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Practical Blending and Post-Fermentation Adjustments for the Homebrewer

  • Speaker: Kyle Kohlmorgen
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2015
  • San Diego, CA

Taste. Evaluate. Adjust. Repeat. This seminar will guide and challenge you to improve your beers through tasting, evaluation and adjustment. Seminar participants will explore techniques for fine-tuning a beer’s “seasoning” and body, highlighting signature flavors and achieving balance through blending. Kyle will borrow techniques from chefs , winemakers, bakers and…

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Tips on How to Homebrew Lagers

  • Speaker: Jason Pratt
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2015
  • San Diego, CA

Jason Pratt of MillerCoors will share tips and tricks to help perfect making an exceptional lager at home. Learn how to apply some large scale quality processes to your small batch setup.

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A Homebrewer’s Musings on Barrel Aging

  • Speaker: Chris P. Frey
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

While barrel aging is popular at the pro level, it can be intimidating for homebrewers. Not understanding nuances specific to barrel aging can create uncertainty for homebrewers and potentially leads to avoidance of these traditional flavor- and aroma- enhancing vessels. This seminar is practically focused, with a minimum of science.…

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Brew In A Bag: It Really Works!

  • Speakers: Brian PhadRex Slagel
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Brew In A Bag explained! We'll cover every aspect of this method, including a few tips that will unravel the mystery of water volume and gravity. You will learn about equipment, insulation methods, bag material and uses, lifting techniques, and cooling. To spark ideas, we'll show photos of rig set…

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Conditioning and Aging Beer

  • Speaker: Colin Kaminski
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Join Water co-author Colin Kaminski for a discussion of conditioning and aging beer, including when and how to rack, when and how to use finings, how to carbonate and measure, and steps to improve flavors and minimize problems from the brewhouse.

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Debunking the Detested Decoction

  • Speaker: John Van Itallie
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Ever heard someone say, “You never need to do a decoction?” Today we might say, “You may never absolutely need to do a decoction, but you should embrace it as another available technique.” Join us as we take a fresh look at the decoction process, including tips for making this…

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Effects of Hot Side Aeration of Wort, Mash & Sparge Water

  • Speaker: John Rozborski
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Ever wonder if you’re ruining your beer because of splashing your wort, over mixing your mash or aggressively sparging? This presentation is the results of an AHA Research & Education Fund project. It will share the results of an experiment designed to test these concepts and may give you guidance…

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Experimental Brewing

  • Speakers: Denny ConnDrew Beechum
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Drew Beechum and Denny Conn discuss concepts from their upcoming book, Experimental Homebrewing. They'll cover why you should experiment and how to set up and evaluate your experiments, as well as give tips on equipment, recipes and ingredients for fruitful experimentation.

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Let’s Brew Small

  • Speaker: James Spencer
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

There are several advantages to brewing smaller batches. This seminar will take a look at the reasons to go small, the equipment needed for smaller brews, sample recipes that have been proven on the small scale, and how to scale up (or down) recipes once they are successful.

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Long Live Lagers

  • Speakers: Jason OliverWarren Haskell
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

This seminar will present an overview of brewing lager styles, from light and crisp to dark and heavy. It will take professional lager brewing practices and translate them into practical methods for the average homebrewer. Lagers, more than any other beer style, require the brewer to pay attention to the…

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Making the Jump to All-Grain

  • Speaker: Scott Mitchell
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Are you on the fence about making the jump to all-grain brewing? Come get the push you've always wanted as Scott explains the basic knowledge, costs, time requirements and techniques needed to brew your first all-grain batch.

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Practical Brewing for Better Beer

  • Speaker: David Houseman
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Excellent beer can be made by beginner homebrewers with simple equipment and 10 simple steps to making better beer. By avoiding the most common faults in homebrewing, homebrewers using extract malts on their kitchen stoves can produce high-quality beer. This seminar’s tips will enable beginner to intermediate homebrewer to improve…

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Putting Some Numbers on First Wort & Mash Hop Additions

  • Speaker: David Curtis
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

First wort hopping is a method many homebrewers use with the idea that it adds a smoother bitterness and a unique flavor contribution to their beer. Mash hopping is avoided by many brewers because it is commonly thought to be a waste of good hops. David Curtis of Bell's Brewery's…

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The Influence of Mashing on Sour Beer Production

  • Speaker: Michael Tonsmeire
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

The characteristics of sour beers are influenced less by the flavors contributed directly by the malt and more by the ways in which compounds in the wort influence the mixed fermentation. Join Michael Tonsmeire as he discusses practical techniques to control the levels of carbohydrates, acids, phenols, and proteins and…

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The Shenanigans of Barrel Aging

  • Speakers: Brett KosmickiJason Heystek
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2014
  • Grand Rapids, MI

Founders Brewing Co. has been aging beer in bourbon barrels since 2001. This seminar will discuss our process of selecting barrels and the beers to age, with particular attention focused on high-volume brands KBS and Backwoods Bastard. The growth of Founders barrel program from a single barrel to the thousands…

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Alternative Wood Aging Techniques

  • Speaker: John Gasparine
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2013
  • Philadelphia, PA

Did you know that wood has been used as a flavoring in modern beer since the 1700s? Yet most of us mistakenly believe that wood was historically used in the brewing process for form and function only—not flavor or aroma. Did you know that there are an estimated 100,000 species…

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Brewing Better Beer: Practical Applications

  • Speaker: Gordon Strong
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2013
  • Philadelphia, PA

Join author Gordon Strong as he discusses how to apply favorite reader tips from Brewing Better Beer. Understand the decisions and reasoning used to create two new all-grain recipes. Learn the approach, not just the recipes, as you see how your target beer preferences impact the decisions you make throughout…

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Brewing with Induction

  • Speaker: Joshua Weikert
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2013
  • Philadelphia, PA

Few brewers use electric heat to boil—and frequently transition to propane when the opportunity arises —and many are missing out on the benefits of electric induction elements, either as a primary or secondary source of boil heat. Induction is cost-effective, efficient and safer than traditional electric elements or propane/LNG jet…

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Brew in a Bag

  • Speaker: Brad Smith
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2012
  • Bellvue, WA

A discussion of the brew in a bag brewing method, its advantages and how to use it to brew all-grain beer.

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Brewing Better Beer: Practical Applications

  • Speaker: Gordon Strong
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2012
  • Bellvue, WA

Join author Gordon Strong as he discusses how to apply favorite reader tips from Brewing Better Beer. Understand the decisions and reasoning used to create two new all-grain recipes. Learn the approach, not just the recipes, as you see how your target beer preferences affect the decisions you make throughout…

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Crafting Award Winning Extract and Partial Grain Beer

  • Speaker: Mark Tanner
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2012
  • Bellvue, WA

Many people assume extract brewing is just a step on the path to all-grain brewing. Mark will convince you that it’s not. He will share simple techniques to brew world-class beer styles which are comparable to their all-grain counterparts. Mark uses simple, partial-mash recipes that anyone can brew in 2-½…

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Homebrewing Lager Beer

  • Speaker: Bryan Cardwell
  • Track: Brewing Process
  • Homebrew Con 2012
  • Bellvue, WA

The basics of homebrewing lager beer will be discussed in this presentation. Topics covered will include wort production, fermentation, maturation, clarification, and helpful techniques.

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