Commercial Styles

[scott]

G'day all,

My name's Scott in Perth. I am relatively new to home brewing after drinking some of the mate's brew's and finding the price of my favorite micro brewy beer leaving the walet a little empty. I've done a couple kits, some with extra's and have my first partial APA in the secondary now. I'm thinking what the hell, start all grain. After xmas when I'll get togethether some equipment.

I have been doing some reading, Palmer's book, this site (which is excellent), other sites, BJCP style guide, beer periodic table (from this site) ect ect.

I am thinking of formulating a couple of recipes based on commercial beers that I like. Matilda Bay's Redback, Malt Shovel's porter to name a few. I intend to keep it simple to get the basics of all grain brewing and recipe formulation.

I have found a huge amount of information and recipes. The one thing that all this information lacks, is taste. By this I mean I like redback and JS porter and so want to have a go at a basic recipe that is similar. But when I look up recipes for porter there are hundreds and I can't identify any as similar to JS porter. Information is out there such as LCPA has a ton of disscussion on this site.

Is there a compilation of commercially available beer in Oz that details it's style, typical malts, hops and yeast?

 

[devo]

All grain is the way to go, I won't go back to brewing any ther way.

I gave up attempting to clone commercial beers because i found the basic recipes found on the web to be as good if better than most beers out in the market place.

Hell why try and clone a beer when you can experiment and make you own better beers that meet your particular tastes.

 

[Vlad the Pale Aler]

Scott welcome to the addiction.

Devo is right, you will find that, style for style, most craft brewed beers are superior to commercial "premium" beers. I am not a lover of commercial wheat beer but love the versions that I and other brewers make, each to his own I suppose.
The commercial brewers also dumb down the styles slightly, they want a product that will appeal and sell to as many people as possible.

There will be an AHB brew day in Perth on 14th Jan. You are welcome to come along and see whats its all about. Keep an eye on the thread "Vlads Perth AHB gathering".

TWOC in Stock Rd markets, Bibra Lake also run all grain brewdays every now and then.

And of course you may like to drop in on West Coast Brewers, Perths only brewclub, 2nd Monday of each month at Rivervale community centre.

Happy brewing.

 

[Aaron]

A good book to help brewing different styles, although it does not address the two specific beers you mention, is "Designing Great Beers" by Ray Daniels. It is a bit US centric but still a fantastic resource when trying to design a beer of a particular style. You should be able to pick it up from Amazon or perhaps one of your local brew shops.

 

[Guest Lurker]

I am thinking of formulating a couple of recipes based on commercial beers that I like. Matilda Bay's Redback, Malt Shovel's porter to name a few. I intend to keep it simple to get the basics of all grain brewing and recipe formulation.

[post="99207"][/post]​

Scott

Easiest way is to see and taste AG beers and borrow other peoples recipes. Make an effort to get to Vlads brewday, someone will probably bring a wheat beer you can taste and talk about ingedients. I can bring a porter that is maybe a bit like JS although more chocolatey, and brewed with an ale yeast, you could taste it, describe the flavours you want to change, and we could work out modifications to the recipe that would get you close on a first attempt. Then it will just take you another go or two on your own to tweak it to exactly what you are looking for.

 

[scott]

Guys,

Thanks for the advice. In summary have a go, brew, drink and learn.

I will have to check with the social co ordinator about the brew day but we do have a few weekends booked. I'll look up the brew club and get down there, I live in Rivervale which makes this very easy, just a short stagger around the corner

 

[Mercs Own]

Scott the great thing about commercial brews is that they are a terrific guideline to your taste and brewing possibilities. As Vlad said they are dumbed down to fit the widest market appeal possible - the beers you will make wont be and will be all the better for it. I only started AG brewing this year and at first thought it a bit daunting but I will tell you it isnt - it is really fairly straight forward and the beer you will make will not be dumbed down versions of those you like but fully fresh high quality hand made beer exactly as you like it!!

Some recipe data bases that are good to read through and give you ideas on formulating the kind of recipes you will want to create:

http://brewery.org/cm3/

http://brewery.org/gambmug/

http://www.thbs.intas.net/beer_recipes.htm

http://thebeeressentials.com/recipes/beer_...ew_recipes.html

I am sure you have done searches like this already but there is certainly plenty out there to point you in the right direction as well as this site.

Good Luck

 

[WillM]

I'd suggest starting with something pretty simple and getting a feel for what the ingredients do by playing with the quantities, Once you understand what they do start introducing more ingredients (if at all).

There are a vast variety of grains and hops to play with, but really simple recipes taste great too. After a while you won't worry as much about copying commercial beers but making something you like.

Having said that, you can get a lot of info about a commercial beer from the web sites, bottle or sometimes the info on the packet. Info such as the amount of hops (IBUs) and sometimes the grains used.

Enjoy you brewing and good luck with the first few.

 

[Darren]

I agree with WillM,
Start with simple recipes. Allows you to pick-up on the initial problems!
If possible try sticking to traditional "hopping for style" too.

cheers
Darren