Partial Mash

Crack some grains and cook some rice if you want, but attacking cold IPA with the partial-mash method is simple. Let the pedants argue about whether it’s a style—we’re too busy brewing and drinking it.

In this excerpt from our Illustrated Guide to Homebrewing, we discuss brewing with extracts and steeping with specialty grains—and why there is much to be said for embracing them at home.

In this throwback IPA style that recalls the beauty of malt—both visually and in the flavor—you can go with a complex, layered all-grain grist. Or, you can get there quicker (and just as beautifully red) with an intentional approach to extract brewing.

You don’t need an industrial Japanese brewery—nor even an all-grain homebrew system—to make a clean, light-bodied, refreshing rice lager ideal for sushi and summertime.

Extract brewing provides a more-than-capable canvas for getting creative with the unusual fruits that arrive this time of year. Annie Johnson breaks it down.

Maybe that P in IPA can stand for “pitch-black.” Once again helping us to extract the most characterful beer from extract brewing, Annie Johnson has the details on Cascadian dark ale, aka American black ale or black IPA.

Die-hards will say you need to go all-grain to brew a great pilsner. They’ll also say you need strict temperature control. That’s fine—we don’t have to share our beer or our tricks with them.

With saison’s high attenuation, delicate body, fermentation-driven complexities, and lasting foam, it would be easy to assume that extract brewers are at a disadvantage. Not necessarily, as Annie Johnson explains.

Whether English or American or breaking new ground, barleywines are the Cadillacs of the ale world. Can you brew a great one with extracts? Of course you can. Annie Johnson breaks it down in our ongoing series on extract-brewing exceptional beers.

In this edition of No Rests for the Wicked—where we aim to extract the most character from extract brewing—Jester Goldman turns his attention toward hazy IPAs as juicy as anything brewed all-grain.

In further exploring how to squeeze the most character out of extract brewing, Jester Goldman turns his attention to kettle sours.

CB&B co-founder Steve Keonig walks you through a full all-grain brew day, from mashing and lautering to batch sparging to hop additions to pitching yeast and racking to secondary fermentation, as well as bottling your beer!