Turkey Fryer or Keggle

Due to many reasons such as having a glass top stove and infant learning to walk in the house, I am in the process of moving my brewing outside.

Originally I had the idea of buying a turkey fryer (30 QT), but like everything else in this hobby I see myself upgrading and moving on to All Grain brewing (currently brew using extract) eventually, maybe soon.

Now after more thought, I am thinking of going up a step from the Turkey fryer to building a keggle.

The pros for the keggle for me would be the size of the boil. I can double a recipe if I like, and the fact that boil overs will no longer be an issue. I do believe that boil overs do occur with full boils when using a turkey fryer. Partial boils are something I would like to avoid. And of course a big pro would be the future expandability into all grain brewing.

Basically the only Con I see right now with the keggle is the added cost over a turkey fryer, and the difference really isn't that great. With the keggle I have to buy a seperate burner of course, where with the turkey fryer I have a one stop solution for boiling outside.

I can get a keg and can get the lid plasma cut for around the same price as a turkey fryer setup. Down the road I can drill out the keggle myself and add on the ball valve, and thermometer if necessary. Storage is also not a problem as I have a 2 car garage I plan on brewing in either way.

I basically would like to know other peoples suggestions in which way I should go, or what they did if they were in a similar situation to me.

I got a turkey fryer with 8 gal. pot. I use this pot for small 5 gal. brews,and its my hlt when doing 10 gal. in my keggle on my turkey fryer burner..

I were doing what you are asking, I would get the turkey fryer first. Work on the getting the Keggle.

Just because then you would have the burner from the turkey set up to use with the keg and can still brew while your saving up for it.

(still need to worry about boil overs with the keggle even with 5 gallon batches)

I'd say blow your tax refund money on both, but I'm not sure how that all works up north.

Look for a turkey fryer kit with a slightly larger pot and then get fermcap foam control drops and you'll be fine. When I boil with fermcap I can set the burner and forget it, don't even get the tiniest hint of foam.

Keggle.

Make a list of the things you NEED and cost them out.

• keg shell (25-50)
• 1 ball valve kit (20)
• tubing (10)
• banjo burner (75)

Lots of niceties that could be added, but this gives you far more options for the future than the turkey burner. Note also that if you want to do a 10g batch, the burner that comes with the turkey burner kit may be unsuitable for BTU and stability issues.

BTW, there are some super easy options for removing the top of the keg yourself. Here's how I did it. Took 5 minutes (which included making this jig!).
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/simplest-keggle-cutting-jig-143048/

I've been doing the turkey fryer extract thing for a couple years and this forum has got me headed to AG full steam ahead.

I have three little ones under 4 and need to brew while playing with them. That has a lot to do with my decision to go electric. No open flame for kids to be injured, can be done inside if necessary, works well with a keggle, my list goes on.

I'm thinking that I will do extract in the electric kettle until I can get the whole rig set up somewhere down the road. It may or may not work for what you need but the more I look at it the more I like it.

There's no reason you can't go AG with a turkey fryer setup.

I'm all electric. Wind would sometimes blow my burner out when I wasn't on my patio. I had enough of that. When I went to keggles, I was worried about 14g of wort precariosly perched on a burner, then falling off. So I skipped the burners and now all 3 keggles sit right on my patio. I don't even want a brewstand.

Franzi said:

I'd say blow your tax refund money on both, but I'm not sure how that all works up north.

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I blew it all on snowpants and choppers

I have had 5 gallons boil over in a keggle .

Get the fryer and then when the time come upgrade to either the keggle or a kettle .

I went from a keggle to a kettle I happened on a 30 gallon pot for nadda .


works fine with the fryer

springer said:

Get the fryer and then when the time come upgrade to either the keggle or a kettle .

Click to expand...

Maybe this is the time?