- Feb 2, 2005
- 17,252
- 19
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So I think I'm getting into brewing my own beer at home. The genesis of this idea came when my girlfriend bought me a Mr. Beer craft brewing kit for valentines day. Now, from looking at forums and literature on the subject it became pretty clear to me that Mr. Beer must be essentially the lowest rung on the ladder in terms of home brewing. I've heard it called the "easy bake oven" of brewing. That still didn't curb my fascination with the fact that I was going to take this can of sticky, syrupy malt extract and somehow it was going to become beer in about 6 weeks. The kit came with 2 extract kits, one for American lager, and one for Mexican cerveza. I felt duty bound to use both of them before I moved on to more advanced brewing equipment, so Saturday I bottled the American lager that had been fermenting for 3 weeks and put the cerveza on to ferment. In another three weeks the lager will be ready to drink and the cerveza will be ready to bottle, so I figure I'll use the intervening time to research some 5 gallon brewing kits.
I know there are a few beer brewers on this forum so I figured I would see what you guys have to say about it.
Right now my frontrunner is this 5 gallon kit from Midwest supply. It includes some stuff that I often saw people suggest that didn't always seem to come with starter kits such as an auto siphon, hydrometer, carboy, and thermometer for a better price than many of the less complete kits I've looked at. Is there any reason not to go with this one?
I'm also looking for some general pointers from experienced folk. In order to be able to bottle my second batch of beer from the Mr. Beer while the first batch is cooling in the fridge, I had to buy a second set of 12 plastic (PET) bottles. I figured I could just continue using those when the first batch comes out of the 5 gallon kit. That's assuming I've consumed all the beer I've made by then of course and the bottles are ready to use again . Will those be ok for the near future? Is there any compelling reason for me to switch to glass bottles with crown caps? Where do people get their recipes and ingredients from? Any good beginner level recipes you could suggest? What are your habits when it comes to cleaning and sanitizing your equipment? Anything else I should know about?
I know there are a few beer brewers on this forum so I figured I would see what you guys have to say about it.
Right now my frontrunner is this 5 gallon kit from Midwest supply. It includes some stuff that I often saw people suggest that didn't always seem to come with starter kits such as an auto siphon, hydrometer, carboy, and thermometer for a better price than many of the less complete kits I've looked at. Is there any reason not to go with this one?
I'm also looking for some general pointers from experienced folk. In order to be able to bottle my second batch of beer from the Mr. Beer while the first batch is cooling in the fridge, I had to buy a second set of 12 plastic (PET) bottles. I figured I could just continue using those when the first batch comes out of the 5 gallon kit. That's assuming I've consumed all the beer I've made by then of course and the bottles are ready to use again . Will those be ok for the near future? Is there any compelling reason for me to switch to glass bottles with crown caps? Where do people get their recipes and ingredients from? Any good beginner level recipes you could suggest? What are your habits when it comes to cleaning and sanitizing your equipment? Anything else I should know about?