Book review: brew your own British real ale

[Twostage]

Firstly, nothing to do with the book but ordered it late Friday night on amazon and got it on sunday. Prime works.

General impression of the book is that he wrote it reluctantly as he was fed up of reading things he disagreed with. Quite a few "I don't believe it" comments. Some interesting things in there that if you're experimental like me make you want to try things. For instance he says that British ale yeast needs rousing twice a day and possibly aerating unless close to FG. He advises that you should only brew in the cold months as there is a greater risk of infection when it is warm. This is probably because he also advises fermenting with an open FV. He also reckons it is sacrilege to bottle straight from the FV, saying you should condition in a secondary vessel first. Food for thought. He also decries priming, the bottles should carbonate slowly with residual sugars.

There is some repetiveness which I think is because some sections have been edited out. For instance the section on hop utilisation opens with "finally we come to the complicated and rather poorly defined subject of hop utilisation...". The second paragraph starts with "this brings us neatly to the complicated and rather poorly defined subject of hop utilisation.". Which makes me think there was originally something between the two. There's also a formatting error in the hop weight calculation where an 'over 5.7' has crept to the wrong side of the equals.

He is not a fan of packaged yeast of any kind - dried or liquid, and reckons we should take a flask to a local brewery and ask for a fill.

So quite a few negatives so far. But, he does simplify a lot of things and effectively tell you not to worry about being too exact or over think. And there is a lot of useful background info and advice. He's upfront about the recipes being not absolute clones but close enough and when you think that we would all brew them differently that's absolutely right.

Talking of recipes he makes no recommendations for yeast (well, he's not a fan) leaves it to your judgement. I'm preparing my short-list of recipes to try.

Recommended ? Yes, lots of recipes and you can make up your own mind on his thoughts.

 

[EssexBrewing]

Can I just ask which version of the book you reviewed here, the early ones were good books but the latest one Graham has very little involvement in

 

[McMullan]

I got a copy about 7 years ago and even now use it occassionally for recipe ideas. It's a great, affordable book for anyone interested in brewing British ale at home. I can't comment on the latest edition, though. What I can say is that there are lots of different opinions among home brewers, which is a good thing. We've been brewing beer for thousands of years. So many ways to make great beer. Over time, as we gain experience, we'll adopt methods that work for us and our brewing set up.

 

[Twostage]

Can I just ask which version of the book you reviewed here, the early ones were good books but the latest one Graham has very little involvement in

Third edition.

 

[MyQul]

I have the third edition too. I really bought it for the reciepes which I'm really happy with. Graham post on some of the the other forums sometimes like JBK, explaining some of the stuff he's written in the book, amongst other thing. I read a really good explanation of why he uses white table sugar in some of the reciepes

 

[GHW]

What was the explanation? To give them a dry edge?

 

[MyQul]

Well basically it's because sugar (not really white sugar but various invert sugars) is commercial brewings dirty little secret. Graham states he'd ask a brewery whether they use sugar and the head brewer would fervently deny it even though Graham would see the lorries carrying the sugar going into the brewery. Invert sugar can also add flavour too. The reason he uses it in BYOBRA is because it's harder for the home brewer to get hold of. However there are ways, detailed across the interweb, that you can make some invert sugars at home.

Dried yeast another 'dirty little secret' apparently loads of breweries use it because it's so convenient but the consumer like the idea of a head brewer putting the time and effort in to harvest and time honoured strain of yeast from one batch of beer to another

 

[GHW]

Don't know why it should be a dirty secret, if the beers good, who cares what's in it (within reason). He needs to chill out!

 

[MyQul]

Don't know why it should be a dirty secret, if the beers good, who cares what's in it (within reason). He needs to chill out!

That's cuz your looking at brewing from a homebrews perspective - 'if it makes great beer who cares' but beer to the general public and as far as a brewery concenred is like any other product - it's all about the marketing, image and perception.
Starbucks make good coffee, right? But don't pay there taxes, which is a PR disaster, even though it has zero effect on the taste of the coffe. So if a brewery is saying, "Yes,we chuck loads of sugar in the beer as it boost ABV% far cheaper and easier than using malt" it goes against the image of a nice 'hand crafted beer, true the the recipe of 18-something or other"

When you say "he needs to chill out" I don't think it's him personally that is labelling using sugar a 'dirty little secret' but it's known that it's wide spread in the commercial brewing industry but just not admitted/talked about generally. I'm paraphrasing really. Will have to go find the post to reread what exactly he says