DJM

Recipes 

Just bought a heating element to boil my wort. Turns out that the element doesnt get hot enough to produce a rolling boil. The water just gets to the point of a boil.....then backs off.

I brewed a small batch last night with grains, which I know can be steeped. But...I put DME in also....

Will it be ok?

doubleb

Recipes 

The DME should be fine. As for hops, you want a rolling boil to extract the bitterness from them. You may want to increase your boil time a tad.

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paranode

Recipes 

It should be sanitary in its packaging. However, you only need to hold something at around 160F or so for around 10 mins to kill germs anyway so you'd be fine in any case.

malkore

Recipes 

wrap your kettle in that foil insulation material (there's a post in the Equipment section)

that'll probably get you to a boil.

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Malkore
Primary: English Mild
On tap: Pale Ale, Lancelot's Wheat, English Brown Ale, Steam Beer, HoovNuts IPA
Bottled: MOAM, Braggot, Raspberry Melomel, Merlot, Apfelwein, Pyment, Sweet mead, Cabernet
Gal in 2009: 27, Gal in 2010: 34, Gal in 2011: 13, Gal in 2012: 10

eddie

Recipes 

Never boil your grains. You'll extract harsh tannins that'll ruin your beer.