WTF? It's only beer, ffs!

[nallum]

https://www.brewtools.com/products/control-systems



It's over complicating a demonstrably very simple process that's been 'traditional' almost everywhere for millennia, because it's so very fn simple.

Malted barley crushed, added to warm water, mixed - with a spoon - to a loose porridge then rested at temperature x before being boiled for a while. Cool then pitch yeast and wait at least a few days before packaging for serving. What am I missing? WTF am I missing?

This isn't about making beer. Hipster 'tech bros' without patents (plagiarists) exploiting a vulnerable demographic. Like heroin dealers. It adds no value. It doesn't make better beer. It's a marketed 'lifestyle choice'. It's a con, ffs. 🥴

[themadhippy]

Malted barley crushed, added to warm water, mixed - with a spoon - to a loose porridge then rested at temperature x before being boiled for a while. Cool then pitch yeast and wait at least a few days before packaging for serving. What am I missing? WTF am I missing

Hops

[nallum]

Malted barley crushed, added to warm water, mixed - with a spoon - to a loose porridge then rested at temperature x before being boiled for a while. Cool then pitch yeast and wait at least a few days before packaging for serving. What am I missing? WTF am I missing

Hops

Goes without saying.

[nallum]

Commercial breweries - brewing tens of thousands of litres in a batch - use continuous monitoring of their process. It makes perfectly good business sense for them to be 'obsessive'. They've invested in a big batch of beer to be sold to customers.

If you are obsessing about continuously monitoring a batch of home brew to a comparable level, please, please, please, discuss your issues with a professional and improve your quality of life. It's unhealthy and consuming your valuable time. It's parasitising you. It's reducing your quality of life.

It's only beer - an enjoyable beverage fortuitously produced by a simple organic process known since the dawn of time.

Scaled-down commercial operations don't generally improve beer quality at home. Practice and knowledge do. It demands you do something more meaningful than get fooled hook, line and sinker by shady salesmen on YouTube.

What's the next 'innovation' going to be? 🥴 Putting wheels and an engine on the bottom of a self-driving fermenter that collects supplies from your LHBS while you're at work? And gadgets guaranteed to facilitate brewing like a tool? An 'awesome upgrade kit' that bolts a drone on top of the fermenter, so it can automatically move into a corner 2 meters away after being filled? Or follow you around all day, so you can triple check for errors using an optional 'accessorised' handheld device with a free app that provides 'exclusive access' to directly buy more crap you don't need?

There's a valuable lesson here, which goes beyond home brewing and can be applied in life generally. Take it. It's free.

[Collingwood]

Wonderful rant. I fully concur.

[IPA]

Most of us at sometime have been seduced by the "shiny". Sitting on the shelf in my brewery are two s/s conical fermenters that bear witness to it. Just recently I mashed ten litres to put in bottles and store in the freezer for future starter worts. Afterwards I asked myself why,apart from the volume, why was this so much easier than when I brew my normal sixty litre batch. So now sitting in a cupboard are the following. A pump, a plate chiller, lots of silicone tubing and an inline " Thrumometer"along with various other bits and bobs. Which means there is less sanitising before hand and less washing up at the end.
The SS fermenters are heavy to move and sanitise I find these much easier to handle and clean.
https://brouwland.com/fr/cuves-de-ferme ... t-60l.html
Plus the foam bungs that I use to replace airlocks fit conveniently in the top.
All in all brewdays are now shorter and simpler with no detrimental affect on the finished beer.
The one thing that I would not replace are my Braumeisters. A 50 and a 20 both with short malt pipes which enable me to brew 10,25,50 and 60 litre batches

[nallum]

Shiny things can add value, when they're designed well, to simplify a process, make it more convenient and consistent. It's a legitimate business model that adds demonstrable value for the consumer. It doesn't necessarily make better beer. An excellent beer can be made using the most basic equipment - without using shiny things.

The process of making beer is not complicated at all. I think that's what makes home brewing so enjoyable. It's an uncomplicated process and ends with a nice beer. The home brewer's knowledge of the process - stripped of science - is the most important thing, because it's all that's needed.

Making the process artificially complicated - especially at home-brew scale - in order to sell expensive 'solutions' (products) for problems that do not exist isn't a legitimate business model. It's con artistry and adds the opposite of value. Sadly, there are cultures that view society with very little dignity and as something to parasitise at any cost.

Con artistry. It takes many forms but the agenda is always the same.