OK so making beer is both a science and an art form, but it boils down to two things ‘The Ingredients’ and the Temperature.
Beer is made from
A Cereal (that has the correct sugars)
Water
Yeast
Hops or other flavourings
The basic way to make beer is: – You steep the Cereal in Water for a while, drain off the liquid (WORT) and Yeast and brew, adding Hops or other flavourings as you go, leave for a couple of weeks rack it off and its pretty much drinkable in a few days.
It sounds so simple, so why is it so complicated. Well lets look at each component in turn.
Cereals
Malted Barley (these days Barley arrives pre-malted)
Wheat
Adjunct Cereals (Need an additional source of carbohydrate to convert starch into fermentable sugars)
Maize
Rice
Oats
Rye
Buckwheat
Cereal grass Sorghum (Africa)
Water
If you have ever tasted water at home from your tap, or when you travel away from home; I’m sure you have noticed the difference. Depending on where you live, water can taste very different from place to place. Primarily this depends on the geology of where your water comes from, Chalk, Peat, Sandstone, Volcanic rocks etc. In addition your local water supplier may clean (remove minerals) or add chemicals to clean the water.
Some people may also have their own springs, provided the water is tested once or twice a year this may be quite usable.
For example I live in a chalk area, and the local water supplier adds Chlorine and may soon add Florine to the water. Depending on the time of day the taste and smell of the water changes.
You could of course go to your local supermarket and just buy 30 litres of spring water; fresh from a mountain stream or from a volcanic region in France etc.
Yeast
You could let your beer become exposed to any wild yeast in the air, that will work, but is unpredictable.
You can use beer yeast
You can also use bread yeast
Hops
Hops are used extensively in brewing for their antibacterial effect that favors the activity of brewer’s yeast over less desirable microorganisms and for many purported benefits, including balancing the sweetness of the malt with bitterness, contributing a variety of desirable flavors and aromas. Historically, traditional herb combinations for beers were believed to have been abandoned when beers made with hops were noticed to be less prone to spoilage.
There are around 80 varieties of Hops in general use today, each with its own characteristic. So this has a big effect on the taste of a beer.
Other Flavourings
These can be used as additional flavourings or possibly as a replacement for the Hops
Heather
Herbs
Honey
Lemon
Orange
Temperature
Varying the temperature at various stages can prolong the extraction of sugars, it can make a beer take longer to brew and develop more or less flavours. So again a huge impact on the final outcome of a beer.
We we look at the above Ingredients and Temperature, you can see that a huge variation is possible and many beers are producible, some better that others. I suspect many beers may also be of quite similar recipes; but as a dedicated beer drinkers do we care?