Welcome to How to Brew!
Welcome to the 3rd Edition of How to Brew, originally published by Brewers Publications of Boulder, CO, in 2006.
I have added a few critical updates to this version (and a few better pictures), but this website is mostly verbatim to the 3rd edition as-published. We can call this website version 3.5.
The 4th Edition of How to Brew contains 200 more pages than the 3rd edition with dedicated chapters for brewing strong beer, fruit beers, and sour beers, as well as more description and clarification of the information presented here on this website.
The 4th Edition (Brewers Publications, 2017) is the current published edition, and is readily available from most home brewing supply shops. I encourage you to patronize your local homebrewing supply shop because these people are your best source for information and ingredients. Otherwise you can click on the book covers in the gallery below to be taken to the publisher's websites.
A Short Note on the Brewing Process, Malted Barley, and Malt Extract
Before we begin, let me quickly explain how this works. Barley is the grain that provides the starches that are converted into sugars that are boiled with hops and fermented with yeast to make beer. The barley seed basically consists of a plant embryo, a starch reserve locked in a protein matrix, and enzymes. If the seed was planted, the embryo would start growing, and the enzymes would release the starches from the matrix and start converting them into sugars that the growing plant would use for food. This process is called germination.
In brewing, we trick the seeds into thinking that they have been planted to start the germination process –the release of the starches. We call this “malting”. Malted barley has been partially germinated and then dried to stop the process so it can be delivered to a brewer. The brewer then completes the release and conversion of the starches into sugars by steeping the malted barley in hot water, and this is called the “mash”. In the mash, the enzymes in the barley quickly convert the starches into sugars that the brewer draws off and boils with hops. The sugary liquid is called “wort”. Malt extract is concentrated wort.
So, brewing with malt extract is like making soup from a can of condensed soup. In fact, malt extract can be dried to a powder just like a packet of instant soup. So, brewing with malt extract saves time from making the wort – you just add water, boil it, and get on with fermentation.
If your country or region doesn’t have malt extract, then you will need to mash malted barley to make the wort. It is not difficult, but it will add another hour or so to your brew day. I will cover mashing in Section 3, but for now, let’s assume you are brewing with a malt extract beer kit.
How To Brew, 3rd Edition, Brewers Publications, 2006.
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.jpg "How To Brew, 4th Edition")
