The Homebrewer's Garden, by Joe and Dennis Fisher - Book Review

As a guy who home brews my own beer, I love absorbing any knowledge about brewing I can find and sharing it with fellow home brewers. That's why I wanted to write about a homebrew related book I just finished reading. The book is called The Homebrewer's Garden: How to Easily Grow, Prepare, and Use Your Own Hops, Malts, Brewing Herbs, by Joe and Dennis Fisher. It is available from all major booksellers, or online from Amazon.

Amazon has the book, which is a soft cover and runs about 180 pages, for just over $10. I got mine as a gift from a friend. He picked it up for me because he knew I'd be planting hops this year, and he figured the book would be helpful.

He was right, the book does have some very helpful advice and suggestions on growing, harvesting, and using hops. I am sure I'll refer back to the section on hops many times over the next few months as I work on my hop garden.

The book has a lot more in it than hops, though. It has a large section of brewing herbs...both traditional (some long forgotten) and some a bit less traditional. This section contained information on a wide range of herbs, including how to grow them, their uses in brewing, and even recommended quantities for each herb in your beer.

The book also contained information on what I'd call the extreme of "growing your brew supplies"...growing and malting your own barley. That's a bit too much for me, but the section was very interesting because it gave a lot of info on barley and other malt sources, how they're grown and harvested, and the malting process. For those like me who don't have the room or the time to grow malts, it offers other entry points, such as places to acquire grains to malt yourself. Even if you never grow or malt or your own barley, this section was very interesting because it gave a lot of information that helped me further understand what goes into my beer.

The book also has a section of recipes from the authors, many of which use homemade ingredients that are described throughout the book. This section was great, because some of the beers are really "out there". We're talking "mixed beer porter", "dandelion bitter", "rhubarb ale", and "spruce beer", plus recipes for mead, cider, and other home brewable beverages. A lot of the beers use herbs that can be grown at home, but aren't often used in brewing. Many of these have a history of being used in beers over the years.

Anyway, the book was a good, quick read, and I imagine I'll refer back to it a lot while I'm growing my hops, and for inspiration for new recipes and information about how to use various herbs to brew with.

Brewing using home-grown ingredients is a natural extension of home brewing, and I look forward to exploring it this summer and beyond!