Favorite Extract Kit

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Another route you might go would be to get a good recipe and then get fresh ingredients at your LHBS. Northern brewer lists the ingredients of the kits on their website.

I have gotten to like brown ales. You might look at Northern Brewers Caribou Slobber kit.
 
Another route you might go would be to get a good recipe and then get fresh ingredients at your LHBS. Northern brewer lists the ingredients of the kits on their website.

I have gotten to like brown ales. You might look at Northern Brewers Caribou Slobber kit.

+1 for that. This is what I do.I have only done 2 out of the box recipes. I do a honey porter that I modified from Midwest's recipe and its wonderful.
 
A good kit is the mrbeer dopplebock or the pilot house pilsner . After a month , not the 2 weeks they tell you to wait , the beer starts tasting quite good . Before that it sucks . I really enjoyed them . How ever they are quite pricey .

I just realized how old I am . I used to buy cheap beer for 5.50 a case , tuborg gold . I do not know the price of cheap beer now but I just paid about 3.00 a bottle , singles , for some good beer.
 
The best rated beer I made right up there with the AG nut brown was a Muntons Wheat I believe . I forgot how I made it and of course did not bother to write it down . But as I remember I think I just made the no boil and then added in a pound or two of light DME and 1 pound of rain flower honey and 1 pound of regular honey . It had a strong rain flower honey taste for a while but after a couple months in the bottle it mellowed out and is one great beer .
 
There are still kits out there I haven't brewed so I can't be positive about a favorite but Northern has some nice kits.
 
So I'm enjoying this thread, thought I'd chime in. I don't know that I have a favorite kit per se. But I think I can say with some certainty that the kits not as important as the brewer. And, the fresher ingredients are the better. I like the kits from my LHBS but he is very busy, he moves a lot of product, and the kits are always fresh. I think that beers that are super hoppy or have another very forward flavor (chocolate, raspberry, etc) are a little more forgiving. I would also say that wheat extracts seem to be more forgiving than other kits. IMHO.
 
I've made several kits from NB and made good beers from them. A few of my favorites are: Le Petite Orange (just finished one and it's very good, my wife is drinking one right now and said it's one of the best kits I've made), Belgian Dubbel also very good, and German Alt to name a few.
 
Brewers Best Red Ale kit, LHBS suggested adding rye and Citra hops. Delicious; and I don't consider myself a hophead. Oldest son liked the cream ale better.
 
Brewers Best American Wheat was awesome when I made it last year. Added 1/2 gallon high pulp orange juice five minutes prior to flameout and it came thru just right. Drank every single bottle myself. Imperial Blonde Ale was good as well.
 
AHS Amber Rye. Oh was that good!

NB St. Paul Porter. 2 bottles survived 2 years, and my dad and I enjoyed them camping. That was my SECOND ever batch of beer, every single bottle was absolutely delicious! Come to think of it...I should brew that again. That was before I had a chiller or temp control!
 
Best extract kit so far was the Northern Brewer Hefeweizen with the Wyeast Weihenstephan yeast. It produced a really great beer.
 
+1 on the Bourbon Barrel Porter kit from NB. Had a 1-gallon kit when I first started, and it was the biggest hit. Currently have the 5-gallon kit in secondary.

On the other end of the spectrum, my favorite kit has been Northern Brewer's Saison Du Vin. The wine added gives it a little bit of sour/funk that I love in a Saison.
 
It sounds like Northern Brewer Cream Ale might be to your liking. I've tried quite a few recipes from Brewing Classic Styles by Zainasheff and his recipes are great. I'd skip the kit and put together something with fresh ingredients - it'll give you a chance to try whole hops or a different yeast strain.
 
My three favorite extract kits were all from Northern Brewer: Kama Citra Session IPA, Jamil's Evil Twin and T-Can and Bearcat's Wheaten Beatdown. Of the three I've also done all grain versions of the Kama Citra and Wheaten Beatdown, and the flavor and quality of the finished beer was just about equal with the only real difference being that the extract versions were darker in color. I have an all grain version of Jamil's on deck, but the response I've received from self-described beer snobs is that extract version was one fine brew...
 
I have done about 12 kits from both NB and BB and even a few of my own creation, but the best was BB black Ipa. That 5 gallons went pretty quick!
 
Favorite From Brewers Best is the Standard ESB, after 4 weeks in the primary. 4 weeks bottle conditioning it was excellent (using Wyeast 1968)

favorite AIH kit is the Raspberry Plunder. it's good, it's an ale without a huge amount of raspberry flavor. but because it used Lorann oil's it does kill the head some.

Brewers best Imperial Blonde is also a very good beer.
 

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