The following is one of the issues that most home brewers eventually encounter: You have gone through the standard exBEERiments. The temperature of the mash is set. Dry hop time adjusted. Now what? Here, the craft is pushed along by curiosity. As if you are a home brewer or a professional brewer, you start experimenting with the fine-tuning, working with different yeast strains, testing fermentation time, or unorthodox hops and adjuncts. Every new production is a lesson and a discovery, providing information that is capable of controlling future recipes, seasonal releases, or commercial offerings.
In the case of brewery suppliers, these trials point to some future trends and flavors that determine what is coming next in the international craft beer market. The paralysis by analysis kicks in. There are too many possible experiments, and there is not enough bandwidth in the brewing. The solution? Get out of your mind and begin rotating.
How I Built My Brewing Roulette Wheel
The thought struck when I was talking to my drinking partner, Jake. The question now is what to experiment with next: water chemistry, yeast pitch rate, or grain crush. After an hour, we were not making any headway and had had three beers.
I told you, Jake said, we ought to toss a coin.
I took my phone and got an online wheel spinner, which is free. After 15 minutes, there were eight experiment variables loaded: hop stand temperature, kettle whirlpool, grain crush, fermentation vessel, yeast rehydration, mash pH, dry hop timing, and carbonation method. We spun. It fell upon the temperature of the hop stand. Decision made within three seconds. The batch turned out to be one of my favorite experiments, which may be partly because I had no emotional attachment to the result. My prejudice was eliminated by the randomness.
The Psychology of Random Selection
Random selection eliminates decision fatigue. When you’ve got thirty potential experiments lined up, your brain makes excuses for why each one isn’t quite right to brew this weekend.
The gambling industry figured this out decades ago. Low-barrier games that remove overthinking keep people engaged. Someone sitting at a casino min deposit 1 euro site isn’t agonizing over a perfect strategy; they’re playing and learning through action. The same principle applies to brewing experiments. Spin the wheel, commit to whatever it lands on, and brew. You’ll learn more from doing ten random experiments than planning the “perfect” one that never gets brewed.
Building Your Own Experiment Wheel
Start simple. Here’s how I set mine up:
- Pick your categories: Choose 8-12 variables you’re curious about but keep procrastinating on. They don’t need to be groundbreaking.
- Make them testable: Each variable needs two clear options you can split-batch. “Hop stand at 150°F vs 185°F” works. “Try something weird with hops” doesn’t.
- Include at least one stupid option: Put something on there that sounds ridiculous. Keeps the wheel interesting.
Variables Worth Spinning For
Сertain categories produce the best experiments:
- Fermentation temperature swings (±5°F variance vs strict control): Results were mixed depending on yeast strain. Not as crucial as I expected.
- Hop addition timing (all bittering vs all late vs balanced): Tasters rarely told the difference in anything under 60 IBUs.
- Water treatment (full profile vs straight tap water): This mattered more than expected, especially in pale beers.
- Yeast pitch rate (manufacturer rec vs underpitch by 50% vs overpitch by 100%): Underpitching created more ester character.
When the Wheel Screws You
Occasionally, the wheel falls upon a beer of which you are not yet quite ready. It might be a complicated sour or a high-ABV stout or something that requires equipment that you have not prepared yet. To homebrewers, such moments fall under the learning curve, and they need to be creative, patient, and plan for the next batch. To professional brewers and suppliers of breweries, it serves as a lesson that tests can be a difficult thing, and every random decision can result in new development or can help to come up with a new approach to an old recipe.
- Option 1: Suck it up and brew it anyway. Honor the spin.
- Option 2: Spin again, but you have to brew whatever lands next, no matter what. One re-spin allowed per brew day.
Never spin until you get what you want. That defeats the purpose.
The Social Element
Brewing roulette gets more interesting with multiple people. Last summer, our homebrew club did a “Spin to Win” competition. Everyone spun the same wheel. Whatever it landed on, that’s what you had to brew for next month. Six of us tested the same variable (fermentation temp) on completely different beer styles. Lagers suffered without temperature control. NEIPAs? Barely noticeable difference.
What I’ve Learned From Random Experiments
The biggest lesson? Most variables matter less than we think.
When I controlled which experiments to run, I naturally gravitated toward variables I suspected would matter. This created confirmation bias. The wheel forced me to test things I assumed were unimportant, and I was usually right. But occasionally I’d stumble on something surprising. I thought the kettle pH adjustment was nonsense. The wheel landed on it. Turns out, it made zero detectable difference in my pale ale. That’s valuable information. Now I don’t waste time on kettle pH.
The second lesson: doing beats planning.
I used to spend more time reading about experiments than brewing them. The wheel fixed this. When you’ve got a variable randomly assigned, there’s no point in deep research beforehand. You just brew it and see what happens. Very Brülosophy.
The Risk-Reward Balance
Unlike actual gambling, the downside risk is minimal. Worst case? You brew ten gallons of mediocre beer. You’ve done that plenty of times following “proven” recipes. The upside is discovery. Maybe you find a shortcut that works. Maybe you can confirm conventional wisdom. Either way, you’ve added data to your brewing knowledge and spent a day making beer. That’s a win.
Try It This Weekend
The following is my challenge: Make a wheel with at least 6 variables that you have been interested in but have not tested. Spin it right now. Whatever it sits on, there is your next brew day experiment. Don’t overthink it. Research: Do not research whether it is worth testing. Simply take the initiative to brew whatever the wheel says.
Then share your results. It is the essence of brewing beer for the ultimate experience, learning in between, and occasionally being surprised by the results when you relax the grip on all the variables. The most memorable experiment sometimes is the one that you did not intend to do, and it provides some insights, new flavors, or techniques that define what you will do next. To homebrewers, just as to professional brewers, these accidental accomplishments are lessons to the brewer that brewing is less about accuracy than it is about exploration.
