Brew pot material

I have a 42 qt aluminum pot I have used for years to boil seafood. Are there any problems in using it as my Brew kettle? Everything I read says Stainless Steel.

No problem with aluminum,just do a full boil for 20 to 30 minutes first.

Lots of folks use aluminum... As long as its nice and clean, why not?

If said aluminum pot was previously used to fry turkeys is it unlikely you could get the organic material sufficiently cleaned from the pot to be confident in using it? That's my current dilemma.

I use a pot that used to fry turkeys all thd time. Just clean it and boil some water in it for a while and it'll be fine.

FYI - this excerpt from Palmer on cleaning it.
Cleaning Stainless Steel and Aluminum
For general cleaning, mild detergents or percarbonate-based cleaners are best for steel and aluminum. Bleach should be avoided because the high pH of a bleach solution can cause corrosion of aluminum and to a lessor degree of stainless steel. Do not clean aluminum shiny bright or use bleach to clean an aluminum brewpot because this removes the protective oxides and can result in a metallic taste. This taste-detectable level of aluminum is not hazardous. There is more aluminum in a common antacid tablet than would be present in a batch of beer made in an aluminum pot.

captwalt said:

I use a pot that used to fry turkeys all thd time. Just clean it and boil some water in it for a while and it'll be fine.

Click to expand...

Thing is filthy. I also learned something about oxygen activated cleaners and aluminum tonight...oops. But a scrub with baking soda and soak in dawn dish soap (I know) and it looks ok and feels completely dry of oil. Still don't know, though. But I will certainly boil a full pot in it if I decide to use the pot. It's scratched to hell, too.

I'm gonna admit something here that may twerk a few folks. I've fried turkey and boiled crawfish in my aluminum brew pot. No oily or greasy residue. No off flavors.

Wash it after each use, right after, immediately after, with hot soapy water and it's fine. I've not scrubbed it to a shine, so no force field has been breached. Give it another go with the sanitizer of your choice. No problemo.

Zuljin said:

I'm gonna admit something here that may twerk a few folks. I've fried turkey and boiled crawfish in my aluminum brew pot. No oily or greasy residue. No off flavors.

Wash it after each use, right after, immediately after, with hot soapy water and it's fine. I've not scrubbed it to a shine, so no force field has been breached. Give it another go with the sanitizer of your choice. No problemo.

Click to expand...

Good to know. This pot was used for years and not cleaned very well. I'm trying to undo a lot of neglect before my Sunday brew day.

My inlaws own a restaurant. My brew kettle is an aluminum stock pot that's about 20 years old. It has worked fantastic for all of my brews.

Thanks all. Its clean. I have been using a smaller Stainless pot for about a year. I want to step it up to a bigger batch and your responses tell me there is no need to spend $125-150 on another pot. I can buy a lot of ingredients for 150!

I bet that a very, very, large percentage of big batch brewers use aluminum pots.