Brewing book recommendations

[ChrisInBucks]

Afternoon all,

I was looking for some book recommendations on anything to do with brewing - from recipes, how to guides, history, water treatment etc. I spend a lot of time reading and am looking to expand my knowledge in any way that I can so suggestions would be great! I currently only have Greg Hughes book that has been very informative.

Thanks,
Chris

 

[robster62]

How to brew, by john palmer, a bit more technical than Greg hughes but very informative

 

[Sadfield]

Randy Mosher - Mastering Homebrew.

 

[Cestrian]

A book I go back to time and time again is Brewing Classic Styles by Jamil Zainasheff

 

[Cestrian]

and if you’re looking to expand your knowledge you should try Yeast by Chris White. Fascinating stuff!

 

[Clint]

Yeast .. what I have learned...
Don't use the SMALL packets.

 

[trueblue]

I rate the Yeast book as one of the top 2 or 3 homebrew books around. Graham Wheelers recipe books are worth a read.

 

[Clint]

I might order Brewing Classic Styles...

 

[chuffer]

How to brew, by john palmer, a bit more technical than Greg hughes but very informative

Seconded....this book is huge on detail if you want it...plus if you search on line, one of the previous editions is available free to view online

 

[Clint]

Is the most recent version just the older one with a new cover or is it updated?

 

[An Ankoù]

Randy Mosher - Mastering Homebrew.

Mosher's a scream, I've only read "Radical Brewing", but I'll look out for the other one. All of Charlie Papazian's books are great, too.

 

[phildo79]

Papazian is the godfather of brewing but his books (of which I have several), whilst informative, are a little outdated. His guidance isn't wrong, per se, but sometimes unnecessary. The addition of malt extract at the beginning of the boil, for example. Yes, you can do it that way but you don't need to. And if you add it late, you save on FWH.

But I'd still recommend his books. Also, extreme brewing by the bloke from dogfish head (Sam calzone?) Is worth a squint for some interesting recipes.

 

[foxy]

Dave Miller's Home Brewing Guide, Gordon Strong Brewing Better Beer.

 

[Drunkula]

I'm all aboard with "How to Brew".

If you're just starting "Brewing Classic Styles" I'd avoid. Jamil wanted to do an all-extract book and got talked back and essentially the book is a tiny anecdote about a beer, a recipe in extract, a convert for grain and then repeat. If you're starting it's not useful. Just look up recipes instead.

Too drunk to remember the good ones but the one to avoid is the biggest lie of all time : "Designing Great Beers" by Ray Daniels. It's like someone said they could show you how to make the best paper plane of all time by listing different angles people had folded paper in previously or make a great song and here's all the notes people tend to use - all in graph form!

 

[Sadfield]

Just look up recipes instead.

That's what Ray Daniels did for Designing Great Beer, and the whole point of the book. The graphs are the collation of data from award winning recipes, presented as workable parameters for each style. It's a great reference to check against when starting to develop one's own recipes.

 

[CD]

‘The Big Book of Brewing’ by Dave line was The Bible when it was published in 1974, and introduced thousands of keen malt extract brewers to the art of grain brewing. It is still a very good read, but of course it does not cover the vast amount of purpose made kit available today.

 

[Sinktipper]

I found Jon Finch's "Beer Craft" very inspirational. Picked it up in The Works for a couple of quid. The Malt Miller do some recipe kits from the book. My first AG effort was his version of Wild Card's Ace Of Spades and it was superb (largely due to Mr Finch, not me).

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

BYO Clone Recipe book. Great for, well, clone recipes. Or a starting point to tweak beers you like. Also good for making beers you have heard of but cant get hold of, like Heady Topper, for example.


https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0760357862/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_14mcFb2W7FT9S

 

[Galena]

How to Brew-John Palmer as already said a bit technical, in fact very technical in places to the point where I reach my attention span limit when he starts on some of the maths and skim over that, but in between those bits I would say it was a must buy for anyone wanting to know the big picture on brewing.

Yeast - Chris White, I have just started on this, he has a style that is easy to read and is probably THE book to get if you really want to know about yeast for brewing.

Home Brew Beer - Greg Hughes, very light on theory, too light for me but has some good info in there as well like easy to reference charts on malts and hops etc. The reason you buy this book though is the recipes and has yeast recommendations etc.

British Real Ale - Graham Wheeler, I was a bit disappointed with this book the recipes seem incomplete, no mention of yeast at all for instance but it has some classic British Ale recipes that give you a decent starting point.

The Real Ale Almanac - Roger Protz, this is a very old book now but lists what was at the time (late 90's) all or most of the breweries and beers in the UK and their ingredients, quantities, OG, ABV, and tasting notes. Don't expect any modern breweries but this is a great source of info to start building a clone recipe from.

 

[ChrisInBucks]

Thanks all, loads of great suggestions to go after on here! Can anyone recommend a book on water chemistry/water PH at all? The one area I feel slightly lacking at the moment