Thinking about getting back into homebrewing after a ~9 year hiatus.
I assume the software situation as evolved significantly and I don’t even remember what I was using back then.
So what’s everyone using these days and why?
I’ve been using BrewFather, I get good results now that I’ve dialled in my usual efficiencies, though I dont really care if my final numbers are slightly off the target, if it tastes alright i’m happy.
I really only started using it to do water chemistry calculations, but now it’s my main recipe builder/checker.
I mainly use it to get my brew sheet that I have on my boox tablet for brew day, the only time I’ve skipped having that brew sheet I forgot to add a major ingredient and screwed up a batch.
Brewfather has been nice. I stock up on ingredients so it’s nice for inventory. It works nice with other tools too so it’s easy to go from built recipe to brew day on brewtools to tap on barhelper.
I’m the bottom right 😅
I used to be meticulous about trying to dial things in with software, and I got really good at it. Then somehow my database got corrupted or overwritten with blank entries (I think I installed a later version of the software and that messed things up). I tried to get back to where I had been, but it was disheartening, so I just went feral.
I wrote them down (for kombucha) and then lost my notebook at some point, somebody at goodwill probably bought a bag or something and now has a fever dream notebook full of frozen blueberries scribbles
Very much bottom right. I’m barely a cut above fermenting in open air and hoping it doesn’t turn poisonous.
I’m pretty sure this comm is for brewing beer not homebrew package manager
brew install --cask BeerSmith?
Beersmith is still around and still ugly, but https://www.brewersfriend.com/ is rather nice for recipe design.
I think this is the company that took over the software I was using (brewgr) but I guess didn’t migrate any accounts or recipes or anything…
I find myself working on recipes using different computers or on a mobile, so I ended up with Brewfather.
I tried for a bit to sync my Beersmith files between machines, but eventually they got corrupted. Fair, since it was never meant to do that.
I see they have free and paid tiers; do you find the free tier is enough or are there enough features paywalled that you find you need to spring for the upgrade?
Personally I upgraded to the Premium plan after a few uses and I felt like I didn’t need any other tools. I have a Tilt, and I enjoy having the data recorded with each batch.
Uhhh… a text document?
I am not doing this in a very sophisticated manner, I could probably stand to learn some things from this thread
If you’re not creating or tweaking recipes, a paper notebook is fantastic. It gives you something to do while you’re waiting on the boil.
I have a notebook with a page for every brew session: date, full recipe, steps, observations, and things I fucked up. Update it until the beer is done and there’s tasting notes. It’s fun to reread in later years. I have a few early brews that I noted got “infected” - and after some experience I had a good laugh because the “infection” was the shitty recipe I designed.
If you’re building a recipe you really need to use software (unless you don’t care about calculating estimated alcohol or IBU up front). The alternative is a level of referencing tables and doing arithmetic that exceeds what I want to see in my hobbies.
But if you aren’t trying to be scientific or you’re just following a basic kit? The only technology that should be involved is your phone playing music!
I’ve got a very similar approach to what you describe doing yourself there! I started off with other people’s recipes, but I’ve adjusted them to my tastes and equipment
your phone playing music!
The brewing tunes are essential, you are absolutely right
Or not. It’s good to have an offline hobby.
That is true! Although I’m not too worried about the notion of a tool to plan brews on provided it’s not, like, required to connect to a server to work or trying to be a social media thing
The trick is to run your own server and self host your own software and social media instance before you can begin to ferment anything. Its all about putting hurdles in front of yourself while you’re alive and able
“If you wish to make beer from scratch, first you must invent the universe”
– Carl Sagan, I think
Fuck, I knew I should have learned to code properly before I bought any grain
I carefully planned my first run on Brewtarget and after getting good results, just started modifying things slightly and never ran Brewtarget again 😁 TBH I didn’t even recall the name but someone else mentioned it here.
I liked the software, and it was great for getting the ratios of things down. But experimenting (and writing every single recipe iteration down) is just my bag.
I use brewfather for the recipes and the rapt pill readings.
This gets sent towards Home Assistant, which also controls the heating of my fermentation chamber using esphome.
Genuinely wish brew father would allow people to leave notes on a batch.
BeerSmith because… muscle memory? I’ve been using it so long it feels like an extension of my soul at this point. It’s never let me down though and I can’t remember ever wanting to do anything it couldn’t handle.
I tried using Beertarget, it looks promising but because it is open source and changed maintainers it is nearly impossible to find some guides so I don’t know his to do some important stuff (but it looks great).
Tbh I just eyeball it and only hops are calculated with some ancient excel sheat.
I use Brewfather it works reasonably well for me, it does seem to be more geared toward people with All-In-One or recirculating systems but I successfully use it with a 3 vessel system that doesn’t recirculate, I just don’t bother much with doing fancy stuff with my mash (single infusion and a mash out FTW).
Grainfather is what I’m trying next. Beersmith still works though too.
Brewer’s Friend app. Paper.
