Extract Brews

[TRXnMe]

Hi

I've brewed a few kits over the last few weeks and am definitely an addicted brewer now

I've seen a few posts about extract brewing and it looks to be an interesting half way house between 2 can kits and a full AG, is this a reasonable description?

While looking for malt extract I came across an offer on the Holland & Barrett web site, they are offering their basic malt extract for £2.29 a 454g jar, buy one get the second half price, so quite ceap to get up to 3 kilos (ish) of extract.

Is it the right stuff for an extract brew? If so I might be needing a big stock pot in the near future :)

PS, this is the extract http://www.hollandandbarrett.com/pages/ ... 3450&sid=0

 

[karlos]

im about to start extract brewing myself so looking forward to the response

 

[abeyptfc]

hi guys, had a quick search on the forum as im sure ive seen this discussed elsewhere here - http://thehomebrewforum.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=21833&hilit=holland+and+barrett

forgot to add, ive done a good few extract brew myself and am now doing all grain. ive never tried the H&B stuff and always used dried spraymalt, if you click on the link above for the homebrew company, they do 3KG for £14 which is the cheapest anywhere, you will probably use anywhere between 2 and 2.5KG for an extract brew so you can save the other 500 grams for either priming a few brews or use with a kit brew. i can recommend the kit brews from brew uk, the way to amarillo and summer ale were quality, the summer ale was so good ive kept 1 bottle and will try on its 1 yr anniversary on 17th july!

 

[jonnymorris]

I've seen a few posts about extract brewing and it looks to be an interesting half way house between 2 can kits and a full AG, is this a reasonable description?

Absolutely. You are essentially creating the wort from extract by boiling it up with hops rather than buying it in a can. Once cooled you'll be back on a familiar path. If you steep some speciality grains before boiling you'll get a fresher more interesting wort that is also more satisfying to make.

The final step to AG is using a mash tun to extract the sugars from the malts rather than using the pre-prepared extract.

It's not a scary as you might think, just takes a bit more time and a big pot.

 

[critty]

I am starting a Weissbier extract today. I have read on the net about the holland and barret stuff and some people have had bad experiences with it. You can buy coopers tinned brewing malt and brewferm also make this. You can also get the spray malt that abeyptfc mentioned. I researched the hell out of this, Pittsy can attest as I think I chewed his ear over more things, and it's far easier than what it appears.

I got an extract kit from brewuk which came with yeast, hops and malt. Once I have the basics I will probably either do a few more, buying my own ingredients, or move onto full AG brewing.

 

[TRXnMe]

Abeyptfc

Thanks for that, guess I ought to have seracched for holland barret rather than malt extract as the search results I got had way too many posts and I got bored after about 4 pages

Jonnymorris

It might not be scary from your spot, ut it's ruddy scary from mine at the minute I'm building up to it, my LHBS has hops in small quantities, and grains, so I'm getting really tempted, but will probably produce the wort in stages as buying a huge stock pot, then an AG setup is probably a waste of dosh :) I have a 10 litre stock pot already, I'm thhinking of hopping some water in that and adding that to the extract, then steeping some grains in more water and adding that to the wort, it'll give stuff chance to cool off ready to pitch the yeast as I've no chiller setup yet

This hobby should come with a health warning, I only wanted to brew some cheap booze and stiff HMG out of a few quid in taxes, now I'm looking into setting up a (very) micro brewery in a shed I don't even own yet!!!!!

 

[critty]

I came into this think I would just get away with a FV, some utensils, a cheap tin kit and a whole lot of dreaming. Yeah two fermenters, bottling equipment, hops, wheat dme, yeast and brewing pot later I am hooked lol.

 

[TRXnMe]

I had 'done the math' before getting my first brew kit and FV and already started collecting pressure kegs, I've now got 6, 2 are full, one is emptying as I type (1 pint less, it's a school night) and I've got 2 FVs bubblinng away along with 3 demi johns of cider..

I'm goinng to bottle one of the FVs, keg the other and have no idea what I'm gonna do with the cider yet, but will work summat out by this time next week

The wife is starting to go beyond hints about a shed to keep the stuff in and has suggested it's going to be my combined birthday and christmas present