April 9, 2015
Recipe Collaboration Exchange – Building Better Brewers
One thing I absolutely love about running this website is that I was able to have so many great people join the forum and contribute. The knowledge that everyone brings is amazing and I often find myself reading about some part of brewing that I just didn’t know before and never really thought of. Even though we’re still a relatively small community of brewers there is a tremendous amount of sharing of knowledge and fellowship.
A great example of this sharing and fellowship is the Recipe Collaboration Exchange (RCE) that is run twice a year. One of our forum members, FedoraDave has taken it upon himself to organize and run the RCE for several years now to bring brewers, often with different brewing skill levels together to collaborate on a recipe of their choosing. Usually someone that has only every brewed using extract will work with another Borg member to find a recipe to brew that will challenge the novice brewer to try something different, whether that’s steeping grains or adding different hops or maybe even attempting an all grain recipe for the first time.
The different brewing levels are determined by the brewers themselves using the following guide.
Level 1 – Only done HME kits such as Mr. Beer or BrewDemon
Level 2 – Have done extract recipes with hops addition; maybe some specialty grains
Level 3 – Have done Partial Mash and/or larger kits, such as those sold by Midwest or Northern Brewer
Level 4 – Have done AG and formulated original AG recipes
Once the brewers have signed up for the RCE, Dave pairs the brewers up making sure to connect higher level brewers (Level 3 & 4) with lower level brewers (Level 1 & 2) whenever possible. Sometimes he has to pair two level 3 or level 4’s depending who participates. Even the two higher level brewers can learn new methods or techniques from each other.
I’ve been a part of this RCE twice now, once as a new brewer several years ago and I took the opportunity then to go from extract brewing to my first All Grain BIAB brew which was the White House Honey Porter. Having someone to help guide me through the process was just what I needed to get me to the next level in my brewing.
In the current RCE I was paired with the_professor and we decided on a Scotch Strong Ale based on a 1879 William Younger N0. 1 recipe that my RCE partner directed me to. That brew is currently in the fermenter and I’ll be writing more about that later but the point here is that I had never brewed a Scotch Strong Ale before and the RCE was a great opportunity to take on the challenge and be able to work with someone that I could bounce ideas off of and and get direct feed back from. This is what a good community can do to support other brewers and make everyone brew better beer.
If you don’t join our community (which I hope that you do) make sure to check out other forums that might fit your needs better or look locally for local home brew clubs. The American Homebrewers Association has a great resource to find a club in your area.
Cheers!