot of fun as the Porter style includes room for experimentation. Porters have an OG of 1.040 and up, color of 20-40 SRM and bitterness of 18-35 IBUs for Brown Porter, or up to 55 IBUs for higher gravity Robust Porter. The color is brown to black, and they have low to medium hop flavor. They are almost always brewed with a full bodied mash schedule (higher mash temperature of 154-156F) to give a full body taste. They have low ester, fruitiness and diacytl, are well balanced and have low to medium carbonation.

Traditional porters start with a Pale malt base, and typically add a mix of Crystal, Brown, Chocolate and Black malts to achieve a dark color and taste. Roasted malts are used only in Robust Porter styles. Pale malt makes up 40-70% of the grain bill (60-80% for malt extract brewers). Dark Crystal/Caramel malts are used for color and body and provide at least 10% of the grain bill. Chocolate and Roasted malts each average around 5% of the grain bill, with roasted malt less common in Brown Porter.

A variety of grains including Munich malt, Roasted malt, wheat and additives are also used. I will occasionally brew “kitchen sink” Porter which consists of whatever malts I have laying around over a pale malt base. Traditional Porter also made heavy use of Amber and Brown malts, though these are less commonly used today. Ray Daniels recommends a mash temperature of 153F, though I often go a bit higher (156F) to provide a full bodied beer.

Traditional English hops are the appropriate choice for Porter, with East Kent Goldings being a favorite of mine. Other good choices include Fuggles, Northern Brewer, Northdown and Willamette. Light dry hopping is appropriate to the style, though hops aroma should not be dominant. English ale yeast is traditionally used for Porter for its fruity flavors, though other high attenuation yeasts are appropriate. Irish ale yeast is also occasionally used by homebrewers. Adjuncts are only rarely added to specialty Porters. A London water profile (high in carbonates) is best.

Porter Recipes

Sample Porter Beer Recipes (All Grain) from our recipes archive:

• Borders Porter – (Baltic Porter Recipe)
• Brown Porter
• Nothing but Wheat Brown Porter
• Porter 2
• Thunderhead Porter
• Robust Porter
• Smoked Porter – (Partial Mash)
• Smoked Molasses Porter

Sample Porter Recipe (Extract) from our recipes archive:

• A Mild Porter
• Playa Porter
• Viscious Kiev Porter
• Bumble Pig Honey Porter
• King Kong Porter
• Prestidigitation Porter
• Run of the Mill Porter
• Tom’s Godwingin’ Porter

We hope you enjoyed this week’s discussion on porter. Thank you again for reading our weekly blog – please keep your comments, bookmarks and ideas coming. If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to our blog or drop a guest vote on BrewPoll using the button on the right.

Reference

• “Designing Great Beers“, a book by Ray Daniels

• Baltic Porter Recipes – Beer Styles
• Brown Ale Recipes: Brewing Styles
• Sweet Stout and Milk Stout Recipes
• Brewing an Irish Stout Beer Recipe
• “Designing Great Beers” by Ray Daniels – A Book Review