Book Review: The Complete Joy of Homebrewing Fourth Edition by Charlie Papazian

The Complete Joy of Homebrewing Fourth Edition contains lots of good information about the brewing process and use of different sugars, ingredients such as berries, coriander, chocolate and when to add them.

There is also a useful description of different hops, basic guidelines of quantities of malts and hops to use for various styles of beer and a significant number of recipes. Unexpectedly there are also a number of different Mead recipes. There is even a section on growing hops.

The coverage of Brew In A Bag (BIAB) was quite light and I didn't see any coverage on how to scale a recipe (maybe I missed it).

Book Review: "How to Brew: Everything You Need To Know To Brew Beer Right The First Time" by John J. Palmer

Having now brewed a couple of all grain beers I thought I should find out a bit more about what I should be doing and why I do certain things so I picked up this book that I had seen referred to in many places from the local library.

"How to Brew: Everything You Need To Know To Brew Beer Right The First Time" by John J. Palmer is a superb book about brewing beer. It explains the basics (from kit brewing to extract to all grain), gets quite scientific and provides a number of recipes. For an absolute beginner of brewing this book may be a bit overwhelming. As somebody who has brewed many kits and recently got into all grain brewing (with Brew In A Bag) I found the book to be superb.