Customer Reviews

BeerSmith (Download... CD Coming Soon on Amazon)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I've been using BeerSmith for a year or so, and I've been thoroughly satisfied. I can't compare it to the other offerings out there (ProMash, etc.) because I haven't used them. I can say that it is light years beyond the more primitive brewing application (SudsW) that I used perhaps 10 years ago. Beersmith provides an excellent way for you to create and tweak recipes, using official style guidelines as a reference point. Of course, you can deviate from them in any ways you would like. The software has databases of hops and malts, which you can customize. The shopping list is handy, too. A great feature is the brew day step-by-step sheet it creates, detailing the quantities of mash water, sparge water, temperatures, expected pre and post boil gravities, etc. Checking and comparing my pre-boil gravity to the one calculated by BeerSmith has allowed me to make consistently better beers than I used to. There are many built-in tools, including hydrometer temperature adjustments, carbonation calculations, etc. To some people, it might seem like cheating, or taking some human factors out of homebrewing, but I don't see it that way at all. It helps reduce some of the uncertainty of brewing and serves as an excellent calculator. I can't think of any other $20 purchase that can advance your brewing as much as this piece of software.

If you are looking for software for homebrewing, take a look at Beersmith. I was considering several brands of brewing software, and heard about BeerSmith from The Brewing Network and their podcasts. I'm no computer geek, but I found Beersmith very easy to navigate. Recipe formulation is a breeze. I really like the fact that BJCP style specs are displayed as you build your beer, allowing you to stay "in style". Information for things such as grains, hops, yeast, and adjucts. Tools for calculating hop utilization, mash schedules, hardware, unit conversion, recipe scaling, you name it! I'm still in the process of discovering all that is available to me with this software, but I am very, very satisfied.

The software is extremely easy to use. The inventory feature is really nice. When you brew a recipe that you have input the software will remove the ingredients from your inventory. With the inventory feature you can add a cost to all ingredients so if you brew with buddies (like me) it makes it easy to figure out what you owe for each batch of beer you brew. Another cool feature is when you are inputing a recipe you need to select a style and as you add ingredients it has a bar graph that will tell you where you are in the style range as far as bitterness, estimated starting gravity and color which is cool if you like messing with your beer color or bitterness. So far the estimated gravities are plus/minus .04 of my actual starting gravities which is cool. I brewed for a year and a half without it and i am glad i bought it because i see it as a handy tool for adjusting my recipes.