BeerSmith, WTF?

It seems like Beersmith is my best chance at that.

 

Hopville is free

 

And you get what you pay for... The ingredient list is sketchy at best.

P.S. I use hopville 95% of the time now...

 

What's are the other brewing program available beside BeerSmith ?

 

Beer Calculus is free. They just did an upgrade but the older version seemed faster and easier.

 

I loved Beer Calculus when I used it years ago...but it was internet based and a pain to save/access sometimes so I went to a stand-alone and still am a little frustrated for different reasons.

 

Gee, should he adjust your recipe and brew it for you too?

Brad Smith does a great job with his software and gives excellent personal service with questions. Email him some time and he might respond by adding something if it is so easy to find. We pay for the software, but not that much. Look what you get with it. I actually found Beersmith 1 much easier to use, but I'll wager I will like Bs2 if I take the time to learn it.

 

Did you even read what I wrote?

 

Unfortunately, sometimes its hard to find all the information for the malts (Yeast and hops seem to be easier to find), even from some Maltsters websites. I'm not sure how he constructs the add-ons, but in some cases it may take some time to work with the maltsters to help get the relevant information.

Re: the midnight wheat, not sure... its new, and because I'm not sure how often some of the ingredient add-ons/databases are updated, I might consider it "a wild thing". It definitely is a nice malt though.

 

Midnight wheat isn't in Beer Tools Pro, but it was just an example. I guess it isn't in BeerSmith either. I know things take time, but hops and yeast are easily added and as the consumer I feel that I shouldn't have to do it myself.

 

When I have to add an ingredient I don't focus on much more than the name and the PPG or AA. I don't entirely rely on the software to get me accurate #s, especially post fermentation. Heck, I don't really even rely on it to estimate my strike water temp. I just use my experience with my system. I use it more as a tool to help document the ingredients I used and how much. Other information I record in a separate brewing notebook with the recipe pasted in.

 

Exactly what I do.. For example, I made my first recipe from scratch, made it in BS, and had it all calculated, played with it to get the IBU's I think I wanted to semi balance it all out, and then had to input the AA's for the Falconers Flight 7C's I wanted to use. Didn't get pissed. It's saved in there now, and not to mention, AA units can change from year's crop to another, so thats not always set in stone if you want to be accurate.

I'll be continually tweaking BS to my system, and it's fun actually. The rest of the details, like me missing my mash temp and doing it 2 degree's higher, the fact that I changed something on the fly, all go into my brew notebook, with the print out of the BS recipe I did. Has the date, the OG I got, and all the numbers I hit that day with times and whatnot. I use that to go back to "re-brew" from, and input another version into BS to get a better idea of what I did.

Works out well I think... If you are willing to accept that no program will brew the beer for you, and enjoy the process, then BS I think make it easier than guessing, and gets you started right.. I like using the tools mostly. The timer and the temp change for hydro samples works really well in the program.

 

Well put. Its the balance between using the software to help with the "science" of brewing, but not relying on it when it comes to the "art" of brewing (what happens in real life/real time).

 

As I have said on countless occasions, "You have to be smarter than the tool you are using." Applies to a hammer as well as software.

 

We've been using iBrewMaster on our iPads in these parts. Can't say it's a brilliant piece of software, but it does some of the math for us, and we can keep our calendars up to date. Also nice to see our numbers in relation to BJCP accepted ranges, for competition season.