Love Beer Learning

When you're tasting beer, you need to take in different aspects of the beverage to fully appreciate it.  Not only do we need to take in the aroma and taste, we also want to look at the appearance. But how do you describe what a beer looks like? There are four parts to thinking about what does beer look like.  I’ll describe how to assess those in this blog post.   What does beer look like? - Put it in a glass The first step in assessing what does beer look like requires a glass. Generally, it doesn't really matter what glass, but different glasses are good for different beer styles. The reason that we put the beer in a glass is not only so that we can see it outside of the can or bottle, but it's also so that we can release the aromas and flavours, This helps us later on when we move on to aroma and taste. On certain beers, especially if they've been aged, you would also want to move the beer off of the older yeast cells or any sediment in the bottle so that you can get ...

When we are beer tasting, we need to think about the appearance and the flavour of beer. But we also need to think about beer aroma. A lot of what we consider taste and flavour actually comes from the aroma of beer. So it's important that we are able to assess this well, and use our beer vocabulary to be able to describe what we are smelling in our beer. After reading this blog post you’ll know how to assess beer aroma and learn some professional tasting techniques that will help you to pick out the nuances in beer aroma. Use a glass to assess beer aroma The first important part of assessing beer aroma is to have it in a glass.  Keeping it in the can or the bottle when you're at home will stifle some of those volatile compounds. Select a good tasting glass, you want one that shapes inwards to capture the aromas and wide enough that you can stick your nose in to really pick up the beer aromas from what's in your glass. My favourite glass to use at home is a Teku. They have a...

When tasting beer, we go through various stages.  We want to take in the appearance of our beer. We want to take in the aroma. And then finally we take in the taste. But what is taste? And how do we describe beer taste? As it turns out, taste and flavour are not actually the same thing. And when we're talking about the taste of beer, we also talk about the mouthfeel. But what does that even mean? And finally, some people will talk to you about the finish or the linger. You may not know what that means either. In this blog post about how to describe beer taste, I'll explain all of these areas and give you some taste descriptors for your next beer review. How to describe beer taste – what is taste? So to begin with, on how to describe beer taste, what even is taste? It said that there are five tastes. These are bitter, sweet, salty, sour and umami. Umami has that kind of savoury flavour that you can't really put your finger on. Think soy sauce or Marmite. There is also an eme...

When a brewer makes a beer, they put a lot of interest and love into that glass. And some of the pure joy about drinking beer is really tasting what they're trying to make for you. But how do you really start tasting beer, not just drinking it?  What are the beer tasting basics? There are several techniques we can use to taste beer, from what you should drink out of, what to consider while looking at and drinking beer all the way through to what part ingredients play.  This blog post will go through the beer tasting basics with you today.   Beer tasting basics 1 – Always use a glass My favourite glass to use is a Teku The first thing you need when you are beer tasting is a glass. You should always drink your beer out of a glass. Not only can you then see your beer, you'll also be opening up the aromas and flavours. That just doesn't happen when it's in a can or bottle. If you haven't got a beer glass yet, my recommendation to you is a glass called a Teku. It's g...