Easy Note Taking for Beginning Brewers
You’ve head this advice millions of times. Take good notes when making homemade beers. The problem is that while everyone is harping about taking good home beer brewing notes no one is taking the time to show people how to capture good notes.
The problem is that there is no one right way to take good notes on your homemade beers. There are many different formats, levels of detail and types of information to capture. For example, ProMash is an excellent software package for all-grain brewers but can be a bit overkill for extract brewers, especially those on a beginner level.
Note taking is so free form that it can be intimidating - however - it still needs to be done. I have a good example to share. I brewed up a batch of beer using a Mr. Beer Vienna Lager mix. The beer turned out to be really good after aging about a month but the problem is that I have no idea what “extra ingredients” I put into it.
Had I taken good notes about that brew I would be able to re-create that brew. Since then I have created a little one-page form to capture information about my extract brews. Yes, even as an all-grain brewer I still do extract brews. This form can be used in conjunction with a software program like ProMash or Beersmith or this form can be your only record.
The form is designed to be printed out and hand-filled in. There is an extra wide left margin for binding in a three ring binder or a report cover. Being that it is filled in by hand it is extremely flexible. Want to record something that doesn’t have a field? Simply notate it in the Notes section. Out of room? Flip it over.
Here is a screen shot of what a blank form looks like (left) and what a filled in form looks like (right).
To download the form click on this link: Extract Brew Log.
Feedback?
If you have some suggestions for how to improve this form I would love to hear them. Leave a comment below and I may incorporate your suggestions into the next version of the form.
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