My problem with home brewing

Taking notes is the easy part. Being at peace and not worrying about what your children (yeast) are making (beer) is the hard part. I thought that is where this thread would go

 

I send emails to myself a lot from work to home. If I'm out and about, I also record messages to myself on my cell for later disposition. Ultimately it all ends up typed into my StrangeBrew software to design new recipes, or else written in cat-scratched notes and stuffed into my "beer drawer" just in case for the future. I'm not super organized with file folders or anything like that, it's a little more scattered than that, but I do know where to find "stuff" when I want to because it's all eventually either in StrangeBrew or in the beer drawer. When I get the craving to do something interesting, I page through that stuff and the ideas come back and I can polish them and make something out of it.

 

Note to self: RDWAHAHB

 

Points off for using the word zillions in your notes.

 

What can I say.... limiting lactose to just 5.9 oz attracts scumbags.

 

The incredibly detailed notes that I take have been a huge help in developing the spreadsheets I have developed for all the calculations. Most brewing software programs are filled with assumptions, and most homebrewers either ignore most of those assumptions (except for the obvious ones), are not aware of them, or they are hidden, and then they wonder afterwards why the results never match the calculations. These assumptions are far more important than people realize. The software often assigns its own assumptions, and since many homebrewers often don't take detailed notes, they just keep using most of the assigned assumptions. My notes and calculations gives me a huge insight into these assumptions, allows me to visually graph the trends, and allows me to fine tune many of the assumptions, and my results are generally almost dead on. I could write a whole book on these assumptions and how they affect the calculations and results. This saves a lot of time and frustration, for example when doing step mashes and having to adjust with extra boiling water or ice water when I don't hit the target temperatures. It also allows me to fine tune my recipes for next time. For example, I find that, for many reasons, bitterness calculations are often off by a large amount, so based on the final results, I can adjust the recipe for the subsequent time.

Although the notes I take during the brewday are hand-written, they all go in a separate folder for each beer I make. I also include print-outs of all the calculations and summaries for that beer for easier reference when making my next version. As well, I include recipe variations, sources, ingredient purchase notes, and other notes pertaining to that beer, including how to change the recipe for next time, based on the actual results. All the calculations for each separate beer I make are also kept separately in the spreadsheets used for the calculations. So there could be anywhere from about 15 to 40 pages of notes in any one folder. As mentioned earlier, these folders all fit nicely in a file box, along with other brewing-related notes and recipes. I also have binders of the typed notes I made for my first fifty or so batches duriing the nineties. The typing was a pain in the a** so I no longer do that.

 

@OldBrewer, you and I have extremely similar brewing habits. I would like to have you over for a beer sometime. If you're ever in 'Sconsin, send me a message.

Just yesterday, I finally brewed for the first time in 8 months. Nailed my volumes perfectly. Brewhouse efficiency was low by 2 points compared to what experience dictated that it should have been, 81% instead of 83%, for this intended 1.052 beer, but based on science, I know why that happened. For only like the 2nd or 3rd time ever, I tried a dunk sparge of the bag (BIAB) instead of my usual pseudo-fly sparge over the colander. It actually could be a combination of that variable and the adjustment of the gap on my mill being slightly too wide, since I changed that about 18 months ago and this beer had a large percentage of rye which I know has a slightly smaller (and harder) kernel than barley malt. So it might have been a point deduction on efficiency from both variables. In other words, had there been no rye and I'd fly sparged, I know for certain I'd have hit the 83%. End result: My gravity was low by one point, 1.051 instead of 1.052. I could calculate an extract addition to make up for that, but nah. Good enough. I also screwed up the mash temperature -- it would have been perfect, but I messed it up in-process. The strike water was exactly 165 F as I'd pre-calculated, and after about 3-4 minutes mixed with the grains the mash seemed too hot, about 156 F instead of the 151 F intended. So I added a cup of cold water. Didn't seem to help enough so I added another cup. From here, all seemed well at 151 F for a couple minutes, but then quickly fell to 149, 148, 147, 146 F. Oh crap. I shouldn't have done a damn thing to it. From experience I know I should never adjust a slightly too hot mash temp in the first ~10 minutes of the mash because it takes more time than you think to equilibrate temps between malt and water in the mash. If I'd waited, it probably would have been perfect or maybe a degree or two too hot which I would have preferred. But then even adding a couple quarts of boiling water, I could only get the mash back up from ~146 F to about 149 F, where it stayed for the full mash time. Oh well, a little too low. I shot my own self. Nevertheless, I was only off by 2 degrees F in the mash, and one gravity point, and volumes were perfect, so all in all, it was a pretty dang great brew day. Not bad for being rusty from an 8-month hiatus. Next time I might do better.

Much (but not all, I must confess) of the above data was jotted down on my printed recipe sheet, and later entered into my database and spreadsheets for future reference. I don't usually get this verbose anymore, only occasionally. As I get older I've gotten a bit lazier. Those sheets are stuffed away in my drawer but probably will just get recycled later since I have the useful stuff electronically.

Math, science, history....... and experience. These are my friends. Because without them, I probably don't really have any.

 

@dmtaylor, I was beginning to think that I was one of the only documentation nerds, but the way you approach your brewing sessions and the constant analysis you do while brewing and afterwards seems so similar to mine. I would love to get together for a beer if I'm ever in Wisconsin, and likewise if you are ever in Ontario (Toronto area) let me know.

I can relate to the stuffed notes in drawers. For many years I had notes everywhere mixed with notes from other interests. Eventually it got so frustrating finding those notes that I rounded them all up and created the file/file box system. This is not to say that I still don't have loose notes lying around, especially before, during and after a brew session, but I try as much as possible to keep them all in one place. I hope to go through these files in the future and try to condense them electronically or otherwise.

"Math, science, history....... and experience. These are my friends." You couldn't have expressed it better. I have often said that I find the math (and science/history) and analysis of beermaking as enjoyable as making the beer itself. It allows oneself to identify even closer to the final product. The real beauty is that there is always more to learn and always more complicated calculations to prepare.