Mashing is a fundamental part of all grain brewing and if you are anything like me, the thought of making the leap from extract brewing to all grain mashing was an intimidating one. At the outset it brings with it a number of anxieties that the producer of the malt extract has borne for you […]
I hadn’t planned it this way, it just happened. A friend had organised for a few of us to go to the NoFitState Circus in Dublin’s Docklands on a Friday night. Like any reasonable and civilised man, I suggested we meet up beforehand for a couple of pints. Since most of us were coming straight […]
This is where the fun starts. While there’s nothing wrong with making kits, and a lot of people are happy to stick to kits, there’s something more satisfying with following a recipe, whether it’s your own or a ‘clone brew’. It can be tweaked to your own liking. At the same time, because you are […]
So you've decided to make the move to all grain brewing. Now you want to know what all these different grains are used for. While you can make a great beer using just Pale Malt there are a lot of different styles of beer out there that use different grains to achieve a certain flavour […]
Note taking is not really stressed by most brewing resources, if it is mentioned at all, but, in my opinion, it is one of the most important elements of the brewing process and can make the difference between producing good beers and producing great beers. Brewing is a craft and there is a lot […]
Websites and books are full of recipes, extract and all-grain, telling you how to make a clone of your favourite beer. The ingredient lists is usually five or more different malts, two unmalted grains, three different hops and a special liquid yeast culture, to make a particular ale. Then you look at what you can […]
All grain brewing is the process of making beer from malted barley, hops, water and yeast. There are many technical tricks and calculations brewers use to increase the efficiency of the process, or make particularly tricky styles of beer. This article will cover none of these, as it is designed to teach you how to […]
Beer has not always contained hops. Before the use of hops began in the 11th century, people mostly used a combination of herbs and spices known as gruit, to bitter their beer. There was no standard way of bittering your beer and everything from mugwort to heather was used to take the edge off the […]
This item presents a set of tables giving you information on water profiles for named water supply areas in Ireland. The raw data has been sourced from Local Authorities and the EPA and is summarised here to, hopefully, save you time. If you find we are missing your area and you happen to have a […]
Choosing the right hops for your craft brew can be a daunting experience when faced with list upon list of hop varieties. The tables reproduced in this knowledge base item aim to give you an idea of the bittering and flavour characteristics of a large range of hop varieties from all over the world.
