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Answer by Corvato
you don’t want to add sugar/fructose/honey, etc… the yeast that is left in the beer will consume it and either over-carbonate or shatter your bottles

you have to use something that the yeast won’t consume… many home brewers use lactose. a few are now experimenting with splenda & stevia sweeteners now.

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I typically like lagers (but they are tough to brew at home due to the temperature requirements). An ale would be suitable.

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Answer by Anonymous
Fantastic web site for you http://reviews.mybeermaking.com/

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Whether the beer is better than commercial branded beer is a subjective matter. Some people will definitely prefer home brewed beer while others will swear that if it isn’t a global name it isn’t worth drinking. But for people who like to have a modicum of control and a bit of a change once in a while, home brewing has an obvious advantage. If you buy a crate of any commercial beer then the first can or bottle of it will taste the same as the 24th. And the next crate you buy will taste the same again.

When you brew your own, you can make changes with every new batch you brew. You just need to buy the ingredients – which can be less than a dollar if you are just looking to add a fruity flavor to the beer – and make the necessary changes to the brewing process. The more you brew, the better you will get, and as long as you like the taste, nothing else really matters.

It is unquestionable that brewing your own beer brings with it a certain amount of freedom, and with that freedom comes responsibility. When the era of prohibition was in full swing, much of the black market alcohol available was made using less rigorous safety standards, and on occasion was so contaminated that it caused serious health problems and even death. Although this is rarely the case now, it is sensible to make sure that you follow safety standards in making your beer.

The practice of good safety standards is something that becomes second nature before too long. Apart from anything, if you have got the beer wrong it will taste wrong. At least in this case you can go out and buy regular beer that has passed stringent testing, whereas in the days of prohibition anyone who wanted to carry on drinking took their life in their own hands.

If you are interested in brewing this kind of beer yourself, the most important advice is to be careful, and it is widely agreed that if you are going to add another alcoholic drink into the mix then it should be done at a late stage in the brewing process – otherwise you risk ruining the taste of the drink and potentially making it dangerous to drink. However, if you can master it this is another string to your bow and makes for a very interesting flavor.

The other thing to be aware of is just how much of the other drink you add to the mix. In this case the watchword seems to be “less is more” – adding a lot risks making the beer undrinkable when what you are really looking for is a “hint” of the new flavor rather than an overpowering taste of it. If you want to drink something that tastes like neat whisky, then neat whisky is a far preferable option.

The brewing of flavored beers is a popular way to make home brewing more interesting. If you have never tasted a flavored beer, maybe now is the time to give it a go and see how enjoyable it can be – some of the more popular ones on the market are Belgian fruit beers which contain elements of cherry and raspberry. Technically, however, there are few limits to the fruits that you can add in the brewing process, and the effects that they can have on the taste.

That’s not to say that it will all be good. You have to make sure that what you are adding goes in at the right time, is added in the right form, and does not conflict with the other ingredients you have added. Finding the right mix is something that may take more than a few attempts. It’s not just a matter of trying new fruit flavors, either. The addition of spices or of other ingredients can turn out a fantastic beer, so it is worth continuing to experiment with different additions and seeing where they take you.

To clarify, the time that you are advised to leave your brew before drinking it is the “ready to drink” time. Now, there is a world of difference between “ready to drink” and “worth drinking”. Many beers benefit from being left a little (or a lot) longer in the bottle before you drink them, during which time they get to settle, to broaden in terms of taste, and to do any number of other things that will turn them into highly drinkable beer.

The reason for this is down to countless small influences that can affect a lot of things to do with the beer. You cannot expect a perfect beer after the minimum “ready to drink” time, just as people who make their own wine will not expect it to mature to its highest quality within weeks. Some of the best wines around have been in the bottle for years – and it is not just wines for which that is true.

The fact is that there are some aspects of the process that are beyond your control. You can buy the best equipment, recommended by experts and talented amateurs, you can follow the recipes right down to the last miligram and final punctuation mark. However, there is still the chance for something to be not quite right, and this is where you will find yourself calling on people who have been there and done that.

It has been seen on several different home brewing forums that a person goes from start to finish in brewing their beer, bottles it and leaves it for drinking and when they come to it, sometimes months later, it doesn’t taste right. Asking around to see what the problem is, they are asked by someone who has been brewing for more than a decade: “What kind of water did you use?”. And something as basic as the pH balance of the water used can interfere with the quality of a beer. Don’t be discouraged if something small knocks your brew off – put it down to experience and learn.

This kind of happy accident can have the most unexpected results. If you add too much of something, too little of something else, add something at the wrong time or leave too much or too little time for something to happen, all of this can change the taste of the finished product quite markedly. As a result you can end up with something that you are happy to drink for the rest of your time as a home brewer. For this reason as well as many others, it is a good idea to keep a notebook detailing what you do during the brewing process.

Of course, people are slow to admit to mistakes, especially when the results are such that the mistake turns out to be a winning move. So we will never know how many of the beers out there on the market were the result of clever research and sound practice, and how many resulted from one person’s slip up. And maybe that would destroy the magic.

The chances are that it’s nothing you’ve done in the brewing process. Remember, brewing is a temperamental process and the most likely reason for your beer not coming out right is that you moved it from somewhere warm to somewhere cold. It is probably that the yeast you used needs to be at brewing temperature – that is, in the same room where you are brewing – in order to carbonate your beer. Leave it in the brewing room for two weeks before moving it outside next time.

This is the first batch I’ve brewed and it actually tastes OK but … it’s a little watery. What does it sound like I did wrong?

Just one thing, and it’s easily remedied. What you need to do is use blended sugars – something more attuned to the brewing process. What you have described sounds to me a lot like you have used white sugars in the brewing process. What comes out of that normally tastes a bit like cider – as you say, it doesn’t taste horrible, it just doesn’t taste like beer.

My first brew is really cloudy, having been in the keg for three weeks. I would have expected it to be mostly, if not totally clear by now. What’s happened?

It sounds like you have done things pretty much right, but to avoid this happening you could try leaving it in the fermentation vessel for four or five more days next time.