Brewing home brew kits. Is it better to boil?

[Schnell88]

The instructions in most kits that I read state that you don't need to boil, just put the sugar and concentrated wort straight in the fermenting bin and give a good stir to dissolve the sugar.

I, however, have always boiled it to dissolve the sugar. When I say boil, I mean both the sugar and the wort. I then add this to a large quantity of water already in the fermenting bin as to not melt the plastic.

My questions are..

1. Is it best to boil both the wort and the sugar on the stove before adding it to the water?
2. Is it best to just boil the sugar with some water to dissolve it, but don't boil the wort?
3. Is there any advantage / disadvantage to boiling the concentrated wort from the kit tin?
4. What would you recommend I do in future?

Thank you for your time.

 

[anthonyUK]

The Basic Brewing Network guys did an experiment last year to test the effects of no boil/late addition/boiling extract and found it to be hardly detectable in the final product.

If you want to listen you can find it here - http://www.basicbrewing.com/index.php?p ... radio-2010
It is the 4th march one.

I would recommend you don't use sugar in future

 

[StubbsPKS]

I've always heard that boiling extract that's already been boiled can make it a bit darker and change the flavor profile a bit. I've never tried it though, just always avoided it when doing kits.

I used to boil the sugar (or Spraymalt) with some water first and then add it in. Same way I batch prime