Ideas for Bottling Artistic, Gift- Worthy Beer

As a homebrew aficionado, you’re among 1.1 million American homebrewing hobbyists who wear that badge with pride.

You’ve probably noticed that as your hobby expands and evolves, so does your desire to show off your suds. Homebrewers typically love to share their product, describe their tasty concoctions to others, and throw one back with their friends. So, do you want to elevate your beer-making game? Embark on your journey with these few tips:

Gift-worthy Venture

Many homebrewers craft more beer than they can actually consume, and as long as your beer doesn’t taste like a dirty diaper, it could make the perfect gift under the right circumstances — perhaps a birthday, a wedding, or a housewarming party.

Here’s why you give beer as a gift:

• It’s a symbol of your relationship
• Gifts strengthen social ties
• It’s a demonstration of how much you care
• It’s a great way to keep gift-giving affordable

Here’s when you wouldn’t give beer as a gift:

• They don’t drink beer
• They only drink domestic beers
• The beer has been sitting on the shelf in the garage since last Christmas and isn’t the kind that gets better with age.

According to Harvard psychologist Dr. Ellen Langer, before you give a gift, you should ask yourself, “What do I want the gift to convey? What are the various ways to convey it? And how might I be misunderstood?” Good advice, indeed! Once you’ve figured out that beer is in fact the right gift for the occasion, it’s time to take it a step further.

Make Cool Labels

In the beer-gifting process, presentation matters. This means avoiding the temptation to use a Sharpie to write the contents on the bottle lid and call it good. What does that message convey? I think you know. Read Langer’s polite quote above to refresh.

For some brewers, a personalized bottle is just as important as the contents inside. There are many talented people out there not only crafting their own beer but coming up with their own designs. But even if you don’t have the design chops, there are ways to create awesome artwork and label your bottles with pizazz. Here are a few tips:

• There are many free beer label templates online. If you’re not a techy person or an artist, you can still look like one. You can design your own or choose from pre-designed graphics by professional artists. You can do the same for a logo for your beer or your home brewery itself. Create both a logo and a label for your beer or beers.
• Waterproof it. Having a durable, waterproof beer label that doesn’t slide off or crumble is an often overlooked component of label making. You can make them using an inkjet printer, or on contact paper, shrink sleeve material, and polypropylene.
• Milk as an adhesive? Supposedly it works! Brush a coat on the back of standard label paper and let the milk dry. Or, if that’s not palatable, you could always use a glue stick.

Your label could actually come out better than the beer. Hopefully not, though. Either way, it will be fun to tell people how you came up with your design and why — the story behind it. But it’s up to you to decide if you want a fancy-looking beer bottle like you would see at the store or a homemade label lovingly crafted from the heart. Stay true to your beer.

Know Your Beer Terminology

There are a whole lot of descriptors that might be best suited for learning in beer school 101. But if you’re proud of the fact that you created a “full-flavored, balanced beer, rich in character, yet approachable,” then you’ll want to know other characteristics to describe it.

Fine Dining Lovers has created a brewmaster’s guide to describing beer, and it’s pretty informative. Here are a few terminologies:

• Malt flavor is: toffee-like, cookie-like, caramelly, roasty, autumnal, oatmeal, scalded milk, swanky.
• Hop flavor is: citrusy, piney, grapefruity, grassy, earthy, minty, pungent, herbal, musty, biscuity
• Fermentation flavor is: tropical, bubblegum, yeasty, Belgiany, clean, clove-like, banana-like
• Carbonation is: sparkly, zippy, spritzy, bubbly, soft, effervescent, gentle
• Body and mouthful is: rich, full, light, oily, heavy, thick, thin, dry, creamy, velvety

If you’re lacking the inspiration to describe your beer, there’s your start.

Are you ready to show off your brew yet? Brewing craft beer is a passion. You do it for the love of beer. Being able to share it with people and build relationships around beer are added bonuses — rich in character, sweet, and full-bodied.

Special thanks to Jori Hamilton for this Great Beer Now guest post!