Austin Homebrew Kits

Does anyone have any experience with Austin Homebrew's clone kits? I'm thinking about trying their Warsteiner clone, so I was wondering if anyone had any experience with their kits.

Never done that one per say, but i have been happy with their copykits before.. infact.. I have a shiner bock kit I am doing in a week..

Austin Homebrew Kits are the bomb. They consistently nail the beers and you won't find fresher liquid malt extract IMHO.

I believe we've done a Stella Artois clone, from Austin which turned out really well.

In fact we've been serving it over the holiday's and have had comments from regular Stella drinkers that they liked ours better than the original.

Haven't ever tried the Warsteiner though.

Back at the beginning of the year I did the Fat Tire clone, it was my first PM beer and my mash temp was a little low so that monkeyed with the body of the beer, but it was pretty damn close.

The AHS kits are really quite good if not down right awesome.

I've done 4 of them and they have been great so far, all 4 partial mash (or mini mash, as they call it) and liquid yeast.

I've never done a AHB kit, but with all of the support and excellent reviews Forrest gets, I don't think you can go wrong with one of theirs. Also, if there's a problem Forrest is pretty quick to make it right. Happy brewing

I did 2 with dry yeast, I think I will try one of them again with liquid yeast (Blue Moon clone) and get Newcastle again for sure.

...what they all said

EdWort said:

Austin Homebrew Kits are the bomb. They consistently nail the beers and you won't find fresher liquid malt extract IMHO.

Click to expand...

1++ I love AHS kits, in fact they're the only kits I buy. I've got a Rogue Mocha Porter kit going right now.

Thanks for all of the great feedback! I went ahead and ordered the kit.

spriggan486 said:

Thanks for all of the great feedback! I went ahead and ordered the kit.

Click to expand...

I think I may order me up some stuff too.

Has anyone tried the Rogue Shakespeare stout clone?

I (also) ordered a AHS Kit (Blue Moon Belgian White). As well as more 'stuff'!

I think I am going to order the Delirium Tremens kit... love this brew and hard to get around my neck of the woods.

I have had many good ones and a few big clunkers and one where the ingredents were . . . . . shorted by 2 pounds - their recipe was wrong.


I've done perhaps 7?? 4 seriously great, 1 good, 1 bad and 1 FUBR (with no reconciliation).

Other then that - read the user reviews on their site.

NOTE - I've spent $800 in 6 months there so I guess I like them LOL

I drank about a gallon of their Blue Moon clone last night.

I new to this hobby and was just looking at their site too. I currently use the Mr. Beer fermenter and have only used their canned recipes. I don't have any of the big boy tools for checking temperatures or gravities or anything. Here are my questions:

1 - Can I simply halve a 5 gallon AHS recipe kit to use to use in the MRB keg?
2 - If I can, what would I do with the other half? Can I store it for a later brew?
3 - Because I don't really have any equipment and have basically just opened cans and combined ingredients, would I get the best results with an AHS canned beer kit or could I use an extract kit?
4 - Would the AHS canned brew kit work just like the MRB kits or is it more complicated?
5 - Any special recommendations if I can do an extract kit?

Thanks for your help.

Dan

scubadan said:

I new to this hobby and was just looking at their site too. I currently use the Mr. Beer fermenter and have only used their canned recipes. I don't have any of the big boy tools for checking temperatures or gravities or anything. Here are my questions:

1 - Can I simply halve a 5 gallon AHS recipe kit to use to use in the MRB keg?
2 - If I can, what would I do with the other half? Can I store it for a later brew?
3 - Because I don't really have any equipment and have basically just opened cans and combined ingredients, would I get the best results with an AHS canned beer kit or could I use an extract kit?
4 - Would the AHS canned brew kit work just like the MRB kits or is it more complicated?
5 - Any special recommendations if I can do an extract kit?

Thanks for your help.

Dan

Click to expand...

1) If your using an all extract kit that will be easy enough to do, but the steeping grains come pre tied up in a grain bag, so you will have to get creative with them. You will also have to divide up the hops and store them.
2) You can store it, but not for an extremely long time. Extract likes to be used in a short amount of time for freshest results. You can put some vodka on top of the extract to prevent mold formation and just pour it off before use.
3) Can beer kits are a whole new ballgame. They are not AHS kits, they are just canned kits that are sold at AHS, as well as a bunch of other places. They will likely not be as fresh or as high quality.
4) Not sure as I haven't done a Mr. Beer kit, but canned beer kits usually involve dumping a can of pre-hopped extract into hot water, boiling it, and adding some DME (dry malt extract).
5) My recommendation is to spend a few hours here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/mr-beer-read-all-about-ask-questions-46360/ I am pretty sure there are some good recipes and I know for sure there are other tips for getting the most out of a Mr. Beer.

In every case that I've been able to match one of their clone recipes to the original on-tap, the clone does very well. In the two cases that I could only find the original in bottles, the clone was better.