Most difficult beer style to get right?

[JRTurner1234]

Hi All,

Interested to see what people think is the most difficult style of beer to get right? I guess by right, I mean 'to style'!

I've heard lager is pretty difficult, but have never attempted a lager!

JRT

 

[Cwrw666]

I always find pale ales the hardest so I gave up even attempting them.

 

[yeastinfection]

atm for me,,,its any with water in the recipe :lol:

 

[serum]

I find the more pale and subtle, the harder they are. Tons of hops will hide a lot of mistakes, as will lots of dark malt and sweetness. If you get a delicate pale beer wrong you really know it.

 

[zippy40]

Ditto to above. Lagers i find most difficult but time really helps.for all brews.

 

[Pawlo7671]

Lagers and pale ale.

 

[Grizzly299]

I would say Lager, as it takes so much time and needs adequate fermentation control or a cold house.

I think it would be pretty easy though If I had a fermentation fridge for lager and one for for ale.

 

[grmski]

I'd say making a really good Best, when you think back to a great Best and I'm picturing Harveys it's hard to recreate or make something that good and I've got the same Downs water, I've used their yeast straight from the brewery and asked about the hop and grain bill but it's still really difficult to make a Best that's absolutely spot on.

 

[IainM]

Hi All,

Interested to see what people think is the most difficult style of beer to get right? I guess by right, I mean 'to style'!

I've heard lager is pretty difficult, but have never attempted a lager!

JRT

I think it depends on what you mean by "get right". If you mean hardest to brew, as others have said you have nowhere to hide with lagers, so you need to get the process right. However, the grain bills and hop schedules are pretty straight forward, lager yeasts are all pretty similar, and the noble hops are all more similar to each other than, say, fuggles are to EKG. If you mean both designing and brewing a great beer, then I recon traditional British beers, bitters and pales, are the trickiest. There are so many decisions to make when choosing grains, hops and yeasts, that it is harder to balance their contributions and make something that really sticks out from the crowd.