HOMEBREWING: How West Virginians can“stick it to the Man”
After toiling for 5 or 6 hours over hot boiling liquid (albeit, while drinking a beer) and all of the hours of follow-up; checking, transferring, cleaning, kegging or bottling, I often ask myself the same question: ‘Why am I doing this?’ When you add the cost of the ingredients and your time, it doesn’t make financial sense to homebrew. Homebrewing is a labor of love. It’s a highly creative process coupled with a very rigid set of procedures. It’s a hobby where the creative side mingles with the technical side of our minds. Then there is the magical moment of finally tasting your beer. Ahhh! What a moment indeed!
West Virginians have even more reason to brew at home because our beer laws are very hostile to the free market for beer. We are very limited as to what we can buy in our state. I spend most of my retail beer dollars out of state, or make what I want at home. With a little bit of study and practice (and a little help from experienced brewers) you can make very good quality beer at home. I like brewing strong Belgian ales, some topping 9% alcohol. I have brewer friends who like to make very authentic German styles, some brew English ales. Brewing and drinking beer that WV State laws forbid us to buy is our way of “stickin it to the man”. I always know where I can find tap of WV contraband among my brew crew….
Unlike wine and winemaking, really good beer can be made no matter where you are located. Wine depends on the available grapes and juices. The ingredients for wine often diminish during transport and handling. Shipping whole juice or grapes is really expensive because there is a lot of water weight and concentrated juice doesn’t cut it. Beer is made by extracting fermentable sugars from grain, mainly malted barley. A 55 pound sack of malted barley can make 25 or 30 gallons of beer. That much wine juice would weigh in at around 250 pounds! Most beginning brewers use malt extract, yielding some very nice ale, but making it from grain will yield better beer.
Charleston has one great brewing asset — its water. Charleston’s water supply is one of the finest brewing waters anywhere. Our water profile is very close to that of water used to make authentic Czech Pilsener beer. It is also easily modified to make virtually any style of beer. You can believe the commercials on this one: water is an important ingredient in beer. Other ingredients such as hops and yeast are readily available via online brewing supply sources. Brewers yeast is quite different than bakers yeast. Luckily there are sources for yeast that specialize in live liquid cultures for nearly every ale or lager style known.
I am not saying that you can just add water and voila, you have great beer. Making beer from grain is much more difficult to make than wine. It is a scientific process that takes understanding and practice. There are multiple phases and conversions that need to work. With that said, you can make excellent beer at home with a little work. Most of the experienced brewers I know, myself included, would put many of our beers up against commercial offerings without hesitation. Forget all of the wives tales about exploding bottles and sour beer, yada, yada… Sure, it can happen if you do not take some time to learn the basics about the brewing process. A great way to learn, and stay informed is to join a local brewing club. For more info check out these useful links:
March 14th, 2007 at 9:54 pm
I like the wine I make & with kits. I can make it year around. Although, juice & grapes are available once a year at a variable harvest time.
Your right about beer being harder to make than wine. Sanitation is much more important in beer than in wine. Fermention tempurature is also, very important. Water can play a key role in some beers. It is also, much more varied than wine. Beer is made through recipes, the ingredients are very numorous. Different grains, hops, yeast, adjuncts & like I said above; Sometimes, chemicals in the water.
“Beer is made by man, wine by God.” -Martin Luther-
March 16th, 2007 at 1:55 pm
Rich,
Having had a 1st hand tour of the “Rosemont” brewery on a cold, snowy winter’s day.. I’ll agree exactly with your comments about creativity meets strict process in brewing. I enjoyed your talk contrasting what “I woulda done” with what the brewer was actually doing. Not that his way was wrong.. but just different than yours.. the process was the same.. but there are certainly endless nuances..
And I too would put the brews you guys make up against the “commercial” brewers..
(does that comment get me for free beer??)
As for the stupid beer laws in our state, maybe you could include a periodic list of great beers that you can’t get here do to the stupid beer law. Maybe generate a little ire in those who would like to try the fantastic beers that we cant get..
Respectfully,
Diggo
March 16th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Diggo, Homebrewing is like cooking or baking. The more you understand why you are doing something, the better your procedures and consistency become. I love to cook as well, and I try to never miss “Good Eats” so I can learn real food science.
I did not quite understand the part where you referenced the “I woulda Done” stuff. I did not that subject on in that this blogpost, but I may have made a comment like that previously. I agree with the conclusion that we all do things a little differently, but can make great beer in the end.
Brewery tours are usually really fun, especially the smaller breweries when the brewer shows you around. If you guys would like good leads on brew tours, I can post them.
The American Homebrewers Association holds a Big Brew in May. I plan on writing about it and inviting my readers to stop by to see the process. Stay Tuned…
March 16th, 2007 at 3:59 pm
Rich..
The “I woulda done” comment was not on your blog.. We had a conversation while someone else was brewing a Kolsh in the arse freezing snow .. or maybe I had just sampled too much of the awesome homebrew at that point and imagined it.. anyway the Micro-Micro brewery tour that day was cool..
peace
March 19th, 2007 at 11:27 am
Oh yeah… It was cold..
I wouldn’t have brewed that Day!!!
Or the night “same brewer” started a batch at 8:30pm….
April 2nd, 2007 at 9:53 am
There are many reasons to brew and making better beer than you can buy commercially is definitely one of them. Homebrewing does have an image problem, primarily because of the bathtub brewers that do it once without knowing what they are doing and make some really terrible stuff. I’ve heard so many stories from these one time brewers. Also, I’ve heard more than one professional brewer use the term “homebrew” as a blanket term for bad beer. The problem with generalizations is their general inaccuracy. The serious homebrewer should think about embracing the term “craftbrewer” to describe what they do. One of the main reasons I brew my own beer is for social reasons. Craftbrewers are friendly folks and they like to get together and share craftbeer and good stories. Cheers!
April 2nd, 2007 at 10:36 am
Amen Brother!