Behind the Bar with John Palmer

Across the globe home brew stores have reported huge upticks in sales of new equipment this past year, as people searched for a hobby to fill their socially-distant free time. Often when the home brew supply stores sell kits to newbies they include, along with a fermenter and sanitizer, a copy of John Palmer's book "How to Brew'', a tome that covers everything you need to know from your first brew day to your hundredth and beyond. The founder of Sam Adams calls it "invaluable both to first-time brewers and professional brewmasters." 

While his book is on the shelves of brewers all over the world, there's not much known about the man who has helped myriad brewing novices gently troubleshoot their batches. 

I sat down with Palmer to chat about his lasting appeal to home brewers, why he thinks more people are diving into the home brew world right now, why he doesn't brew professionally, and what’s in his fridge right now. 

To start off, can you tell us a bit about how you got into homebrewing? 

John: I had a homebrewed beer in college (in the 80’s) so I knew it was possible. Years later, after graduating and moving to California, I was looking for the bock beers that were popular throughout the upper Midwest, but there weren’t any to be found. So I started researching home brewing at the library, found a local home brewing shop, and made my first few batches.

Bailey: Was there an ah-ha moment when you decided to write a how-to book

John: Funny thing, that first batch was awful, but the home brew shop owner told me it was good! That was when I decided to figure out what went wrong and prevent it from happening again. I learned from the bulletin boards and eventually wrote a document called “How To Brew Your First Beer''.

It basically said not to follow the instructions on the can of malt extract to add table sugar, but instead to use more malt extract, and a fresher package of yeast. To make a long story short, I posted that document to a brewing site and eventually someone (or several someones) told me I should write a document on how to brew all-grain. That’s when I decided to write the book. 

Bailey: You self-published your book right? How did you go about getting it on the shelves of supply stores and homebrewers shelves across the country?

John: The book went through several drafts, pictures were lost, the original publisher went out of business, I rewrote it again, and published it to an internet site called The Real Beer in 1997. At that time I thought actual publishing was too complicated. But my wife convinced me that I should try, so I learned how to do layout, took out a home-equity loan, and got it printed.

From there, it was a matter of emailing brew shops around the country, sending them a copy, and getting them to carry it. It was very well received, and most shops would sell a case of 18 books each month. I went through two or three printings and by 2005 Brewer’s Publications got interested. They published the blue book that most people are probably familiar with.

Bailey: Brewing has been around for millennia, how often does it change enough to warrant a new edition of How to Brew? Has it been changing more rapidly in recent years as craft beer has seen an explosion of interest (or perhaps as breweries get more playful with their beers)?

John: Well, brewing doesn’t change too much, but my understanding of it changed, and to be fair, everyone’s understanding of brewing science has improved tremendously in the last 20-30 years with the home brewing and craft brewing movements. 

I filled the 2017 edition of How to Brew with what I had learned about fermentation in the past 10 years, as well as documenting what the latest homebrewing practices were at the time. In 2005, mashing and batch sparging in a cooler was the way it was done. In 2015, Brew-in-a-Bag was the new standard. Today, it’s the all-in-one systems, like the Grainfather, that are the most popular. 

Of course, beer styles have exploded. I think we are averaging at least one new style a year these days. It may seem like there are several new styles hitting the market every month, but many are fads as opposed to something different with staying power in the market. Hazy IPA is probably a good example of one that has stuck around.

Bailey: How has homebrewing changed since you first started?

John: Ingredients have changed in diversity, variety, and quality. There used to be 5 yeast products on the market, today there are hundreds, if not a thousand. There used to be a couple dozen hop varieties, now there are hundreds. Same with malts. For equipment, you used to have to build your own out of spare buckets and brass fittings from the hardware store. Now there are dozens of different manufacturers making all-stainless steel systems and that’s just for home brewing. It’s a billion dollar industry unto itself these days.

Bailey: Do you see anything as the next frontier of homebrewing? 

John: I have been totally surprised by every new beer style that has come along. There is this myth that beer in the olden days was better, that we need to get back to real beer, and that’s not true. Today’s beer is brewed to a quality and consistency that has never been better. This is truly the Golden Age of Beer – there has never before been as many breweries, as many beer styles, and as many beer drinkers as there are in the world today.

Mankind has been brewing beer of some type or other for the past 10,000 years, but we only started using microscopes to understand yeast and fermentation about 200 years ago. It really wasn’t until the 20th century that we learned how yeast actually worked, and how beer worked on a molecular level. And genetics! It’s only been within the last 20 years that we have developed the genetic technology to determine how closely different strains of yeast are related and how to engineer them if we so choose.

I think that is indeed the next frontier of brewing – the genetic engineering of yeast to produce specific traits in fermentation and take some of the guesswork out of it. 

Bailey: You used to be a scientist, right? What do you do now?  

John: I am a metallurgical engineer by trade. I worked 20 years in aerospace and medical devices before switching to brewing science full-time. I started being invited to conferences all over the world and it has just spiraled from there. I became the Editor-in-Chief for the MBAA (Master Brewers Association of the Americas) several years ago and that has been my day job ever since, but I normally spend about half my year traveling and speaking at various conferences and competitions around the world. The pandemic has interrupted that, but my schedule hasn’t really slowed down -- it’s just switched to virtual. Next year it will probably be back to normal.

Bailey: Have you ever considered opening a brewery?  

John: Yes, but no. Operating a brewery is a lot of work. All my friends are brewers, and I know that they all started it because they loved beer and brewing, but it’s a business and to continue to have a successful business, you have to put in the time and energy. It used to be that you could open a small brewery and people would beat a path to your door. These days there is so much competition. You used to be able to install a three barrel (100 gallon) system and have it made. Nowadays I really don’t recommend starting with less than a ten barrel system because the economics just aren’t there to support it anymore. It’s go big or go home. 

Bailey: There’s been an increase in the number of first-time homebrewers since the beginning of the pandemic -- any idea why people might all of the sudden be interested in brewing? 

John: Home brewing continues to be fun. If you are stuck at home, you might as well pick up a hobby, whether it’s gardening, baking, knitting, cooking, whatever. Brewing is cutting edge, it’s elite like fine woodworking, but doesn’t take as much practice and is easier to share. I dunno, it’s like asking a season ticket holder why people go to a game; you can’t imagine everyone not loving it!

Bailey: What do you think keeps people who’ve made a beer or two from continuing the hobby?  

John: For many people, cooking/baking/brewing/creating isn’t really their thing. They would rather eat out than cook or buy a six pack. People are diverse and everyone has different priorities. 

Bailey: If you could only give a newbie brewer one piece of advice, what would it be? 

John: Just do it! I meet so many people that want to try brewing, that have read all the books, but haven’t actually tried to brew because they are afraid they will make a mistake. What’s the worst that can happen? It will still be beer, it may not be the best beer, but the next batch will be better. Have fun with it. 

Bailey: Favorite thing happening in beer right now? 

John: I think the most exciting thing is the international craft beer movement. The creativity is astounding: sweet beers, candy beers, bitter beers, fruit beers, sour beers. The world of beer is as diverse as the people of the world, and I have found brewers to be the same all over the world too – we want to share good beer and happiness.

Bailey: What is your favorite style to brew? Why? 

John: I have a couple of favorite styles, West Coast IPA and Dunkel. Brown Ale and Porter too. I love playing with the hops in IPA, and I love playing with the malts in Dunkel and Porter. Black IPA is also a favorite. Logically, it would seem that I would attempt to combine all three, making a highly hopped Dunkel, but I haven’t.

There has to be balance so the flavors aren’t fighting each other. Balance and harmony. Flavor is like music, too many instruments results in noise. Great composers, like great brewers, pick a theme and work to enhance it.

Bailey: What’s in your fridge right now?  

John: Heretic’s Evil 3 (Triple IPA) – Amazing beer, 11% that tastes like 6% with layered hoppiness.

Stone’s Sublimely Self-Righteous Black IPA, Limited Re-release – One of my all-time faves.

The last of my homebrew Dunkelbock – 1.060 OG, 30 IBU bittering only, 60% Vienna, 30% Munich, 7% Crystal 60L, 3% Roast barley. 34/70 Lager yeast.

And an assortment of IPA, Barleywine, Sours, Stouts, and Pilsners given to me by other homebrewers.

Bailey: What do you wish was in your fridge right now? 

John: Some Dortmunder Export and more Dunkel.