Don't You Love It When a Plan Works?
In this blog post http://www.experimentalbrew.com/blogs/denny/am-i-good-or-just-lucky , I wrote about the changes I'd made to my Rye IPA brewing process that I felt had made a huge improvement in the...
View ArticleRepeating Yourself
Inspired by Janis Gross and her Facebook post today, I feel that its important to say a few words about repetition. So digging back through my archives, I want to present to you the unedited version of...
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Old Tools
Ok, so this tool isn't a brewing tool per se. It was my very first mash paddle!On my mom's recent trip to visit her new grand-kitties she spotted me using this old bamboo spatula that she gave me 21...
View ArticleConverting the Wicked - Pumpkin Time!
It's pumpkin time and as sure as my name is Drew Beechum, the internet is awash in question about pumpkin beers. So to aid in answering some pumpkiny questions, I present to you a column all about the...
View ArticleAnother Reason Why Experimental Brewing Is Important
As Denny and I get deeper into this book, the stronger I feel the whole enterprise depends on your favorite definition of "experimental". It means something different to lots of people. Do we mean...
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Facial Hair?
An experiment that we must ponder: What is it with brewer's and facial hair? Is there an aura? A special contribution from the hair? Solar powered thinking machines?But it can't just be solely the...
View ArticleTroubleshooting
Over at maltosefalcons.com, I just put up the first of a series of notes about my club's "Troubleshooter's Corner." It's an old tradition that we've recently revived but think of it as a small group...
View ArticleHow Many Hop Varieties Are In the Best IPAs?
Derek Dellinger, over at Bear-Flavored.com did some research by polling for information from the brewers of nationally ranked IPAs.I'll let you discover the answer over at his site in this...
View ArticleRadio Silence - No More!
Hey, so you may have wondered what happened here - why have we gone full radio silence? Did Putin finally discover that we were going to bad mouth Russian beer? Oh, better yet - did Hitler discover all...
View ArticleCoffee and Jalapenos
For a long time I've been a proponent of a very simple method of adding coffee to your beer. My process is a long cold steep - 1 cup coarse ground coffee, 2-3 cups of filtered cold water. Mix in a...
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Return of the Wee Shroomy
Here in Oregon, we had the best year for mushrooms in the last 20 years. Yummy bits of fungal goodness were popping up all over in the woods behind my house. When my wife came back from a walk in the...
View ArticleThe Latest Experiment
A friend who writes for the Northwest Brewing News contacted me recently about an experiment he wanted to do. It just so happens that it was an experiment we had written up for the book, so I was all...
View ArticleExperiment - Comparing pellet hops to whole hops
A couple months ago, my friend Mitch Scheele, who writes for the Northwest Brewing News, contacted me about an experiment he wanted to do. He had invented a piece of equipment he calls the “Hop Screw”....
View ArticleThe Effect of Color on Taste
This is something I'd never thought about before. But once you stop to consider it, it makes perfect sense. There are so many things that influence our perceptions of food and drink...why shouldn't...
View ArticleA Virile Beer in the News
A news story that I just read............ A Virile Beer? According to a news item in Tokyo's Mainichi Daily News, a French brewery has started tests on a beer, said to contain natural aphrodisiacs,...
View ArticleChampagne Splits
The first article I ever wrote for Zymurgy was "Et Tu, Brut: Brewing the Champagne of Beers". It was featured on the cover of the May/June 2006 issue (AHA Membership required to read). The whole...
View ArticleBrewing up a new style
Thought I'd start a thread to document my attempts at coming up with an "American Mild" ale. I want to end up with a sub 4% beer that doesn't have flavor and mouthfeel comparable to water! I'm basing...
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Mad Melomel
Pontische rododendron struik (Rhododendron ponticum)". Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.I never knew this was a thing - deli bal aka Mad Honey. Apparently, a special variety of honey...
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Denny and Drew beer kits!
Brewcraft will be releasing beer kits based on recipes from Drew and me. Many of the recipes are from the book, so if you want an easy way to brew partial mash versions of them, look for the kits!
View ArticleNew Zealand Brewers - Liquid Nitrogen Luplin Extract IPA
I like goofy weird things - I'm not afraid to admitI'm also not afraid to tell you that I love novel uses of things like liquid nitrogen. I'm just jealous I didn't think of this first! The brewers at...
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