learnincurve fucked around with this message at 09:01 on Oct 7, 2015

• Radical Brewing: Tales and World-Altering Meditations in a Glass, By Randy Mosher (Foreworded by Michael Jackson)[. Quite dated now (2004) but its been the most useful book in the last few years for getting ideas and getting references for spices, herbs, fruit and such. Aswell as coming up with new recipes [the ethos is the book is not to copy the recipes but to inspire]. For example Strawberries are terrible in beer and the flavour fades fast, if you were to use them you'd need about 2lb per gallon and you'd have to freshly pick them (not buy from them supermarket). Freeze then thaw all your fruit prior to putting your beer on them because it breaks the cell walls down. Doing a gruit? Be careful of yarrow etc etc
  
  
• Wildbrews: Beer Beyond the Influence of Brewer’s Yeast, By Jeff Sparrow. The best book for anything and everything to do with sour beers, wild yeast and bacteria. History of the Belgian sours, brewers and brews. Goes quite advance into Brettanomyces, Lactobacillus, Pediococcus, Saccharomyces and other microorganisms that can be found in Belgian sours. Temperatures and pretty much everything you need to know. Goes full into the turbin mash and tells the Wyeast’s shortcut / cheat way of doing it. Aswell as some recipes on the back for Lambic, Flanders Pale, Red, Brown and such. If you are interested in sour beers this is a must buy, even if you’re not a brewer. Some cool photos too!
  This book is still good, but wrote this prior to American Sours coming out. The all round best book if she is into Sour Beers is American Sour Beers, unless she loves Belgian history and such.
  
  
• American Sour Beers By Michael Tonsmeire. If she likes or enjoys sour beers this is the book for her. It's written by the guy at http://www.themadfermentationist.com/ and its outstanding. Can't praise it enough, just everything about it from all the many souring techniques to recipes to history to the little things like maintaining and taking care of your oak barrels etc.
  
  
• Farmhouse Ales: Culture and Craftsmanship in the Belgian Tradition, By Phil Marowski. Everything there is to know about Bière de Garde and Saisons. If she isn't into the farmhouse / farmbarn type beers don’t get this. If you are you’ll be in for a treat. Goes into detail about the history, style and such and the different techquies and different types of Saisons and Bière de Garde you can get out of it.
  
  
• Brew Like a Monk: Trappist, Abbey, and Strong Belgian Ales and How to Brew Them, By Tim Webb. It pretty much covers everything that isn’t in the Farmhouse Ales or Wildbrews, again Belgian. History, styles, processes, a couple of photos and finishes with a couple of recipes to give you an idea of each style. Enjoyable read about the history of styles and such with some techniques and recipes.
  
  
• Complete Guide to Growing Your Own Hops, Malts & Brewing Herbs (Back to Basics Growing) By John Peragine. Do you own a garden and does she have green fingers? Well this one is great, everything from growing your own barley, alt grains, hops and such to looking over them and everything you need to know from seed to harvest to looking after prior to next harvest etc. Also how to malt your own grains once harvested and such. Diseases to watch out for, what works best in your garden/climate etc etc. I've just recently harvested my first year of hops thanks to it.
  
  Photo taken about a month prior to harvest. Should have done a long shot, the 12 hop rhizzones went up about 18foot
  
  
• Tasting Beer By Randy Mosher. Is she a foodie? This book is outstanding for food pairing, being able to practice picking out faults with the beer, subtle differences and all things foodies love to do.
  
  
• Smoked Beers: History, Brewing Techniques, Recipes By Ray Daniels. 75% history, 20% technique 5% recipe. But if her favourite style of beer is smoked [mainly German/Polish] this book is extremely interesting.
  

Fluo fucked around with this message at 12:58 on Oct 7, 2015