How to Make Hard Seltzer: Refreshing Recipes for Sparkling Libations

by Chris Colby

Hard seltzer is a booming category in the world of lifestyle beverages and many craft brewers are lending their artisanal skills to this refreshing beverage. Simple to make and with a wide range of creative flavor additions, hard seltzer is a sparkling alternative for beer lovers looking to give their palate a different experience. Learn about the development of the current market and delve into the intricacies of sugars used in making seltzer. Understand the different regulations for this beverage based on how you make it so you can be in legal compliance. Explore recipes, serving suggestions, and even mocktails for using hard seltzer. In this guide, some of the country' s best hard seltzer producers provide recipes and advice for making seltzer for both commercial and home enjoyment.

• ISBN10: 1938469658
• ISBN13: 9781938469657
• Publish Date: 7 September 2020
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Brewers Publications
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 176
• Language: English

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally published on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

How to Brew Hard Seltzer: A Guide for Craft Breweries and Homebrewers is a technical guide with some tutorial instruction for engaged hobby zymurgists up through small scale professionals to create alcoholic seltzers. Due out 7th Sept 2020 from Brewer's Publications, it's 250 pages and will be available in paperback and ebook formats.

The book follows a logical layout and is meticulously annotated throughout. Although it's slanted toward the professional/technical end of the scale, there's a fair amount of background history and information to keep non-brewers interested. I found it a fascinating read and read it straight through cover to cover. An introductory history and background leads into chapters covering characteristics, ingredients, instruction for craft breweries (professional scale) to produce seltzer along with recipes, government regulations, instructions and recipes for homebrewers, and cocktail recipes for using the seltzers produced.

The appendices include tutorials for beginning brewers with instructions for both seltzers and beer. The tutorials include good equipment lists, definitions of brewing terms, and relatively simple step-by-step instructions. Recipe ingredients are contained in bullet lists in the sidebar with American standard units given along with metric/SI measures in parentheses. Ingredients and varieties of hops, yeast, etc are very specific and will require a specialist retailer for sourcing. Alternatives and variation ingredients are listed in the recipes.

This is a -very- thorough and interesting book, but I would imagine it might be intimidating for complete beginners (maybe not with some mentoring from a local brewing supplier). My only quibble with the book was that I felt there was an implied elitist prejudice against anything other than -real- beer; that seltzer is a hipster drink, but it sells like crazy, so we have to produce what the customers want. It wasn't terribly overt, but it really was noticeable several places.

I've never before seen a book on brewing hard seltzers. This one is definitive. Five stars (despite the weird implied elitism).

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.