The Brewing Shed The Veg Plot

We’re brewing up a book

brewing book

Regular readers of this website may have noticed we’ve been less frequent in our posts than usual. For this we apologise, but we do have a good excuse…

…we’ve been working hard to secure publishing rights for our first book.

Thanks to the amazing interest shown in our recipes by website visitors, fellow bloggers and twitter followers, news of our home grown drinks recipes reached the book publishing world and we’ve been beavering away to make sure we get the best team for our print debut. We’re now very pleased to announce that we’ll be working with Duncan Baird Publishing on a recipe book, cannily titled ‘Brew It Yourself’, due for release in 2015. DBP have an excellent track record in the cookery market and will be able to give our book an international reach, so we’re extremely excited to be working with them.

We’re now busy brewing, writing and photographing lots more recipes for a rapidly looming deadline, but we’ll still keep you up to date with other digging and swigging news on the website (although you may see some of our older recipes temporarily disappear as we hone them into shape for our new audience).

If you’ve ever tried one of our recipes then do let us know how you got on – your feedback is hugely important to us in reviewing existing recipes and helping us decide on what to make next.

So thanks to everyone who has made one of our drinks, sent in their own digging and swigging tips, commented on the blog, tweeted us to their followers or even just read the site once in a while. It couldn’t happen without you all.

8 Comments

  • Hoooorah! Well done chaps. Put me down for a dozen. Or one, anyway. I tried your parsnip wine, if you do remember. I harangued you with foolish questions for quite a bit about it. Kind of mixed up your two ‘parsnip wars’ recipes. There was some ginger involved, and raisins. Anyway, it worked like a dream. It was the first homebrew wine I’d ever attempted and I was really quite surprised at just how lovely it was. No idea how strong it was, apart from ‘quite’ ie similar to ‘real’ wine. A bit like retsina, in a good way. Have you done that, by the way? Isn’t it made from pine or am I (ahem) barking up the wrong tree? (Sorry).

    • Hooray for parsnip wine! A brave first choice but I’m glad you’re reaping the rewards. I opened a bottle of my spiced parsnip wine on the weekend. Not quite ready yet. But I took it to a party anyrate for some real folk to try. At least three people were were impressed enough to drink a load which is quite a good result for not-yet-ready spiced parsnip wine.
      Keep up the fermenting – I’m off to type ‘retsina’ into google…

  • I’m doing the spiced parsnip wine, it’s hissing like a box of snakes at the moment. Last night we opened a Rhubarb form this June, happy to report it had turned into a very nice Sparkling. Lucky we opened it as it was in a screw top (owing to a corker failure at the time of bottling) so a bit more apt to explode.
    Best of luck with the book – want any illustrations?

    • Thanks for the feedback, Brenda.
      Be careful using screw tops – they should only be used if you’re completely certain that all sugar has fermented out. Corks are much safer! You can also kill of all fermentation by adding potassium sorbate with a campden tablet before bottling.
      I think the book is going to be all photography but by all means send us some examples of your illustrations and we’ll take a look at them.

  • Yes I normally only use screw tops when it’s going to be drunk (or I am) very soon.. but on that occasion my trusty corker had broken. Now replaced, hope this one lasts as long. You’re right about “stopping” but I do like to ferment my brews out naturally, using as little chemical help as possible. It is nice to have the odd one go Sparkling (if a bit unusual when it’s a red). Happy to report the spiced parsnip is bubbling away, slowed a little with the drop in temperature.

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