Josh Weikert

Over the years, this recipe has gotten a bit darker and a bit lighter in body, but the goal is the same: to shape an IPA that is distinct from stylistic “neighbors” such as American brown ale.

• Beer Recipe
• American IPA
• Brown IPA

This hop-forward yet malt-backed niche IPA style has gone from rare to nearly extinct over the years—all the more reason to take a stab at its unusual balance while brewing something that the others aren’t.

• Make Your Best
• Brown IPA

Brewing a helles is a worthy challenge. If your process is consistent and your ingredients fresh, you can make this beer sing on command.

• Beer Recipe
• Helles
• Pale Lager

A great helles is simple in composition—but simple can be surprisingly hard to get right, especially when there’s nowhere for mistakes to hide. It's a worthy challenge, and the payoff is a beer that pretty much everyone is happy to drink.

• Make Your Best
• Helles
• Lager

When it comes to building your malt bill, go smarter, not harder. Here are some key insights from two award-winning brewers on purposeful malt choices that can elevate beers, not muddle them.

• Malt
• Recipe Development
• Flavor

It’s a throwback, now, but we remain loyal, and we know they’re still out there. And brewing a great IPL is more about executing the “L” than anything else.

• Make Your Best
• IPL
• India Pale Lager

The finished beer should be light on the palate yet offer plenty of rich biscuit and toffee flavors with some herbal-earthy hops. This is an excellent beginner style, as simple to brew as it is enjoyable to drink.

• Beer Recipe
• Mild Ale
• Pale Mild

Hard to find and historically interesting? Easy to drink and straightforward to brew? Sounds like the perfect style to tackle at home—or a nice one to grab some interest in the taproom, with its quick turnaround and quantity appeal.

• Make Your Best
• Beer Recipe
• Pale Mild

Josh Weikert prowled his local produce aisle following a simple principle: Buy what looks best, and go with the freshest fruit you can get. That led him to guava and passion fruit, a dynamic for this Brazilian-inspired tart fruit beer.

• Beer Recipe
• Fruit Beer
• Berliner Weisse

Brazil’s take on tart fruit beer—the Catharina sour—has its own name and moves, but brewers anywhere can follow the steps.

• Catharina Sour
• Fruit Beer
• Sour Beer

Big yet simple in its construction, this is a showcase of what clean ethanol flavors can add to a beer. Apple-like alcohols meld with the hop aroma and bready grist to yield a simple yet dangerous lager that’s anything but boring.

• Beer Recipe
• Maibock
• Heller Bock

When most people hear “bock,” they think malt—and there’s no question that maibock is a malt-forward style. However, you can lean into hops and other flavor elements to add interest, and—done well—the result is much more than a “strong helles.”

• Make Your Best
• Maibock
• Bock