Replicating a beer is a different skill set (though it does overlap), but don’t worry too much about making an identical twin – making a great sibling is more than good enough, and who knows, you might even improve upon a classic!
Alternative grain beers don’t need to be excessively complicated or weird to be successful – this recipe (and others in the category) show how base grains can make a significant difference in flavor and improve upon the standard barley-based approaches.
Once you get the process down for your system and palate, you can play around with the amount and type of coffee involved, and you should also start playing around with the styles of coffee beer you brew!
Lambics are hard to get right. They take a long time to mature, so you’re going to need to show some patience. They’re worth it, though. In exchange for a couple of hours each year, you can develop a steady rotation of complex and flavorful sour beers.
One nice thing here is that once you get past the “emergency – need beer” time window, you can lager this beer just like any other. Tuck the bottles or keg away for a few weeks of cold refrigeration to clean up and clear up.
Drink this one as soon as it’s ready. It doesn’t age poorly, but the seasonally-evocative nature of the recipe might make it seem out-of-place. Happy (early) Holidays!
As a Specialty style, Fruit Beer is necessarily broad (or, more accurately, user- and declared-style-defined). The overarching theme of the style is “balance,” though, with a beer that’s still recognizable as “beer” but also with “evident” fruit character.
Far from being just the “middle child” of the British Pale Ale family, the Best Bitter should be one of your favorites because it combines the lightness of the Ordinary Bitter with the more flavor-forward nature of the ESB.
Kellerbier merges the best of British cask ale with German malts and hops in a unique lager style. It has an atypical flavor profile that, depending on your finishing steps, can represent itself as a kind of German ESB or a Continental IPA.
There’s a simple pleasure to this style that makes it a joy to drink, with the added bonus of being a beer that you can enjoy a full dimpled mug of and still follow the action on the pitch.