Home-brewers' beer hits the big time

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Home-brewers’ beer hits the big time

Sam Adams

These winning home brewers get their beer made and sold nationally by Sam Adams, along with their smiling mugs on the label.

There’s something personal about a home-brewed beer. In the flavor you’ll find a brewer’s likes and dislikes, their attention to detail, their best effort at making something special with their own hands and know-how. And just like a Pixies song or a Nirvana rip, there’s usually a rough edge or two that lets you know this is something crafted by people mustering as much creativity and human precision as possible. 

But when a home brew recipe is recreated on a large scale by a professional brewery is that personal essence still intact? Sam Adams’ LongShot home brew competition offers the chance to find out.


Sam Adams calls for submissions from home brewers, judges them, and then brews and ships the winning beer across the country. It’s a home brewer’s dream come true everybody can get a taste.

This year, three beers made it into the LongShot six-pack; a Dunkel-style lager, an Imperial Stout, and a boozy old-style German Altbier. I was eager to see if their beer still had a homebrewed character, or if the rough edges had been polished off by the pros at Sam Adams. 

The first I sampled was the Dunkel (German for dark lager), named A Dark Night in Munich. It was brewed by Corey Martin, a home brewer from Austin, Texas, who has entered the LongShot competition for the past three years. 

Sam Adams

Corey Martin, one of the winners of Sam Adams’ LongShot competition, shows off his brewing lab.

“I’ve been trying to make a good Munich Dunkel for a while, but they always had too much roasted malt flavor or weren’t dark enough,” he told me. So he used a trick he saw on The Brewing Network. “They had a pro brewer on that mentioned how he ‘stains’ his black IPA by pulverizing the dark-roasted malts in a coffee grinder and adding them in during the sparge (a process to extract sugar from the grain),” he said. “The ‘staining’ process is what helps give the beer its dark color without the roastiness.”

It’s makes for a unique and tasty approach to the Dunkel style. There’s a caramel sweetness and subtle notes of brown sugar that aren’t overshadowed by the roasted malts used to make a beer this dark. With an ABV of just under 6% and medium to light mouth-feel, this beer won’t bog you down.

But does it taste like Corey’s? Corey said Sam Adams nailed the recipe. “It tastes pretty much like the one I have on tap at home right now.” So Corey’s friends can stop bugging him to brew more.

Story: QA with Sam Adams 2011 LongShot winners

The next winning beer was brewed by Fred Hessler, a Sam Adams employee who works in the accounting department.  Yes, even the accountants brew beer over there! Fred swung for the fences with a big and boozy submission called Derf’s Secret Alt. An “Altbier” (German for “old beer”) is brewed in the centuries-old northern German tradition of using cool fermentation temperatures and cold conditioning. The result is a crisp copper-colored ale that is the only thing you should drink if you ever visit Düsseldorf. Seriously, the stuff is magic.

But Fred’s is no ordinary Altbier. “I figured that I could not advance in the competition with a regular Alt,” Fred says. “Thus the Sticke Alt (a stronger style Alt), a style that I have only seen in one commercial beer,” he said. “I made it on my back porch one night while my wife was out and the kids were in bed.”

The result is almost irresistible to a malt hound like myself — a rich and bready ale with notes of molasses, caramel, and toffee along with a pretty sizeable kick of booze on the back end. This one checks all of my boxes, and with an ABV of 9.3%, it could kick my butt as well.

The final of the winning trio is Five Crown Imperial Stout, brewed by Joe Formanek, a long-time home brewer from Chicago who has entered the LongShot competition every year since 2006. 

He’s a grain enthusiast, and likes to cruise the home brew shops looking for new grist for his mill. The difference-maker in Five Crown, he said, is the grains he used. “It’s some of the darker wheat malts, specifically chocolate wheat and caramel wheat malts. I also use oatmeal in all my stouts, which adds to the slickness and richness.” 

Joe thinks Sam Adams got “pretty darn close” to recreating his brew. “I use a more old-fashioned oatmeal that offers a slightly different taste. There was also a slight difference in the fermentation flavor, maybe from the yeast, but I think Sam did a great job of producing this beer.”

It has a complex blend of roastiness, coffee, chocolate and earthy dark fruit, and a noticeably herbal hop finish and a slick mouthfeel. It’s also slightly boozy, which makes sense given its 8.9% ABV. 

It’s really cool that Sam Adams, by far America’s largest craft brewer, has dedicated their time and resources to encouraging people to brew their own beer. Are these the best beers I’ve ever had? No. But the six-pack is full of good brews, lots of personality and dreams come true. What tastes better than that?

LongShot six packs hit shelves recently, and can still be found wherever better beers are sold.

Jim Galligan is co-founder of the Beer and Whiskey Brothers blog, where he and his brother Don cover the ever-evolving world of craft beer and distilled spirits.

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How to Make Beer

beer

How to Make Beer

Making beer is easy, inexpensive, and most of all, fun. With the rise in popularity of home brewing, there are a wide variety of top quality ingredients available.
You can literally make hundreds of styles of beer that will taste great and impress your friends. Getting started making beer will only cost you a small amount of money, depending on your level of interest. Most beer making kits range from only $60 to $200 and make great, unique gifts.

How to Make Beer

Making Beer is just like cooking. Each recipe requires different ingredients and techniques. This page is an attempt to go over the basics of home brewing in order to give you an understanding of how beer is made.

First of all, beer is made from 4 basic ingredients: water, malt (malted barley), hops, and yeast.

Water

Water is the most abundant ingredient in any style of beer. When making beer at home try to use filtered water instead of plain tap water. If your water doesn’t taste good from the tap, you probably won’t like it in your beer either. Do not use distilled water because it has been depleted of its oxygen.

Malt

Malted barley is barley grain that has been carefully soaked in water until it sprouts and then dried. This malting process develops the necessary sugars and soluble starches needed for fermentation.

The malt is then taken through a process called mashing which extracts the sugars and starches from the grain. Although advanced home brewers can accomplish this step at home, most will buy the malted barley already mashed in a product called malt extract

Hops

Hops are green flowers that grow on a vine and look similar to pine cones. They perform several roles in the beer making process. Most notably are the taste and aroma they impart on a beer.

Since not all of the sugars will ferment, the malt will cause the beer to be really sweet. Hops will balance out the sweetness by adding a degree of bitterness. Hops will also add a distinctive aroma to the finished brew.

Yeast

Yeast is the catalyst that makes it all happen. In short, yeast is a living organism that feeds off of the sugars in the malt. The yeast will convert the sugars to alcohol and carbon dioxide in a process called fermentation.

There are many strains of yeasts (even in the air we breathe). In order to get the results needed for making beer, a specially cultured beer yeast is required. The yeast will also impart taste and mouthfeel qualities to the beer.

The Beer Making Process

To summarize, the malt, hops, and water are boiled for a period of time. This mixture is called wort (pronounced wert). Then the wort is poured into fermenter and allowed to cool.

Next, the prepared yeast is pitched into the fermenter and an airlock is placed over the opening. Now it’s the yeast’s job to do its thing.

The yeast will multiply like crazy as it consumes the sugars in the brew. After a period of time, usually within 7 to 10 days, the yeast will have consumed all that it can and fall to the bottom of the fermenter.

Finally, the beer is bottled and set aside for a couple of weeks to mature and carbonate.

Making beer at home really is a fantastic hobby and can be a great social activity. Have some friends over and let them try your new brew. Better yet, get them involved and see who can make the best batches. Have blind taste tests with your buddies. Most of all, have fun!

author:Jason Ditto

All About Beer with Bill & Sheila

How To Brew Your Own Beer

How To Brew Your Own Beer

There’s no bottle of brew that tastes quite as good as the one you’ve made yourself. It’s also a fun hobby. So what are you waiting for? Here’s how to brew your own beer.

There’s some equipment you are going to need. You should be able to pick it all up for under $200, and it’s not hard to find. Any local brewing supply store or online brewing site will have everything you need which includes:

Brewing Pot
Plastic hose
Fermenter
Bottling bucket
Airlock and stopper
Bottle brush
Bottle capper
Thermometer – the stick-on type is best
Small bowl
Saucepan
Spatula
Oven mitts
Wooden mixing spoons

The easiest way, especially for beginners, is to pick up a beer kit. It will contain all the needed ingredients, which include yeast and hopped malt concentrate. You also need to buy fermentables, which are what add the different flavours to your brew. Of course you can buy your ingredients separately, but the kit is a fool proof way to get everything you need.

You will need to sanitize all your equipment. In fact, it’s the most important thing you will do. Clean everything with hot soapy water. Then you need to sanitize all your equipment by using either the iodine solution or chlorine solution that came with your brewing equipment.

Now that everything is sterilized, you are ready to start. Put two quarts of water in your brew pot; then heat to around 180F or until it steams; then remove it from the heat. Add your beer kit and fermentables. Follow the instructions provided with your kit.

Stir until everything is dissolved; then put the lid on and leave it sit for 20 minutes on low heat. Add your mix, which is called the wort, to the fermenter which should be filled with four gallons of water. Stir for 4 minutes. This oxygenizes the mixture. When the wort is cool to the touch you can add your yeast.

Now it’s time to let your wort ferment. The process starts right away and continues for 5 days. During this period it’s important to keep the temperature constant, around 65F, and to keep your wort in a dark place. You’ll be able to tell when your wort is fermenting because you will see tiny little air bubbles rising to the top.

When 5 day arrives you need to start checking your beer each day. When there are no more air bubbles your beer is ready to bottle. Don’t be impatient. If you don’t wait for the fermenting to complete you’ll wreck your beer’s taste.

Before you bottle you have to prepare what’s called the primary solution. This is what carbonates the beer. In your saucepan add 2 cups of water and ¾ cup dextrose. Bring to a boil over medium heat, and then let it cool for 30 minutes. Pour it into the bottling bucket.

Attach the hose to the spigot on your fermenter and put the other end of the hose in your bottling bucket. Open the spigot and transfer your beer over to the bottling bucket. When done, detach and clean the hose and toss the fermenter. Fill each bottle leaving 1” of air at the top. Cap securely and make sure there are no leaks.

Wait, it’s not quite time to drink it yet. You need to put your bottled beer in a cool dark place for the second fermentation process. Don’t put it in the fridge as that’s too cold. Basements work great. It now needs to sit for 2 more weeks. And then it will be time to enjoy!

author:Gray Rollins

All About Beer with Bill & Sheila