homebrewandbeer.com

Want to hear something funny? Or maybe not funny? About 12 months ago, I rang a HBS that is listed in our Yellow Pages and asked did they have a Wyeast 1084.
They said they`d never heard of Wyeast or any other liq. yeast.
Out of interest, after reading the above, 10 minutes ago I rang the same shop as 12 months ago and asked for Wyeast 1084.
Yes readers.........the answer was "wine yeast?... you want wine yeast? .... what?...Wyeast?...never heard of it, what is it?"
Anyone who doubts this farce can PM me for the shop name and try for themselves

Oh Ryan I believe you. Maybe our HB shops should get together and form some kind of chain. That way were ever people go you can identify these kind of shops, much like McDonalds?

lethaldog wrote: ...i am now an all grainer and i have a keg setup with 8 kegs and i also bottle occasionally, my advice is dont listen to others just do what suits you, most of the time you already know the answer to your questions anyway and apart from a few specialty shops i have never had any advice from a HBs that i would bother listening to much less put into practice, go with your gut mate and if you keep brewing then your guts gonna be hard not to take notice of anyway

....ditto Lethal! I started with a kit and bottles and kept pushing the boundaries trying to work out how to make better beer and store / serve it to suit my needs - not unlike what a Chef with a passion for food would do!!

Maybe we should start a thread with a list of all the BS quotes that we've had from HBS owners - I suppose the only longer thread would be all the BS quotes we get on forums!!

I may be an all grain kegger, but it'll be a cold day in hell when you see me slagging off any kit or extract brewer!!

Cheers,
TL

I live in brisbane and work in beenleigh and could never get home to my local hbs after work before it shut. So I tried the hbs store in beenleigh and he gave me one a beer that he'd made. First time I'd been offered a beer in a hbs. I was stoked. I guess theres alot of variation in attitudes for the operators.

Good stuff! It's one thing to sell malt etc, quite another to make beer and be prepared to offer it up for tasting / evaluation...

The local HBS here does brewday demos and we've had the odd, er, um. Friday arvo sensory evaluation session in the shop!!

Cheers,
TL

I've found that much of what you hear in the HBS (pub, tram, street or almost any other place) or read on the Intraweb thingy is likely to be ill-conceived babble. I get ideas from both places (less so the HBS these days as I have outgrown their style of doing things). Shops that are staffed by people suffer all the issues that people have - not always a good thing, but reality...

I agree with Lethaldog and Trough Lolly, I believe the idea is to get out there and do what seems right to you and don't get too fussed over the occasional failure.

I've got some mates who reckon that moving to kegs makes a bigger difference than moving from kit/extract to grain brewing, but it isn't possible for me at the moment so I bottle everything except for the occasional party keg.

Interestingly, I had a conversation a lot like this with a professional chef over a drink a couple of weeks ago...

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:I've found that much of what you hear in the HBS (pub, tram, street or almost any other place) or read on the Intraweb thingy is likely to be ill-conceived babble. I get ideas from both places (less so the HBS these days as I have outgrown their style of doing things)...<snip>

Hmmmm, I'm not altogether in agreement that the "Intraweb thingy" is mainly ill-conceived babble. To call it babble suggests you know better and worst than that, there are some things that I've foolishly dismissed as babble to find out later that it was in fact the truth - and that applies to any advice, not just what's on the net or in a HBS. My rationale is "If I don't know the answer or have solid / reliable evidence to back my claims, don't post!"...admittedly and sadly, not everyone operates under the same tenet...

I found that the two best things I did to improve my brewing techniques were to join online forums and become a member of the local brewing club. If I hadn't, I would not have found Palmer's online book, or the many other excellent resources online. Nor would I have met other more accomplished brewers in the club who happily showed me what fresh grains, hops and yeast can do to your beer.....I was trapped in a mindset where my ultimate goal was to clone VB with a Country Brewer kit and a bag of dextrose!

...I'm still working on it!

Cheers,
TL

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:I've got some mates who reckon that moving to kegs makes a bigger difference than moving from kit/extract to grain brewing

If it makes you feel any better SMOI I think your mates are talking crap.

Well, the response to my post has been very interesting..

As I said when I posted it that I would visit another HBS only 20min away and I was very impressed, he also said he has heard some bad comments about the person at the HBS im talking about. He also said, im not an expert and wont try to be and also wont tell you how to do things, just give advice on what I know.
I found him very approachable and will be visting him from now on for my needs based on what he has available in his store...

Someone mentioned QUOTES FROM HBS OWNERS: Here is a start: QUOTE: I KNOW WHAT IM TALKING ABOUT, IM STUDYING BREWING AT UNIVERSITY!!!

are you in the sutherland shire by any chance Clean Brewer ??

Tipsy wrote:

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:I've got some mates who reckon that moving to kegs makes a bigger difference than moving from kit/extract to grain brewing

If it makes you feel any better SMOI I think your mates are talking crap.

I fail to see how that will make him feel any better.

Trough Lolly wrote: Hmmmm, I'm not altogether in agreement that the "Intraweb thingy" is mainly ill-conceived babble. To call it babble suggests you know better...

Not at all. There is a great deal of stuff that has helped me a lot (and I have a very long way to go) in brewing and other endeavours. But, the signal to noise ratio is also really high, so I find that I have to trawl through a *lot* of dross to find the good stuff.

As a f'rinstance, I have been reading everything I can find about using olive oil in brewing. In several forums, the number of people who either openly or otherwise have said (paraphrased) "I don't know anything about this, but I am telling you it is crap." is simply amazing. Others have contributed stuff which defies logic entirely. I have no other option but to brew and give it a try for myself... *sigh*

Trough Lolly wrote: My rationale is "If I don't know the answer or have solid / reliable evidence to back my claims, don't post!"...admittedly and sadly, not everyone operates under the same tenet...

This is exactly my current complaint.

ryan wrote:

Tipsy wrote:

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:I've got some mates who reckon that moving to kegs makes a bigger difference than moving from kit/extract to grain brewing

If it makes you feel any better SMOI I think your mates are talking crap.

I fail to see how that will make him feel any better.

Given that I'm a bit over bottling and can't have a 'real' keg system at the moment...

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:But, the signal to noise ratio is also really high, so I find that I have to trawl through a *lot* of dross to find the good stuff.

I think you mean "the signal to noise ratio is really low."

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:As a f'rinstance, I have been reading everything I can find about using olive oil in brewing. In several forums, the number of people who either openly or otherwise have said (paraphrased) "I don't know anything about this, but I am telling you it is crap." is simply amazing. Others have contributed stuff which defies logic entirely. I have no other option but to brew and give it a try for myself... *sigh*

If I remember correctly, a link the original research paper was posted on this site. The amount of olive oil was really small for a 23L batch, like measured in the microgram range.

Edit: Actually, it's a doctoral thesis done by the brewer at New Belgium. A blog post on it is here.

Sorry Benson,
Im not in the Sutherland shire, Im in a boring old country coastal town in Qld. Hence why ive started brewing and Woodworking. You must have the same issues??????

rwh wrote:

SpillsMostOfIt wrote:But, the signal to noise ratio is also really high, so I find that I have to trawl through a *lot* of dross to find the good stuff.

I think you mean "the signal to noise ratio is really low."

Yep. That *is* what I meant, but for some reason I had a doubt about phrasing and so I googled it and the first couple of sites I looked at suggested my original phrasing was correct. Oh, well... *sigh*

rwh wrote: If I remember correctly, a link the original research paper was posted on this site. The amount of olive oil was really small for a 23L batch, like measured in the microgram range.

I read it on a couple of the US forums and the required quantity *is very* small, but that shouldn't provide too much of a challenge. The reason I'm contemplating it is because I think the greatest improvement I can currently make in my brewing is probably by improving my fermentation practice. Although this is a fairly wiggy step, I figure it can't hurt too much to give it a crack.

I was once chastised in one establishment for wanting to use a champagne yeast in a brew after the initial fermentation had finished. Imagine what sort of reception I might get with the olive oil concept from that guy!

rwh wrote:...I think you mean "the signal to noise ratio is really low."

...indeed - and on this site it's quite tolerable compared to other forums that I've been on!

Thanks for the link too, Rob! I still haven't read the BYO mag article yet but plan on doing so during the mash this Saturday so I'll see where the two articles differ and post a summary (under a new topic!), if anyone's interesting in finding out more on this issue?

Cheers,
TL

Sure, sounds good. Thanks, TL.

i have actually done the olive oil thingy, i sterilised a pin and dipped in some oil, then touched it on the surface of the wort.

i didn't really aerate, and its looking like a really healthy fermentation.

i only decided to do it because i was drinking at the time, so i didn't happen to make a control batch.

so i wouldn't take any of this as science, but as anecdotal evidence that it works.

That happens to me alot... only doing something cos i happened to be drinking at the time.... the main one for me is adding too much hops..

i'd have a recipe set out in front of me, and it would all go out the window...