Extract brewing: does everyone buy kits or does anyone buy the materials separate?

It seems like it might save some money to buy the materials separately instead of buying a pre-assembled kit, but maybe not. I could always tweak the recipe too. So does anyone do that or does everyone just buy kits?

I did 4 extracts and switched to all grain. Saves about $10 per batch, and I like being able to play with the all grain recipes.

To avoid investing in equipment, I just used this process and bought a $10 bazooka screen for the brew kettle. You could also look at Brew In A Bag (BIAB). However, I already had a pot that could handle a full boil.

Nothing wrong with extract, but I liked the money savings and the availability of more recipes.

http://morebeer.com/brewingtechniques/library/backissues/issue2.3/schmidling.html

When I want to make something quick and easy, extract-based kits are great. One of the LHBS here makes some good ones.

Otherwise, AG or extract, I like blending my own recipe, which means buying malts, grains, hops, and otherwise separately. Not so much about saving money, more about making the beer I want to make.

IMHO, it's a trade off between time and $$$. I've made some batches recently from malt I sprouted and kilned, and hops from the backyard. Besides time (which was considerable...it took a few weeks to make the malt!) my biggest expense for those brews was the package of yeast. AG is more effort than extract - but cheaper.

My buddy does all extract, but NOT kits. He mixes everything himself. More variety that way. And cheeper.

C-Rider said:

My buddy does all extract, but NOT kits. He mixes everything himself. More variety that way. And cheeper.

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same here, buying all the ingredients at my LHBS is actually cheaper than buying the kits from say northwest or midwest brewing BEFORE shipping, let alone after.

I agree with above posts my initial brewing kit came with an 8 gallon pot and an extract kit . I did 4-5 extract batches purchasing ingredients separately and moved to all grain after that I have done a few extracts in between for a quick brew

I used to do kits but there was always at least one thing about them that I wish I could do my way; so I stepped up to doing all grain for my low to mid gravity brews and partial for my high gravity brews.

I *like* the kits I did, but they never quite felt "mine," you know? Assembling the grains and/or extracts myself helps me feel like it's more of my own creation instead of just following steps that someone else made up. Not that there is anything wrong with that; it's just a personal thing.

If I buy my extract and hops in bulk I pay about half of retail at my LHBS. I would imagine if you added up everything in that kit you are paying full retail for it. Plus the whole point for me is making my own recipes.

I do partial mash brews and buy only the ingredients I want. Course, here in New Zealand, there is not a lot of "kit" variety. I choose the ingredients as it seems more fun than just assembling a kit. I like to be able to choose the materials.

I've done both and had good results each way but preferred the personalized feeling of non-kit batches. I'm doing all grain now and if I decide to do another extract batch I'd probably be buying ingredients separately. Although I have to say that some of the Austin Homebrew kits look interesting....

I think of myself mainly as an all grain brewer, but if I am short on time I have no problem going wih extract. In those cases I have used recipes that either I convert from AG to extract myself, or are from the Brewing Classic Styles book that has each recipient in an extract and all grain version

I'm drinking a best bitter that I brewed from that book now. I used the northern brewer marris otter syrup for the base malt - and I have to say its one of my best beers ever! I did modify the recipe a bit knowing that extracts often are not as fermentable as you might get in all grain. I removed some of the syrup and substituted corn sugar - about 7% I think - keeping the OG constant. Finished at 1.012 and is fabulous!!

The other one I recommend is the 15 minute cascade ale. Amazing and fast. Makes use of the hop bursting technique (all late addition hops) and takes advantage if the fact that extract doesn't need to be boiled long.

Thanks all for the info. Very helpful.

I put a couple of extract kits from well-known internet places on my christmas list. Figured it was easy to buy and would be fun to brew. Last night I brewed the black lager kit from midwest. I was done in 2.5 hours. Perfect for a weeknight. This was a very nice change from my usual 4.5 hour brew day. If the beers turns out well, I'll be doing this more and more.

I'm thinking of doing a simple pilsner extract with one selected variety of hops in the near future. No steeping grains. I could theoretically be done in about an hour and forty-five minutes.

progmac said:

I put a couple of extract kits from well-known internet places on my christmas list. Figured it was easy to buy and would be fun to brew. Last night I brewed the black lager kit from midwest. I was done in 2.5 hours. Perfect for a weeknight. This was a very nice change from my usual 4.5 hour brew day. If the beers turns out well, I'll be doing this more and more.

I'm thinking of doing a simple pilsner extract with one selected variety of hops in the near future. No steeping grains. I could theoretically be done in about an hour and forty-five minutes.

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Nice to see a fellow Cincinnatian on here

And what you mention is what has kept me from going to all grain and it would change it from a 'brew in the evening after work' thing to a 'only brew on the weekends' thing, which can be tricky, especially during the summer with so much stuff going on and definitely during football season.

It is weird because here in Singapore, kits are actually the cheapest to brew, both in terms of ingredient cost and equipment startup cost.

It's like ~ $S 50 for a kit plus extract. The unhopped extract alone will cost that amount when I do non-kit extract brew.

With pale malt at $S 7 per kg, we are staring at $S 40+ worth of malt for each batch of normal gravity. Throw in the hops and yeast, it will be cheaper than non-kit extract but cost wise still higher than kits.

Weird.

I was pretty tired last night - I forgot to mention kit-hacking!

Wait for an extract kit to go on sale - they sometimes do - and then use hops or grains (perhaps also sourced on sale!) to craft something unique.

My first homemade stout was based on a terrible can-and-kilo kit I grabbed for $5 (dented) from the grocery store. Steeped some roasted barley and flaked oats, dropped in a bit of molasses, and presto - "President's Choice Canadian Lite Ale" kit turned into a stout that my Irish soccer buddy had to admit stacked up well with Guinness.

So, there's always kit-hacking!

Nice, I like that - kit hacking. I actually might do that with a double IPA kit I got for $20! I was thinking of making 2 pale ale batches (it's almost the same recipe, but with double the ingredients). So it would be $10/5 gal!

Making my own recipes is part of the fun for me. I know people who have brewed tasty beers from kits, so I don't on kit brewers. I'm OK with people enjoying homebrewing for reasons different than mine.

I have done 4 extract brews in the last 3 months and all of them have either been my own recipe or a modification of something I found on here.

For me it was the whole idea of the the Kit brew not truly being my own brew. Actually my starter kit came with an extract kit but I just took ingredients from it, mainly the LME, and used it for my own recipe.

Interestingly, I figured it would save me a chunk of money buying it separately, but I priced out a breakfast stout on Northern Brewer and without the coffee and grain sacks, it came out only a couple dollars cheaper. Yes I would have a few ounces left over of some ingredients, but that's not worth much. I guess I'd have to really buy in bulk to save more. Good to see they aren't gouging us just for putting the kits together.

Never bought a kit.

My LHBS lets me buy 2.3 oz of crystal 120 if I need it. Plus I want them to be OPEN. She is a genuine german import. Wealth of knowledge on beer and wine making.

Wine and Beer supply Louisville, Ky.

My experience with kits were mixed. I made some good beers and some ok beers. The kits I once purchased sat on the shelves for who knows how long. The hops and yeast were not kept refrigerated. That changed when I went away from "kits" and ordered / bought the ingredients separately. I knew the extract was fresh and I perceived a difference in improved taste.
That was about 5 years ago... moved on to AG and never brewed another extract. There's nothing wrong with extract brewing... I just enjoy the AG process.

I recently got a friend who had been tweaking Mr Beer kits to at least get a little more involved by making him a wheat beer "kit" and giving him my old bottling bucket.

He was looking over the kits from MoreBeer and decided it was easier to just buy their kits as stopping by a LHBS was too much of a hassle, and MoreBeer only sells their grains by the pound.

I don't like hanging on to opened hops, which is why my low IBU beers are made with a single type of hop typically.

The kits the sell are very reasonable.

If you have a LHBS that will sell you exact amounts of grains then making your own may be slightly better, though you may end up as I did and limiting yourself on hop usage. I do save a little, but not a lot.

But that savings buys me a couple of oz of hops for stocking! So I'm all in! And I enjoy creating my own recipes and having to ask the more knowledgeable people here if it'll need some changes.

twalte said:

I did 4 extracts and switched to all grain. Saves about $10 per batch, and I like being able to play with the all grain recipes.

To avoid investing in equipment, I just used this process and bought a $10 bazooka screen for the brew kettle. You could also look at Brew In A Bag (BIAB). However, I already had a pot that could handle a full boil.

Nothing wrong with extract, but I liked the money savings and the availability of more recipes.

http://morebeer.com/brewingtechniques/library/backissues/issue2.3/schmidling.html

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Neat, but that doesn't come close to answering the question

I started with kits, then looking up extract recipes and gathering ingredients. A couple times I went on the northern brewer website, then spec'ed out what a kit would cost if I bought the ingredients separately, there was little difference.

The nice thing about a kit is that you're usually going to have little waste. When you do your own recipe, you might have to buy much more than the recipe calls for

I used extract kits at first while I was getting the hang of things, but over the last 3 years or so, I've moved onto buying separate ingredients and working from (or creating) recipes, and greatly prefer it that way. For one, I had some freshness issues with some of the kits I got. Plus, there were several occasions when I'd make a kit beer and think "it's ok, but I'd like more hop aroma" or "this seems a little thin". I like being able to make adjustments as I go.

It's easy enough to get a concept of what you make and go on Hopville or some other recipe calculator to do the math for you. Being able to find a store that sells loose ingredients may be the biggest hurdle.

"Being able to find a store that sells loose ingredients may be the biggest hurdle."

That right there might be key for you.
I have a place I can buy grains in the amounts I need. Otherwise I suppose I'd be buying kits.
And maybe the kits would be better than some of mine, but I sure do enjoy creating recipes, doing the research, and asking questions.

m_stodd said:

I started with kits, then looking up extract recipes and gathering ingredients. A couple times I went on the northern brewer website, then spec'ed out what a kit would cost if I bought the ingredients separately, there was little difference.

The nice thing about a kit is that you're usually going to have little waste. When you do your own recipe, you might have to buy much more than the recipe calls for

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Agreed. Have been using kits (mostly from AHS and NB), but have also started to make non-kit recipes. The extra/waste quantities are starting to accumulate in the frig.

Do you not have a local place that sells grains in exact amounts?
Is that uncommon?
I'd probably do kits if I couldn't as I don't like stuff sitting around long.

rodwha said:

Do you not have a local place that sells grains in exact amounts?
Is that uncommon?
I'd probably do kits if I couldn't as I don't like stuff sitting around long.

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LHBS does sell grains in 1lb bags, but not complete confidence that the label always matches the malt/grain.

Im only only on my first brew...I started with a kit. I look forward to customizing my recipes and eventually going all grain!

Being sold in 1 lb bags doesn't give you much flexibility. You'd no doubt end up with various opened bags of different grains in the fridge. That's what keeps me from buying my grains online with the bulk of my other ingredients.

Instead I buy locally where I can buy it by the oz and have it all mixed up in the one bag meant for the pale, and another meant for the amber, etc.

Otherwise you'd need to try to create your recipes or tailor them to use up those grains so they don't get wasted.

Have you looked to see if there are any other LHBS anywhere else convenient?

rodwha said:

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Otherwise you'd need to try to create your recipes or tailor them to use up those grains so they don't get wasted.

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That can be interesting as well. Making a brew soon called "inventory ale" to us up the leftovers from 1lb packs as well as leftover hops.

I always liked buying kits. even now that I do all grain, I still usually buy kits. that way I know I'm getting a solid recipe that makes a good beer. when you make up your own recipe, you don't know if it's going to be that good or not, and you're wracked with worry until you can finally taste it. But mainly I do kits because it's easier. just pick a style of beer you want and then order a kit in that style. no hassle of figuring out what ingredients fit ion the style, etc. I would definitely recommend starting with kits for anyone's first several beers, before trying to make their own recipe. If you have never brewed before and you throw together a recipe, 1, you don't know what ingredient adds what flavor yet, and 2, if it comes out bad, you don't know if you have a bad recipe or a bad process. with a kit, if it comes out bad, you know you screwed something up while making it.

Austin homebrew has some nice budget kits. Might want to check them out.

rodwha said:

Being sold in 1 lb bags doesn't give you much flexibility. You'd no doubt end up with various opened bags of different grains in the fridge. That's what keeps me from buying my grains online with the bulk of my other ingredients.

Have you looked to see if there are any other LHBS anywhere else convenient?

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AHS has started selling 1/2 lbs which might help in the future.

I'm OK with keeping milled grains for a little while, but not so much for hops. If I'm going to split up a pack of hops I will schedule the next brew day within a week as I'm uncertain as to how quickly they will fade.