diff --git a/recipes/apache-json-logs/logstash.conf b/recipes/apache-json-logs/logstash.conf
index b9ce75e..989163d 100644
--- a/recipes/apache-json-logs/logstash.conf
+++ b/recipes/apache-json-logs/logstash.conf
@@ -3,8 +3,10 @@ input {
     path => "/var/log/httpd/access_json.log" 
     type => apache 
 
-    # This format tells logstash to expect 'logstash' json events from the file.
-    format => json_event 
+    # This codec tells logstash to expect json events seperated by newlines from the file.
+    codec => json_lines {
+      charset => "UTF-8"
+    }
   }
 }