One Gallon all grain kits? I don't get it!

The other day, a friend told me that in some magazine he read that Brooklyn Brew Shop is selling 1 gallon all grain kits, and I'm trying to wrap my head around this since I can't see spending $15 for one gallon, and I can't imagine spending several hours on brewing while getting so little in return. I get that they are trying to market this to those NYCers with no space, but is this anything more than a gimmick?

This isn't a comment about the quality of their recipes, since I have never seen one. I just can't imagine the cost and the time. Do they have some technique where a one gallon brew only takes an hour like this guy does for a partial mash (see video below). Even a boil in a bag would still take too long (I think).

Not everyone is gung ho about 5 gallons of beer and many brew just because they like to brew thus, time is not an issue.

Yup, exactly what he said. My HERMS is probably getting sold for this very reason.

GilaMinumBeer said:

Not everyone is gung ho about 5 gallons of beer and many brew just because they like to brew thus, time is not an issue.

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What you say makes sense, but this shop seems to be geared towards the novice brewer.

CrankyOldLibrarian said:

What you say makes sense, but this shop seems to be geared towards the novice brewer.

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therefore, a one gallon full boil negates the need for a massive brewpot. for one gallon, most have a pot large enough for taht at home and can easily boil this on stove top.

It's a good marketing idea and I applaud them, like the first time someone posted about this. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/1-gallon-brewing-148881/#post1701987

I wish I thought of it.

There's nothing wrong with one or 2.5 gallon brewing. In fact the Basic brewing folks have done plenty of videos on 1 gallon (actually 3 quarter gallon) brewing. The've done a "six pack Ipa" and even a small batch barelywine.

In this case it's a possible great gateway to the hobby, and I can't fault it for that either.

I do a ton of 2.5 gallon AG brews in my loft, usually when the weather turns cold and I don't want to brew outside.

I do a lot of Experiments, test recipes, or beers that I know I won't need/want more than a case of.

I sometimes use an unmodified 2 gallon cooler for a lot of my small btaches it holds up to 4 pounds of grain.

I just us a folding steamer in the bottom along with a grain bag. Just break off or unscrew the center post.

It's funny, mead and cider makers make tons of 1 gallon batches and noone says anything about that, but someone wants to make a small batch of beer, and other's say "it's too much work with little payoff."

But I figure this is a hobby for me, not work...so the "payoff" is spending the time brewing, NOT the size of the batch...

I suppose, if they sell them and people buy them... it doesnt really matter why.

I personally cannot imagine $15 for 10 bottles of beer, BUT... that is me.

Id much prefer to brew on a 3 gallon scale myself.

In fact here's one of the basic brewing videos where they made a 3/4 gallon barleywine recipe, then made Ice beer with it..

I actually was going to post about this the other day. It seems like the Hipster Mr Beer. Nothing wrong with it, and if I was just starting out then it might be good, but Gizmodo and the other Gawker sites have been pimping them a lot and I want to say 'This is nice and all but ONE GALLON?'

The Pol said:

I personally cannot imagine $15 for 10 bottles of beer, BUT... that is me.

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Lol, I've spent 15 bucks for 1 bomber of beer...but someone had already done the work.

While I do agree with most of the comments, I still can't see spending the amount of money & time on a one gallon recipe that I didn't create. I've done several small batches over the years, and I wouldn't be brewing for almost 20 years (on & off) if I didn't enjoy the process. However, if I were a newbie, spending that much time with so little to drink for it might have turned me off of the hobby.

CrankyOldLibrarian said:

While I do agree with most of the comments, I still can't see spending the amount of money & time on a one gallon recipe that I didn't create. I've done several small batches over the years, and I wouldn't be brewing for almost 20 years (on & off) if I didn't enjoy the process. However, if I were a newbie, spending that much time with so little to drink for it might have turned me off of the hobby.

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But you're a brewer already, this product isn't geared towards you, or me, or anyone on here....it's aimed at the folks that in 6 months or so will have pipelines and rigs to rival ours.....Or people who just want a little fun, trying something new, and at 20 bucks is not a huge investment.....

It's a gateway in, rather than disparage on them, we should salute their ingenuity, I mean I wish I had thought to pair up a 6 dollar wine jug, a few cents worth of grain and a pack of yeast and bundle it for that price.....

I think one thing many of us forget to consider is that this Brooklyn Brew Shop is in "Brooklyn". I would imagine much of thier client base are apartment dwellers that would have some major space issues with not only 5gal equipment, but storage for ingredients. You also have the transportation issue, sure I can just run to my LBHS and toss 10 to 15 lbs of ingredients in my car, but many folks living in NYC don't have that luxury. It's a little pricey sure, but I am sure many justify the expense.

CrankyOldLibrarian said:

a one gallon recipe that I didn't create.

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That's the issue for me as well. Experiments or barley wines or some such would fit the one gallon size quite well, but I can't see buying a kit for a gallon.

Revvy said:

But you're a brewer already, this product isn't geared towards you, or me, or anyone on here....it's aimed at the folks that in 6 months or so will have pipelines and rigs to rival ours.....Or people who just want a little fun, trying something new, and at 20 bucks is not a huge investment.....

It's a gateway.....

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I can't argue with this point!

Revvy said:

But you're a brewer already, this product isn't geared towards you, or me, or anyone on here....it's aimed at the folks that in 6 months or so will have pipelines and rigs to rival ours.....Or people who just want a little fun, trying something new, and at 20 bucks is not a huge investment.....
.

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Exactly. Also, the company's in New York, where pretty much everybody has really tiny apartments. I lived there for 10 years, and never really lived in a place where there would have been enough room to keep all the equipment around to do even 5 gallon batches. Closets are small and usually packed with stuff anyway. Very few people in NYC have backyards or garages or porches where they can use propane burners, which means that most people are doing stovetop brewing, which is why a product like this makes total sense for the market it's aimed at.

I know there are some NYC brewers on this board, so I personally salute you for making it work! If I still lived there, I'd probably be doing the one-gallon thing too.

EDIT: Damn, beaten to the punch!!

I agree with Revvy here. The one gallon kits are a great idea. Sure they're expensive per bottle, but they're an easy way in. I could imagine many of my friends trying this, or even giving it as a gift...

Revvy said:

It's a gateway in...

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I understand what you're saying Revvy, but sort of a bad analogy. Now anti-drinkers everywhere are going to be saying "1-gallon batches are a gateway to alcoholism!!!!!!"

AZ_IPA said:

I understand what you're saying Revvy, but sort of a bad analogy. Now anti-drinkers everywhere are going to be saying "1-gallon batches are a gateway to alcoholism!!!!!!"

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BAWAHAHAHA!!!!

CrankyOldLibrarian said:

I can't argue with this point!

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I think we all forget this when we see things like that, or even the mister beer or other things marketed to "civilians." It's not about us. It's not even about "noobs" it's about pre-noobs. People who may never even have considered making beer. Who thought it was some great mystery, and who for 20 bucks think it's not a bad investment.

I'm really interested in seeing how long it's going to be before we get some of those folks showing up here, saying they got their start in brewing with one of those.

I know in many large metros, its illegal to use propane burners on balconies or outside any kind of apartment complex...and it may also be hard to get anything bigger than 1lb disposable propane tanks.

1-2 gallon AG is really easy to do on a stove though. And i often do 3 gallon batches for styles i know i won't drink a ton of or am unsure about (like my pumpkin ale...never tried a single commercial pumpkin ale, but we had extra canned pumpkin leftover from the pie making...so what the heck, i went for it!)

malkore said:

I know in many large metros, its illegal to use propane burners on balconies or outside any kind of apartment complex...and it may also be hard to get anything bigger than 1lb disposable propane tanks.

1-2 gallon AG is really easy to do on a stove though. And i often do 3 gallon batches for styles i know i won't drink a ton of or am unsure about (like my pumpkin ale...never tried a single commercial pumpkin ale, but we had extra canned pumpkin leftover from the pie making...so what the heck, i went for it!)

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Yup!!! I live in a loft, so any turkey fryer brewing I can do usually involves taking my gear to someone's place. I manage to do it quite a lot in the summer, but come the winter, I'm back indoors mostly, so it's small batch and maybe one or two winter group brews with people.

So how did your pumpkin turn out?

On a similar note, there's a product available at my LHBS called "Big & Easy Beer", which is simply a 2L bottle of wort, a yeast capsule, and a "EZCap" (2L plastic cap with a & rubber gasket and pinhole for CO2 to escape). For $10, you get a half-gallon of beer in 10 days. The review I've linked to above says it's pretty good beer, too.

It can't get much simpler than that... plus, you have an EZCap and 2L fermenter you can reuse at the end!

In general the members of this site aren't their market, so it isn't surprising that we wouldn't buy their product.

I think they have good packaging, good marketing and are pretty much the only shop catering to a particular market (not really apartment brewers per se, I think the hipster version of mr beer comment was pretty close). They will probably do very well; I hope they do.

Just remember, somewhere on the internet their is a flashlight forum where everyone is saying how stupid you are for buying the flashlight you own. We can't all be geeks about everything.

I have a friend that brewed 5 times and quit because he didn't like the extract twang of the beers. I started to brew and did an all-grain. When he tasted that he got back in to brewing.

So I think a cheap 1 gal all-grain batch is a great way to get started. I had a hard time shelling out the $80-100 for a brew kit (wife ended up getting it for me for Christmas last year). I would have gotten in to this sport a lot sooner if I would have come across these.

two words: minifridge lagers

I'm actually about to start some adventures in small batch brewing myself. I mainly want to split my wort into smaller batches to do some yeast experiements, and when they finish I'll have propgated a nice amount of various yeasts to pitch into bigger batches. And until my fermentation chamber is finished, I can fit a 2 gallon batch in my minifridge, then move it to the main fridge for lagering.

Brewing is brewing. I think small stovetop batches are great.

I have been hoping that someone like Austin Homebrew Supply would offer mini-kits of their specialty brews. Such as a barleywine or clones. Something in the range of 2.5gals then package them together.

This way you can brew small batches of a beer that you have been curious about, but would hate to drop $50 or more in case you didn't like it.

Maybe call it a sampler pack (pair two brews together)??


The 1gal idea is what a homebrewer would call "micro brewing" and offers tons of opportunities to tweak the mash temps, hop additions, or spices without messing up 4 extra gallons.

If someone's buying I can't blame a business for offering the small size beer kits.

I actually just bought some 2 gallon buckets for the purposes of making 1 gallon all grain batches. I'm probably doing my first one this weekend. I like the idea of being able to experiment with different recipes without having to worry about wasting $30-50 worth of beer on a bad recipe. Their kits are a bit on the expensive side, but I would assume at some point many people would start buying their ingredients seperately anyway, and then they'll have a fully functional setup.

You have to understand that, up until about 9 months ago, NYC proper was the only major US city WITHOUT a homebrew shop! Yes, there is a homebrew shop or two out on Long Island, but nothing easily accessible to your typical NYC resident.

I have met the couple selling these 1 gallon kits. They are very nice, dedicated and hardworking... and yes, they are a bit hipsterish. They show up at two flea markets every weekend to sell their kits and premeasured recipe kits, and it is a fairly high quality kit. This is not Mr. Beer. I bought one and it reinitiated me into the hobby.

I used to be a huge homebrewer. I built a RIMS brewer on my back porch. Then I moved to NYC and gave the hobby up for lack of space. I read about this and it was like a lightbulb went off. I didn't have to be a nonbrewer any more despite my small apartment.

Now, thats not to say their system doesn't have flaws. I was an experienced brewer and my first batch, a maple porter, ended up having horrible tannins and every bottle was a gusher. All 9 of them. I know great all grain beers can be brewed 1 gallon at a time, but I don't think very many people who buy their kit make great beer the first time. Or even the second for that matter. My second batch was at least drinkable, having learned from my mistakes the first time around, but I didn't brew a third.

Having gotten my feet wet a second time, I just made the sacrifices in space and clutter to be able to brew five gallon batches. But they are expanding and opening a new storefront where I will be able to buy grains and homebrewing supplies. So their 1 gallon kit was a "gateway" for me.

Thank god. I really missed this hobby.

If they read this forum, I hope they take some advice and sell their kit as an extract/partial mash. It would cut down on the time/effort to beer ratio involved considerably and make a much more consistently good beer that will get more people coming back.

One more great thing about their system I'd like to add though. Unlike Mr. Beer, most people who make the leap probably won't be throwing this away. This kit can be used for all sorts of different things. You can fill it with homebrew and use it like a growler, continue to brew minimashes or use it to brew experimental side batches off your 5-6 gallon batches.

Or you can use it like I have been using it - as a great container/system for yeast starters.

The two local homebrew clubs have been seeing more and more people attending, and I think it is due in a large part to these 1 gallon kits and the two new homebrew shops opening in Brooklyn.

NYCHomebrewer

Brew-Happy said:

I have been hoping that someone like Austin Homebrew Supply would offer mini-kits of their specialty brews. Such as a barleywine or clones. Something in the range of 2.5gals then package them together.

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luckily with the advent of the interwebz and brewing software, you can do exactly this yourself.

Find a recipe you like, scale it to whatever size, and order the ingredients....

A lot of interesting responses. I can't believe that NYC didn't have a proper homebrew shop until so recently. Well, I guess in Boston we don't have one unless you want to pretend that Cambridge is part of Boston.

And, NYCHomebrewer, thanks for responding. I was hoping to hear from someone who has brewed with their kits. I was sure that they had figured out a way to make a decent 1 gallon all grain batch in less than 2 hours. I was wrong.

Well, they have some great recipes and I'm positive that you can make good beer with their kit given enough experience and practice and the proper tools. I think it would be easier to do BIAB with their kit than attempt the sieve etc.

Lots of people on this board brew with systems I'm wholly unfamiliar with. I think this is a situation like that. Brewing AG isn't hard. Its not all that complicated, but there are just a lots of places where error can enter in. Way more than in extract brewing. Don't hit your temp? Don't hit your OG? Do you get the appropriate final volume? I felt like I was winging it a bit on some of these things.
But you know what? At the end of the night I had beer. Well, at the end of a couple weeks anyways. It probably didn't taste like they could make it given their experience brewing on their own system, but I think its going to expose a lot of New Yorkers to the hobby, and that is only a good thing.

NYCHomebrewer said:

One more great thing about their system I'd like to add though. Unlike Mr. Beer, most people who make the leap probably won't be throwing this away. This kit can be used for all sorts of different things. You can fill it with homebrew and use it like a growler, continue to brew minimashes or use it to brew experimental side batches off your 5-6 gallon batches.

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But who says you have to throw out your mr beer keg? I put together an entire primer on 2.5 gallong ag recipes with a 2 gallon unmodified cooler as a mash tun, specifically for using the mr beer keg. Above and beyond any bias folks may have towards the ingredients, the mr beer keg, is still a fermenter. If you can put Mr beer ingredient kits into the little guy, you can put any beer recipe into it All grain, partial mash, any extract recipe.

The nice thing about it is that it is such a low profile that one can even lager or cold crash it in their own fridge without taking to much space. It's perfect for an aparment brewer.

And I know plenty of brewers who usually have a batch of apfelwine going in their old mr beer.

I hate when folks desparage that little keg, after all it is the for-runner to this 1 gallon thing in terms of being a mass market geared gateway into our hobby. And shouldn't be maligned as often as it is....

+1 on Revvy's defense of Mr. Beer.

Shee-yoot, I just put my Mr. Beer, filled with an experimental Kriek recipe, on the back porch to cold crash (it's 20*F in Portland, Oregon!) in preparation for filling the Full Sail Session stubbies I have dutifully been emptying this past week. Kriek is not a style you want too much of at one sitting, and 2.5gals of 11oz stubbies is the perfect combo, in my estimation!

AZ_IPA said:

luckily with the advent of the interwebz and brewing software, you can do exactly this yourself.

Find a recipe you like, scale it to whatever size, and order the ingredients....

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That is true, but there is something to be said about the convenience of selecting a tried recipe at a smaller scale. Not work and all play kind of thing. This is especially important for newbs and those wanting to try.

Plus, these could be Apartment Kits as mentioned before, but with more variety.

There are so many clones of beer on Austin Homebrew's site that I have never heard of before. If I could sample one, then I would be more willing to try the full scale.

At some point a brewer will confidently jump into making quality recipes from scratch. I will get there one day.