I take pride in making homebrewed beer. With a few exceptions, all my beers contain only barley, hops, water and yeast. I'm confident that you will appreciate the result, at least if you enjoy other beers of these styles. To enjoy these ales to the fullest extent possible, I recommend you do the following:
1. Allow the beer to fully bottle-condition. While in the bottle, ales undergo many transformations, subtle flavors are developed, the beer becomes smoother, and the all-important carbonation is created. This process takes time, at a bare minimum, wait two weeks from the bottling date before drinking. Like fine wines, these beers get better with age, therefore I recommend waiting one month from the bottling date for lighter styles (pale ale, IPA, old ale) and two months to a year for darker styles (barleywine, stouts). During this time keep the beer in a dark place at, or just below, room temperatureÖ do not refrigerate. The darker styles will keep indefinitely, but the lighter styles should be enjoyed before their second birthday.
2. Chill the beer to 45-50 F. This is warmer than your refrigerator, and probably warmer than the temperature at which you are used to drinking beer. But this is good stuff, and you donít want your taste buds to be too cold to tell you how much you like this beer. A 12-ounce bottle will be cold enough after about 1 and 1/2 hours in the refrigerator, 2 hours for 22 ounce bottles. Or you can fully refrigerate your beer and let stand out for about 1/2 hour before pouring.
3. Pour the beer. Begin with a clean glass, as any fingerprints or soap residue will destroy the head. Before you uncap the bottle notice that pad of yeast at the bottom, this will show as a tan layer 1-2mm thick. Uncap the bottle and begin pouring. For a lot of head, pour straight down the middle, for less, pour down the side of the glass. I usually alternate the two to get the proper amount of foam (between 1-2 inches). Now comes the hard part: you donít want to pour the yeast in (donít worry, theyíre not dangerous). The easy way to avoid this is to leave the last 1/2 inch of beer in the bottle. A more efficient method is to watch the stream as your pour, stopping when the stream begins turning the tan color of the yeast.
4. Drink the beer. Salute, Prost, Cheers.
-Nick Perera
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Created by: nmp8@cwru.edu