Where are all the kit brewers?

[clibit]

I understand people without time doing kits, obviously. Perfect sense, and I had years like that, three young kids and busy job.

As for taking one step at a time, that can involve drinking a lot of kit beer when you could be drinking AG beer and gradually learning more about it. It's not difficult. If you want five gallon batches but don't want to get the gear for it, make partial mashes. Add a mini AG to a kit, or to some malt extract. I bang on about it cos I wasted years before doing it myself. I tolerated kit beer. I love AG beer. And the only extra gear I needed was a stock pot and a muslin bag. I never made a kit beer that was even close to my first AG brew.

 

[MyQul]

I understand people without time doing kits, obviously. Perfect sense, and I had years like that, three young kids and busy job.

As for taking one step at a time, that can involve drinking a lot of kit beer when you could be drinking AG beer and gradually learning more about it. It's not difficult. If you want five gallon batches but don't want to get the gear for it, make partial mashes. Add a mini AG to a kit, or to some malt extract. I bang on about it cos I wasted years before doing it myself. I tolerated kit beer. I love AG beer. And the only extra gear I needed was a stock pot and a muslin bag. I never made a kit beer that was even close to my first AG brew.

'Your feeble kits are no match for the power of the dark side'

 

[MyQul]

Your just very very lazy MyQul

Just stretching out the pleasure of brew day :whistle:

 

[dad_of_jon]

Am i the only kit brewer on here?
I will do partial mash etc but i barely have time to write this thread.
Come on guys,dont be intimidated.

I've done 3 kits pimping up 2 and only followed instructions to the letter with the brewfferm abdij which recommends a clarification step which takes more time than many kits.

I do extract with grain/hops additions. If you do a fifteen minute boil with a chunk of hops and dilute wort with a lot of chilled/near frozen water there's not much extra time needed over kits. cooling down to pitching temperature is where it can add quite a bit of time to the process, but the iced bottled water reduces that.

Equally when boiling up water putting some in a kettle as well as in the boil pot and combining them speeds up the time to boil.

Or you can do an overnight chill to split the process into more manageable chunks.

so there's lots of options to improve your beers without succumbing to lord vader :grin:

as for kits I recommend the muntons oaked ale. I brewed it short and used mangrove jacks west coast yeast. Brewferm abdij is super too.

 

[clibit]

Everyone succumbs eventually. Resistance is futile. :thumb:

 

[Wardy]

Everyone succumbs eventually. Resistance is futile. :thumb:

Darth Borg [emoji43]

 

[alarmsparks]

I confess I only do kits, to be fair they taste good to me and I get fed up on bottling day.

 

[mike-os]

i will continue to do kits... though probably as partial mashes as they do seem to produce some decent beer and are quick & easy....:grin:

however the dark side calls to me...... just ordered a mash tun :whistle:

 

[clibit]

i will continue to do kits... though probably as partial mashes as they do seem to produce some decent beer and are quick & easy....:grin:

however the dark side calls to me...... just ordered a mash tun :whistle:

Mwahahaha!

 

[pms67]

I've done 3 kits pimping up 2 and only followed instructions to the letter with the brewfferm abdij which recommends a clarification step which takes more time than many kits.

I do extract with grain/hops additions. If you do a fifteen minute boil with a chunk of hops and dilute wort with a lot of chilled/near frozen water there's not much extra time needed over kits. cooling down to pitching temperature is where it can add quite a bit of time to the process, but the iced bottled water reduces that.

Equally when boiling up water putting some in a kettle as well as in the boil pot and combining them speeds up the time to boil.

Or you can do an overnight chill to split the process into more manageable chunks.

so there's lots of options to improve your beers without succumbing to lord vader :grin:

as for kits I recommend the muntons oaked ale. I brewed it short and used mangrove jacks west coast yeast. Brewferm abdij is super too.

My full brew is fifteen minutes and I'm thankful when it's in the FV before my lovely family interrupt,I mean share the house/kitchen :roll
Yeah Muntons kits are good,not done the Oaked Ale though,sitting drinking a Youngs Red India Ale and have a Brewferm raspberry beer waiting.
Good discussion,cheers guys :thumb:

 

[pms67]

Mwahahaha!

I can hear that evil laugh from up here in Bannockburn :-o

 

[pms67]

It's wort chilling me to the bone :grin:

 

[thegoatboy]

I was tempted with trying an AG then I read the post on here and got scared.

I've spent a lot on gear the past month, so don't want to be spending more at the mo.

 

[clibit]

I was tempted with trying an AG then I read the post on here and got scared.

I've spent a lot on gear the past month, so don't want to be spending more at the mo.

You don't need any gear.

 

[Covrich]

I was tempted with trying an AG then I read the post on here and got scared.

I've spent a lot on gear the past month, so don't want to be spending more at the mo.

Okay so maybe this is a simplified way to look at it (very simplified)

But think about it as making a large pot of tea (with grains) steeping for an hour (the only tricky bit will be keeping the temp at a constant temp around 66ºc), then you boil it for an hour adding just a few ingredients at the start of the boil and at the end..

Cool, strain dump in your fermenter or demijon and then chuck your yeast in..

Okay simplified way of looking at it but to get to grips with it that is all you need and you don't need any additional equiment if you're doing small batches.:thumb:

 

[Cwrw666]

Going back to the original post - where are all the kit brewers? I guess most who are using the forum are bound to be newbies, because it doesn't take long before they realise that kit brewing is so easy, so if they're going to carry on with kits there's not much of interest on here.
Those who hang around are probably those who've switched to AG because there's always something new to find out, and because compared to kit brewing it is so much fun.
When I made the switch I found the whole process quite intimidating at first, but of course it isn't half as difficult as it seems at the beginning. I started with a full 23L brew but it would have been so much easier to start with 10L in a big pot on the stove and then of course all you need is a big pot and a BIAB bag - which will all be paid for out of the money you save per brew (currently my AG brews are working out at 34p per pint).

 

[thegoatboy]

Okay so maybe this is a simplified way to look at it (very simplified)

But think about it as making a large pot of tea (with grains) steeping for an hour (the only tricky bit will be keeping the temp at a constant temp around 66ºc), then you boil it for an hour adding just a few ingredients at the start of the boil and at the end..

Cool, strain dump in your fermenter or demijon and then chuck your yeast in..

Okay simplified way of looking at it but to get to grips with it that is all you need and you don't need any additional equiment if you're doing small batches.:thumb:

Well I need a huge pot for a start (I guess that won't cost much)

cool it over night I suppose to save on that immersion cooler.

 

[clibit]

Or make half batches in a smaller pot. Or do partial mash brews, which are great. And you can do in a smaller pot on your cooker, then boosted to 23 litres in the fv with extract and cold water. Stock pot from Wilkinsons, no chiller required.

 

[thegoatboy]

you guys are like drug dealer pushers!

 

[thegoatboy]

Or make half batches in a smaller pot. Or do partial mash brews, which are great. And you can do in a smaller pot on your cooker, then boosted to 23 litres in the fv with extract and cold water. Stock pot from Wilkinsons, no chiller required.

what size stock pot would you recommend?