Recipe-level variables for Calculated Fields, e.g. allow "Add ingredient" quantity to be the result of a calculation

Starting to use calculated fields. Great for formulas to be able to refer to Reporting Tags and other Calculated Fields but would like to be able to define “per recipe” values. For example, if my IPA recipe has a target post-boil gravity of 16.5 ºP, I’d like to be able to use that in a Calculated Field that computes the liquor-back volume. Then my PA recipe with a post-boil gravity of 13.5 ºP could use the same Calculated Field. Can work around by entering a post-boil gravity “reading” each time I use a recipe but this is a bit clumsy.

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That will be a really helpful thing to add

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Hi Erik,

Glad to hear that you’re getting use from the calculated fields functionality! I think that suggestion makes a lot of sense, we could add the ability to define “Targets”, which could then be set on a per-recipe basis, that can then be used in your calculated fields.

If that sounds like it would cover everything you need, we can certainly look at adding this sort of functionality. If you have any other thoughts on it, let us know, and in the meantime I’ll add this to the list and let you know here once it’s in!

Thanks,
Max

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OK, thanks. Only: maybe give them a more generic name than “targets” since there may be other useful recipe-specific values that aren’t necessarily targets. And while you’re at it, it would be nice to be able to define some global (brewery specific but recipe independent) values too, i.e. water chemistry parameters. And why stop there? How about some built-in formulas that ALL brewers might find useful: water volume as a function of temperature, hydrometer reading temperature correction, dissolved CO2 as a function of pressure & temperature, etc. Separate feature requests beyond my initial suggestion, but perhaps something to keep in mind if you implement.

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Just ran into another related issue: would like calculated fields to be able to access a recipe’s “add ingredient” quantities to, for example, be able to calculate the mash efficiency. Or better yet, this would be another built-in calculation since useful to all brewers.

Just hopping in on this one. Would like to be able to use Calculated Fields to determine the quantity of an ingredient.

For example, Sparge water addition would determine how much H3PO4 is added to the kettle/mash tun.

This way, If I create a new recipe from my Hazy template, all I have to really do is change my sparge volume and all my calculated fields would work out how much water treatment is required.

To add more clarity to my rant.

Recipe Edit > Add Action > Add Ingredient > H3PO4 > Qty “= Phosphoric_Lager” Calculated Field

The Calculated Field “Phosphoric_Lager” would reference my Sparge Quantity or any other Reporting Tag.

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Thanks for this example, Evan, that’s really useful.

I think this would be a great feature and it’s great to see it picking up more votes. We’ve recently launched Adjusting the quantity of hops added to a beer batch for alpha acid percentage which has plenty of improvements as part of it which will help pave the way for this request :+1:

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Alpha acid % value for each hop lot is a useful addition, thanks. But note that the quantity of hops to add also depends on the volume and gravity of wort which varies from batch to batch of the same recipe. If we could access the alpha acid % in a calculated field, we could calculate the hops to add ourselves. (I guess this would be a “batch-level” value to complement the “recipe-level” values of the original feature request.) In the mean time, one can work around as before by manually entering the alpha acid % as a “reading” for each batch and then doing the calculation.

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As far as I understand the recipes scale the quantities based on how much you plan to produce so the quantities will be based on what you brew. For the same recipe, slight deviations in gravity should not impact the IBU’s in a meaningful way. If you another variation of the beer it might be best to make a new recipe for it.

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Agreed: gravity differences between batches of the same recipe won’t impact IBUs (much), but it will matter for different recipes and so you’d need a different calculated field for each recipe. Or better, and back to the original feature request: recipe-level variables, one of which could be a ‘hop-rate adjustment’.

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