Fancy doing some home brewing. Any one have any advice?

[nadger]

Hi all
I'm rapidly approaching my birthday, and people are asking for ideas for pressies. Struggling for ideas, but something I've fancied for a while is brewing my own beer. However I have no idea what to get as a new beginner. I know there are brewing kits out there, but I think I'd like to be able to do it again, so are kits a good idea?
Basically I'm hoping to plumb the collective depths of PH knowledge to see what people advise!
Many thanks in advance.

[doosht]

Welcome to middle age (i assume).

[nadger]

I'm going to be 34, but swmbo insists I've been middle aged for years!
I haven't put a flat cap on the birthday list, but am now considering it!

[Turn7]

Been brewing Ales and Ciders for years, its good fun and chaep tax free beer!

Kits today are leagues away from the olden days, where all you could taste was the yeast.

What do you want to brew, how involved do you want to get ?

Ask away.

[DocArbathnot]

Get a starter kit. These have everything you need. If you like bitter a Woodfordes Wherry is pretty foolproof and a good drink. Add a week at least to the stated conditioning time however.

I've tried kegs and bottles, I much prefer the taste of kegs.

enjoy

Edited by DocArbathnot on Sunday 19th May 22:17

[Turn7]

King kegs all the way....

[SwanJack]

Start out with the canned kits. The best ones are the two can type, such as the Woodford ones,these are the best as they are full extract kits and you do not need to add any sugar,they are more expensive however. Coopers do a starter kit that I used first off (and is the basis of what I use to brew now) http://www.tesco.com/direct/diy-beer-starter-kit/2... Use these to master the basics of bottling, cleaning sanitisation, as if you don't have sterile kit, you'll end up with an infected beer with 'off' flavours. Once you've done these you could move on to extract brewing, BIAB brewing and full mash brewing. I've got to BIAB brewing and find that the brew's are streets ahead on the kit beer, don't think I'll move to full mash any time soon.

There are some great forums out there,this one's an easy one to start off on http://www.jimsbeerkit.co.uk/forum/index.php, a bigger UK based one is http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/ and if you want to blow your mind and see what they get up to over the pond http://www.homebrewtalk.com/

If you want good beer though, everything that touches it must be sterile. And don't bother with a kit that mentions Lager, they turn out nothing like what you expect, to replicate Lager by homebrewing is extremely difficult.

Edited by SwanJack on Monday 20th May 09:26

[MOM]

Kits are good- if you like ale the woodfordes wherry kit actually tastes spot on -
Only advice i would give is filter your water first. I get a varnish aftertaste if i dont. Hard water here

[SwanJack]

MOM said:

Kits are good- if you like ale the woodfordes wherry kit actually tastes spot on -
Only advice i would give is filter your water first. I get a varnish aftertaste if i dont. Hard water here

Or you could use Aldi bottled water, would work out about £4 for a 40pint batch.

[casbar]

Turn7 said:

King kegs all the way....

King Kegs are ok, but for the serious brewer you need Cornies and use pub gas. The problem with King Kegs are, if they are not sealed correctly, you won't find out until you come to drink it, and the beer could be flat and ruined by then, plus its difficult to cool.

Try this site for advice www.jimsbeerkit.co.uk

Lots of places to buy kit from, this is a good home brew online retailer with good advice - http://www.brewuk.co.uk/store/

There are basically two ways to brew beer, kit and then whole grain, which is basically how the brewery do it. Kit is good to start with.

[captainzep]

Would echo what has been said already.

Decent kit and a thorough approach to sanitising should equal a cheap and very acceptable pint of bitter.

And home-brewing doesn't mean middle age. My best brews were done in a student house, where 40 pints was a basic weekly minimum requirement for us.

[Turn7]

casbar said:

King Kegs are ok, but for the serious brewer you need Cornies and use pub gas. The problem with King Kegs are, if they are not sealed correctly, you won't find out until you come to drink it, and the beer could be flat and ruined by then, plus its difficult to cool.

Try this site for advice www.jimsbeerkit.co.uk

Lots of places to buy kit from, this is a good home brew online retailer with good advice - http://www.brewuk.co.uk/store/

There are basically two ways to brew beer, kit and then whole grain, which is basically how the brewery do it. Kit is good to start with.

Cornies have got to silly money now, and even Norman is saying used ones are getting harder and harder to obtain.

[SwanJack]

casbar said:

There are basically two ways to brew beer, kit and then whole grain, which is basically how the brewery do it. Kit is good to start with.

For the homebrewer there are more than just two choices though, for example kit,extract, extract with specialty grains, partial mash, mini BIAB, maxi BIAB, full grain (there are sub divions of this also).

The Firkin brewery when it was going didn't do whole grain,it used extract malt.

[DocArbathnot]

Turn7 said:

King kegs all the way....

I've got 3 budget barrels, never had a problem spares are available. I usually dismantal and put the taps, lids etc in the dishwasher to keep clean.

[andygo]

How much a pint does it wok out at roughly?

[Turn7]

andygo said:

How much a pint does it wok out at roughly?

Depends on how you get there - ie top end twin can kit is about 30/40p ish, cheapy single can probably about 25p

[DocArbathnot]

andygo said:

How much a pint does it wok out at roughly?

By the time you factor in sundries and the fact that you never get 40pts out of a 40pt kit, I reckon 60-70p per pint for something decent.

It's not just it's cheaper, as a bitter drinker I prefer keg to bottles. Equal to decent pub beer and often better than some.

I've been brewing Festival and Woodfordes kits

[nadger]

Many thanks for the advice chaps (and chapesses?!). I have found a few kits that I may be interested in, any opinions on the following -
http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/coopers-canadian-blon...
http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/muntons-gold-india-pa...
http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/midas-touch-golden-al...
http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/woodforde-s-sundew-ab...
http://www.brew2bottle.co.uk/festival-landlords-fi...

As you can see I prefer a pale ale! In addition to the kits above, what else would I need?

Finally, is using a kit cheating somewhat? I really enjoyed watching the documentary where Neil Morrisey and Richard Fox made their own beer, and it's something Ive harboured an ambition to try ever since! How difficult would this be? Should I start with a kit and built up from there, or simply abandon the idea as yet another idiotic plan!

Thanks again for all the help so far!

[Turn7]

Whole grain homebrewung us possible,but I think you are looking at a good couple if hundred quid set up plus needing a whole day to brew.

[SwanJack]

Turn7 said:

Whole grain homebrewung us possible,but I think you are looking at a good couple if hundred quid set up plus needing a whole day to brew.

You can brew from grain quite cheaply, I do so by BIAB (brew in a bag) and reckon my set up costs were about £45 on top of the Coopers starter equipment that I already had. If you want to know more about this method then there's a forum on it here http://www.biabrewer.info/ .

Using left over grain and hops from other brews that I did, the cheapest I have achieved is 15p a pint. It usually works out at about 30p a pint though and the end result is streets ahead of kits.