Hey gang. Been reading the beginner forum and it feels like I stepped into an advanced PHD level class!
20 years ago when I made beer, we got a kit with the plastic bucket fermenter, got a "beer in a box" extract kit or got the ingredients separately from the guy at the home brew store, and made beer in the kitchen pantry. We made sure to keep the house AC set to 72 during fermentation (72 summer and 65-68 winter) and had mostly good results.
Seems like every thread is about complicated chemistry, precise temperature control, and other stuff we didn't know about back then.
I guess my questions are these.
1. Can you make decent beer in the kitchen without dedicated refrigerators, chillers or the like? How much temperature fluctuation is ok? ( really don't want to have to buy a dedicated beer fermenting fridge)
2. Anybody have input on something like the FastFermenter beer making kit? Looks like it would solve 80% of the mess we used to make racking the beer and filling bottles.
3. Any good beer making books for beginners that can help me through the rookie phase and then move up to more complicated brewing a step at a time?
4. Im going to be purchasing a starter kit soon, Any labor/time/mess saving devices in addition to the beginner kit that is a "must have" ?
Sorry if these questions have been answered, for some reason Im not having any luck with my searches.
20 years ago when I made beer, we got a kit with the plastic bucket fermenter, got a "beer in a box" extract kit or got the ingredients separately from the guy at the home brew store, and made beer in the kitchen pantry. We made sure to keep the house AC set to 72 during fermentation (72 summer and 65-68 winter) and had mostly good results.
Seems like every thread is about complicated chemistry, precise temperature control, and other stuff we didn't know about back then.
I guess my questions are these.
1. Can you make decent beer in the kitchen without dedicated refrigerators, chillers or the like? How much temperature fluctuation is ok? ( really don't want to have to buy a dedicated beer fermenting fridge)
2. Anybody have input on something like the FastFermenter beer making kit? Looks like it would solve 80% of the mess we used to make racking the beer and filling bottles.
3. Any good beer making books for beginners that can help me through the rookie phase and then move up to more complicated brewing a step at a time?
4. Im going to be purchasing a starter kit soon, Any labor/time/mess saving devices in addition to the beginner kit that is a "must have" ?
Sorry if these questions have been answered, for some reason Im not having any luck with my searches.