Brewing Classic Styles: 80 Winning Recipes Anyone Can Brew

Considering the celebrity status of both authors, the homebrewing community knew that this book was going to be big long before it hit bookstore shelves. As expected, Jamil and John delivered up a treasure trove of information that should be in every homebrewer's library. It is not, however, intended for the novice brewer. The authors assume that you have knowledge of basic extract brewing techniques, and it would be best to have a working knowledge of all grain brewing as well before you attempt your own versions of these award-winning recipes. I do feel that the book's title is a bit misleading: it would have been better to call it "Brewing and Appreciating Classic Styles." Anyone wanting to be a beer judge or at the very least a proper beer snob should read this book. The style notes that precede each recipe are invaluable in helping the reader to understand the nuances of all the BJCP style categories. Even if you take away the entire collection of award winning recipes alluded to in the book's title, I would still feel like I got my money's worth out of it. The first four chapters cover some brewing basics, and do an outstanding job of it. Many of the pitfalls of making merely good beer are exposed, leaving the reader with a better understanding of how to make great beer. As if all that valuable information was not worth your money, they threw in four appendices and a glossary. All of this is written in a very accessible style with a minimum of technical jargon. Appendix A, "Pitching Yeast Rates and Starters" is one of the best treatments of the topic that I have ever seen for those of us that did not major in microbiology. Then we get down to the meat of the book, the recipes. Each recipe is carefully crafted to result in a beer that is both of excellent quality and fits the BJCP style guidelines for the style it represents. The authors do not leave you with just a grain bill and a list of hops and boil times. The process for each recipe is carefully covered, and the subtle nuances of brewing each style are covered in sufficient detail to result in easy duplication. Another unique aspect of these recipes is that they are extract based, with all grain options given as well. No matter how unsophisticated your brewery, you can brew excellent examples of every style. Just to show that Jamil and John did not pay me to write what would otherwise be a gushing review, I must find some fault. My only complaint is that each recipe is designed for a seven-gallon boil. This is standard stuff for all grain brewers, but beyond the limit of many extract brewers who use an old 5-gallon enamel canning kettle for brewing. The author's do, however, consider the plight of the volumetrically challenged brewer by giving easy to follow instructions on how to downscale the recipes for a 3-gallon boil that you can do on the kitchen stove with grandma's canning kettle. Simply put, this is probably the most important homebrewing book to come out since John's How to Brew. So if you do not own a copy of How to Brew, get that first and learn your basic brewing skills. Once you have the fundamentals down, it is time to get a copy of Brewing Classic Styles and expand your brewing horizons. [email protected]

After reading through Palmer's "How to Brew" several times, and then trying to make the leap from extract to all-grain brewing without kits, I decided I needed a recipe book. My recipes were okay, but I was looking for something really great. I was recommended this book, and am really pleased with it. Palmer provides the technical details for things like amount of priming sugar to add to achieve a certain level of carbonation, and how large of a yeast starter to make, and Zainasheff provides information about what to keep in mind when brewing a certain type of beer, as well as at least one recipe for each type. Each recipe has both an extract and all-grain method, as well as information about mashing, the type and amount of yeast to use, and fermentation temperature and duration. I'm impressed by the range of recipes in this book. You might not find a recipe for the "Jalapeno-coffee stout" you really want to make, but there will be enough information and instruction in this book for you to figure it out and produce something decent. For instance, I really wanted to make a blueberry blonde ale. This book didn't have that recipe, but it did have a blonde, and it had instructions in the fruit beer section on how to make a fruit beer. I used the blonde recipe, followed the fruit instructions, and made an amazingly good beer. I'm really impressed with it. Other recipes from this book I've tried without modification, and all have ended up stellar. My favorite so far is the Special/Premium Bitter. Fantastic beer. If you're looking for a recipe book, I'd recommend this one. If you're looking for something on the mechanics of brewing, I recommend "How to Brew" by Palmer.

First, Jamil Zainasheff shared his award winning recipes. His recipes fits the style of the beer. Not really what he imagines the beer should taste like, but what the guidelines state what the beer style should taste like. Second, you have to know the style guidelines if you want to enter competitions. It is also useful to modify the recipes for your own personal enjoyment. I do not compete in competitions. I have used this book and modify different recipes to fit my taste. Several of his recipes are just awesome. People always comment that my kegerator has better beer then most bars. :) Thanks Jamil!!!! Third, He also describes the flavors and hints on brewing with the recipe. He talks about do's and don'ts when brewing to a certain style. He is sharing his brewing knowledge and it is full of wisdom. One con is that it is for extract with a side mention of all grain. To remedy this problem. Use an online tool or Beersmith program to make sure the base malts measure up to the extract. Its a minor con because any experience brewer knows that efficiency of mashing varies widely on the all-grain brewing setup of the brewer. As a recipe book goes, its 4 stars. Given the rarity of good beer brewing recipe books, it has to be 5 stars ( or 6 stars, hehehe).

My wife bought me this book for my birthday, and it has proved to be a solid addition to my homebrewing library. The book provides a basic introduction to some of the science behind brewing. This is great for novice brewers, as it is always nice to understand exactly how stuff is working behind the brewing process. Personally, I already was aware of most of this information from reading How to Brew by John Palmer, and several other books/articles, but its nice that the information is in there. As for the recipes, they are broken into chapters by beer style. Each chapter provides a brief introduction to the style, and 2-3 recipes. These recipes provide fairly detailed instructions and ingredients list, however some of the terminology might confuse the novice brewer. The recipes are good by themselves, but I personally find them as useful references when developing my on recipes. Its a great starting point to brew the beer as introduced in the book, then fine tune to your personal taste. Its important for up and coming brewers to learn creativity though, so I would advise new brewers to not be afraid to try something that maybe doesn't seem "right" or match up with a specific style or recipe, because that is how you learn about flavors (and the beer will probably still turn out well). Overall, I would say this is the quintessential recipe & style guide for homebrewers. It offers a good amount of recipes covering a breadth of styles. It is a handy reference when brewing and is most useful, in my opinion, for developing your own recipes. Happy Brewing! Dave

There are some great recipes in this book. Look around online and you'll see Jamil's name mentioned quite often. He knows his stuff. I will say that although there is a bit of info on the approach to brewing, it would help greatly to have an understanding of the brewing process before diving into these recipes. There isn't a ton of info on the procedures to follow within each recipe or even the part of the book leading into the recipes. A fantastic starting place would be John Palmer's "How to Brew". After reading that though, this was a great book for taking me from kit extract brewing to the next step. Is suspect I'll still get some good use out of the recipes as I continue on to all-grain brewing, as well. Oh, one other note. Many of the recipes, which I would love to try, are for lagers (probably half the book), which makes perfect sense for a book like this, but unfortunately, you need a second refrigerator or other approach to be able to maintain cold fermentation temperatures over long periods. Many people may have that setup already, but if not, just know that you'll be limited to how many of the recipes will currently apply to you.

First off this is NOT a how to book. I would hope that people would realize it's a "Recipe" book based on the title, but I guess some people don't read the title close enough. If you're looking for a how to brew book, buy Charlie Papazian's "Joy of Homebrewing" or John Palmers "How to Brew." Then when you want to make amazingly well rounded and delicious brews that rival many that you can purchase at your local retailer...then this book is for you! Every brew that I've made so far from this book has been levels better then when I used recipes from other books. Even when I was throwing recipes together without much understanding of correct ratio of malts in a batch, or bittering units to match specific gravity, this book came along with fantastic recipes that are all perfectly balanced to each style desired. Buy this book only if you're interested in making great beer!

Excellent book to have in your brewing library. If nothing else the recipes are ALL award winning, and for us all grain brewers out there it is easy to substitute grain for the extract in the extract recipes. The grain substitutions are at the bottom of each recipe. The book does have solid info and proper fermentation temps for each style and yeast type used. Great recipes to show you what grain bill makes up each style. You can tweak the recipes from there or brew them as is. You can't go wrong trying these solid recipes out and that is why I can recommend this book to all levels of brewers!

This book is the perfect answer to the queastion... Now What??? If you are seriously thinking about homebrewing, or have already done some, and now want to know what else you can brew this book has all the recipes you need to brew all the basic, and not so basic beers. Briefly I will also say that yes you can go online and find "some" version of all these recipes, but not all, or with so much information, and they really are award winning. These recipes are tried and true brews worry free of if it will turn out right. Peace of Beer brewing mind is definitly worth the price of paper. And by the way "How to Brew: by John J. Palmer" Is the best home brew book ever, and is a good companion with this book

A great reference and recipe book.

Livro excelente, receitas tops, recomendo a compra deste livro.

I loved this book. It is a must have for new brewers and explains everything in a very nice and understandable way. It also features some very nice recipes. I highly recommend this book!

Venu au brassage de la bière depuis 2 ans, une fois les premiers brassins effectués, on se sent à la fois confiant, mais là où on croyait avoir fait un bout de chemin dans le monde du brassage, on se rend compte de l'infinité des possibilités mais aussi des difficultés à connaître et appréhender les différents styles existants. Ce livre couvre donc ce besoin, à savoir ne vous apprendra pas à brasser de la bière (pour cela se référer au "How to brew"), ni à forcément vous inviter à la création (cela est très bien fait par Randy Mosher ou Ray Daniels) mais donne des recettes "de compétitions", qui ont gagné des concours pour la plupart des styles ; il est donc simplement possible de copier les recettes (et voir ainsi si la maîtrise de la technique est bonne) ou de s'en servir de base pour élaborer ses recettes, ou voir encore ce qu'on peut faire avec les ingrédients qu'on peut avoir en stock à un instant T. Les recettes sont données pour de l'extrait de malt mais la conversion en "tout-grain" est donnée. Le seul bémol est que ce livre a été écrit il y a une dizaine d'années, et depuis le monde du brassage a beaucoup changé, avec une offre beaucoup plus large en houblons et levures (notamment sèches) ; c'est pourquoi une mise à jour serait la bienvenue.

It did not meet my requirement because I wanted a book on basics simple brewing with ingredients available in India.