Tips and Resources for Tasting Guides:
- Research your selected breweries by making a visit or hopping on their website. Learn some history of the brewery by reading info on the website or, even better, talk to an employee, manager or owner of the brewery. Don’t forget to take notes.
- Learn the brewery’s core beers. These are the beers that they serve year round, and almost always have on tap. Make note of the styles and any adjuncts they might have included. Order a flight and try them out if you can, making your own notes as you taste.
- Know what non-core beers are going off tap and what’s coming on so you will know the offerings the day of your session. This is not always possible as many breweries keep their upcoming selections under wraps until a week or so before the release date. Also, breweries don’t know exactly when a beer is going to run out. For these reasons, we suggest checking the brewery’s beer selection as close to your scheduled date as possible.
- Bring a set of style guidelines with you for reference. You can print individual pages from the BJCP guidelines or you can use materials from the sources listed below.
- To learn beer styles, buy commercial beers that best represent the styles you would like to learn. The BJCP website lists commercial examples of beers in each style. While we are always supporting our craft breweries, in this case it is always best to buy beers from the country they originate from. If you are looking for a Belgian Trippel, find an import from Belgium.
- Make note of the most frequently asked questions from your session, and anticipate these questions in future sessions. We’ve included most of these questions in our test, so go back through the test and make sure you have the answers.
- Don’t forget to bring blank tasting pages for all your guests as well as plenty of pens or pencils.
- Determine what your customer wants out of their visit. Do they just want the basics or do they want more detailed information? Do they want to take notes for later, or is this a more casual session?. Let them decide.
Websites:
Tons of resources from Cicerone.com.
https://www.cicerone.org/us-en/resources-links
A ful website filled with great visual info.
https://www.pintsandpanels.com
2022 Brewers Association Beer Style Guidelines
https://www.brewersassociation.org/edu/brewers-association-beer-style-guidelines/
Want to know what beer goes in what glass and why?
https://homebrewacademy.com/beer-glass-types/
An Easy-to-understand introduction to everything craft beer.
https://vinepair.com/beer-101/
Great visuals on the various colors of beer.
https://brookstonbeerbulletin.com/thinking-about-beer-color/
Materials:
Some cool beer infographics.
http://www.brewgeeks.com/charts.html
Tasting Sheets from “Tasting Beer” by Randy Mosher.
https://randymosher.com/uploads/images/pdfsdownload/tasbeer-shtx2-1.pdf
Flash Cards for purchase.
https://www.cicerone.org/us-en/flash-cards
BJCP Style Guidelines
https://www.bjcp.org/bjcp-style-guidelines/
Tons of educational materials to view or download from the BJCP.
https://www.bjcp.org/education-training/education-resources/library/
Videos:
The Craft Beer Channel YouTube page has 147K Subscribers. Learn by watching.
https://www.youtube.com/user/TheCraftBeerChannel
Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine’s very own YouTube channel.
Podcasts:
Prefer listening? Try Good Beer Hunting, one of the biggest and best craft beer podcasts around.
https://www.goodbeerhunting.com
A funny and informative craft beer podcast 550+ episodes strong. Each week, the Beerist crew drink five beers and give their opinions on each.
A video and audio podcast from two women who love to talk craft beer.
Books:
- Tasting Beer, 2nd Edition: An Insider’s Guide to the World’s Greatest Drink
by Randy Mosher , Ray Daniels, et al. | Apr 4, 2017 - Beer For Dummies
by Marty Nachel and Steve Ettlinger | Feb 7, 2023 - The Complete Beer Course: From Novice to Expert in Twelve Tasting Classes
by Joshua M. Bernstein | May 16, 2023 - The Beer Bible: Second Edition
by Jeff Alworth | Sep 28, 2021 - Beer and Food Matching: Bringing together the finest food and the best craft beers in the world
by Mark Dredge | May 29, 2018 - Beer A Tasting Course: A Flavor-Focused Approach to the World of Beer
by Mark Dredge | Nov 8, 2022 - Beer School: A Crash Course in Craft Beer
by Jonny Garrett and Brad Evans | Nov 1, 2016 - The Guide to Craft Beer
by Brewers Publications | Aug 6, 2019
