Brewer's Best Kits - Opinions

[Matt B]

I'm starting back in homebrewing after a 9 year break. Right now kits are super simple for me. My LHBS carries BB kits and can order any they make for me. What is everyone's opinion on these kits? Are the instructions that come with these OK to follow, or would you change anything? Like late extract additions, boiling as much water as possible, etc?

TIA!

 

[RM-MN]

The Brewers Best kits are designed to be easy to make with minimal equipment. You can brew a 5 gallon batch even if your biggest pot is 5 gallons since the kit contains concentrated wort that can be diluted to get the proper OG. If you have a bigger pot, then boiling a larger amount of water will be better as it doesn't darken the wort as much.. Adding only part of the extract at the beginning of the boil and the rest at the end also helps keep the beer lighter color as the Maillard reaction always leads to darker beer.

The last kit I used called for a week in the fermenter and then bottling the beer. That's too short to let the suspended material settle out and gets you a lot of sediment in the bottles. 2 to 3 weeks lets a lot more settle out. That kit also did not suggest controlling the temperature during the fermentation which always improves the beer.

 

[Matt B]

The Brewers Best kits are designed to be easy to make with minimal equipment. You can brew a 5 gallon batch even if your biggest pot is 5 gallons since the kit contains concentrated wort that can be diluted to get the proper OG. If you have a bigger pot, then boiling a larger amount of water will be better as it doesn't darken the wort as much.. Adding only part of the extract at the beginning of the boil and the rest at the end also helps keep the beer lighter color as the Maillard reaction always leads to darker beer.

The last kit I used called for a week in the fermenter and then bottling the beer. That's too short to let the suspended material settle out and gets you a lot of sediment in the bottles. 2 to 3 weeks lets a lot more settle out. That kit also did not suggest controlling the temperature during the fermentation which always improves the beer.

The Cream Ale that I did last night said for me to add the DME at the last 15 minutes. However, it told me to add the LME at the beginning of the boil. That seemed backwards. I would think the LME would darken more than the DME.

 

[RM-MN]

The Cream Ale that I did last night said for me to add the DME at the last 15 minutes. However, it told me to add the LME at the beginning of the boil. That seemed backwards. I would think the LME would darken more than the DME.

I think you are right. I would have put the DME in first. I also would have put the LME in after I had completed the boil and had turned off the heat. The LME doesn't need to be boiled as the wort would be hot enough to santize it.

 

[OpenSights]

I started with BB, haven’t had any that I’ve been disappointed in even making beginner mistakes.

My LHBS also makes their own kits, I bought one, have yet to brew it because I have a few questions about their instructions.

 

[doogster]

Our LBHS sells these kits and though I haven't made beer with them, I have tasted the results from other members of our homebrew club and the results are very good (assuming you pay attention to other standard homebrewing practices like, sanitize anything that touches the beer post boil) Good luck and happy brewing.

 

[kh54s10]

I haven't brewed a kit in over 6 years. Those were Northern Brewer kits. What I have heard is that most kit instructions are a bit simplified. They are good enough to give you good beer but skimp on simple things that can make the beer better.

What most don't go into is waiting until the beer is at final gravity and clear before bottling. Instead the instructions will say something like; "ferment for a week then transfer to secondary for a week then bottle it."

Many will have you do a secondary, that is something that you don't need to do.

Most will tell you nothing about keeping the fermentation temperature controlled or at what degree.

I found this forum to be very helpful. Read every thread that you think will pertain to your brewing. Digest each response. Some are OCD. Some will give alternate methods. Some will save you from making similar mistakes. And some are just bad advice.

 

[Matt B]

Controlling fermentation temps I something I know I need to figure out. I don't have the space that I used to have when I brewed previously. Right now I'm putting it in a carboy, wrapping it with a shirt or towel and setting it on the floor of my basement. It stays pretty cool, about 60F with not much variation. I was afraid the yeast would not be active enough to hit my target FG. I'm using the dry Nottingham yeast since that's what comes with the BB kits. However, the one I did a few weeks ago hit the FG target perfectly. So the one I did last night I used the Nottingham again, we'll see how it performs at those temps.

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

Ok, I think I can help here and am going to throw a whole bunch of information at the wall:

In addition to being a professional brewer who has worked at several breweries producing both all grain and extract beers I also was briefly the manager of a local home brew store that sold alot brewer's best kits. The key with those kits (and brewing in general) is freshness of ingredients. 9 out of 10 kits on a shelf have been there for several months, in addition to sitting in a warehouse for several months.

Always do the following inspections prior to purchasing (beer kits are considered "food items" and most shops will not allow returns):
Check the yeast expiration date- This right here will give you an idea of how old the kit is. If the yeast is expired, or really any older then 12-16 months, bring that to the attention of the shop. A good shop will swap the yeast for a fresh pack for free. If the shop does not... don't shop there! The yeast expiration date will also give you some idea of how old the ingredients as a whole are.
Check the extract date- Different manufacturers of malt extract have different coding systems, the most common being Briess or Muntons. Both explain their date coding on their website. This is (arguably) the most important part of brewing a good beer from a kit. If the extract is expired bring it to the shop's attention. A good shop will either swap the extract for new(er) extract or, atleast, give you a discount in the range of 20-30%. If the shop does not... don't shop there!
Check all bags/packaging for tears/holes- Make sure the hops, yeast, grains, dme bags, etc are not punctured/ripped/etc. If they are, bring it to the shop's attention. The should swap or discount, if they don't... don't shop there!

After you go through all of that and decide to make a purchase of a kit you can drastically improve the final quality of your beer by doing any/all of the following (regardless of what the kit instructions say):
Full volume boil- boiling a small amount then topping up with water can throw of your flavor profile and color
Boil longer- if you are doing a full volume boil you should be boiling for atleast 45 mins, 60 is even better, longer (70+) is best.
Pitch more yeast- if you use a pitch rate calculator you'll find that the 1 pack of dry yeast you typically get with a beer kit is not enough viable cells to ferment 5+ gallons of wort that is 1.040+ so you'll always have more complete fermentation and cleaner overall flavor profile by adding a 2nd pack of yeast. It's very much worth the extra $2-$6, the shop may even give you a discount if you explain why you are getting an extra pack.
*Always skip the secondary "fermentation"- Your beer can sit on the yeast cake, autolysis is a myth that has been debunked by many commercial breweries and legit labs. Implementing a secondary requires a transfer that will usually introduce oxygen to your beer...o2 is BAD at any point after your fermentation has started. In order to properly transfer to complete a secondary fermentation at home without introducing o2 requires a c02 tank and purging everything with c02 prior to use.
*---->A few exceptions to the above rule: you can use a secondary if you are aging beer, souring, adding oak, adding fruit, dry hopping, etc. Still, I advise against it. Any of those "additives" can be added to your regular primary fermentation.
Add irish moss/whirlfloc, if the kit does not already contain it- this is a cheap and effective way of clearing up your beer before it even hits your carboy/bucket.
Let your bottles condition longer- When you pop open a bottle to check the carbonation and think "yup, it's ready!" give it one more week. It never hurts. If you made sure to not bottle prematurely and not overprime your sugar then your are fine.

With all of that being said... I would suggest you buy a kit from Northern Brewer or Austin Home Brew over a brewer's best kit any day. The NB and Austin kits are put together by them with fresh ingredients they get from their suppliers. The Brewer's best kits are put together by the brewer's best company then sit in their warehouse, before going to a supplier and it sitting in their warehouse, before going to a lhbs and it sitting on their shelf. Even the "freshest" BB kit right off the truck into a lhbs is still anywhere from 6 or more months old... when it's "fresh"

Hope this helps!

One last thing, when you have a few minutes to kill hop over to the Briess website and look through their recipe database. They have a ton of great recipes and you can literally just print then take to your lhbs and say "I want this stuff". I exclusively use Briess malting products at my brewery and they are by far the best I've ever worked with in terms of customer service, freshness, and overall quality of ingredients.

 

[Matt B]

Ok, I think I can help here and am going to throw a whole bunch of information at the wall:

In addition to being a professional brewer who has worked at several breweries producing both all grain and extract beers I also was briefly the manager of a local home brew store that sold alot brewer's best kits. The key with those kits (and brewing in general) is freshness of ingredients. 9 out of 10 kits on a shelf have been there for several months, in addition to sitting in a warehouse for several months.

Always do the following inspections prior to purchasing (beer kits are considered "food items" and most shops will not allow returns):
Check the yeast expiration date- This right here will give you an idea of how old the kit is. If the yeast is expired, or really any older then 12-16 months, bring that to the attention of the shop. A good shop will swap the yeast for a fresh pack for free. If the shop does not... don't shop there! The yeast expiration date will also give you some idea of how old the ingredients as a whole are.
Check the extract date- Different manufacturers of malt extract have different coding systems, the most common being Briess or Muntons. Both explain their date coding on their website. This is (arguably) the most important part of brewing a good beer from a kit. If the extract is expired bring it to the shop's attention. A good shop will either swap the extract for new(er) extract or, atleast, give you a discount in the range of 20-30%. If the shop does not... don't shop there!
Check all bags/packaging for tears/holes- Make sure the hops, yeast, grains, dme bags, etc are not punctured/ripped/etc. If they are, bring it to the shop's attention. The should swap or discount, if they don't... don't shop there!

After you go through all of that and decide to make a purchase of a kit you can drastically improve the final quality of your beer by doing any/all of the following (regardless of what the kit instructions say):
Full volume boil- boiling a small amount then topping up with water can throw of your flavor profile and color
Boil longer- if you are doing a full volume boil you should be boiling for atleast 45 mins, 60 is even better, longer (70+) is best.
Pitch more yeast- if you use a pitch rate calculator you'll find that the 1 pack of dry yeast you typically get with a beer kit is not enough viable cells to ferment 5+ gallons of wort that is 1.040+ so you'll always have more complete fermentation and cleaner overall flavor profile by adding a 2nd pack of yeast. It's very much worth the extra $2-$6, the shop may even give you a discount if you explain why you are getting an extra pack.
*Always skip the secondary "fermentation"- Your beer can sit on the yeast cake, autolysis is a myth that has been debunked by many commercial breweries and legit labs. Implementing a secondary requires a transfer that will usually introduce oxygen to your beer...o2 is BAD at any point after your fermentation has started. In order to properly transfer to complete a secondary fermentation at home without introducing o2 requires a c02 tank and purging everything with c02 prior to use.
*---->A few exceptions to the above rule: you can use a secondary if you are aging beer, souring, adding oak, adding fruit, dry hopping, etc. Still, I advise against it. Any of those "additives" can be added to your regular primary fermentation.
Add irish moss/whirlfloc, if the kit does not already contain it- this is a cheap and effective way of clearing up your beer before it even hits your carboy/bucket.
Let your bottles condition longer- When you pop open a bottle to check the carbonation and think "yup, it's ready!" give it one more week. It never hurts. If you made sure to not bottle prematurely and not overprime your sugar then your are fine.

With all of that being said... I would suggest you buy a kit from Northern Brewer or Austin Home Brew over a brewer's best kit any day. The NB and Austin kits are put together by them with fresh ingredients they get from their suppliers. The Brewer's best kits are put together by the brewer's best company then sit in their warehouse, before going to a supplier and it sitting in their warehouse, before going to a lhbs and it sitting on their shelf. Even the "freshest" BB kit right off the truck into a lhbs is still anywhere from 6 or more months old... when it's "fresh"

Hope this helps!

One last thing, when you have a few minutes to kill hop over to the Briess website and look through their recipe database. They have a ton of great recipes and you can literally just print then take to your lhbs and say "I want this stuff". I exclusively use Briess malting products at my brewery and they are by far the best I've ever worked with in terms of customer service, freshness, and overall quality of ingredients.

Wow, nice. Thanks for the info. Do you think Irish Moss/Whirlfloc is needed with extract kits? I thought that did something to all of the grain particles when doing all grain?

The kit I did last night I got from my LHBS and the yeast expired sometime the first half of 2019 so I think it was fairly fresh. The one I did a few weeks ago that I bottled this weekend, the yeast had expired in Dec of last year. I made a starter and I had a rocking fermentation within 5 hours. However, the hops seemed a bit stale. Everything that I've tasted (Hydro samples) it tastes really good. But I did notice the hop flavor was a little weak.

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

I've never had any negative impact on a beer using moss or floc with an extract base. I have noticed that it doesn't seem to settle in the kettle post-boil as quickly as it does when used in an all grain beer but again, no negative result. My extract beers with floc have been so clear (when all said and done, meaning at serving/pouring) they look filtered when they are not. I don't even use gelatin, biofine, etc. No impact on head retention either. The moss/floc simply aids in precipitation of solids, that includes hop material. So although you may not have as much proteins from grain sources to drop out it still does help with overall post-boil clarity.

Also I forgot one HUGE thing above!!
Save 90% of your extract (liquid or dry) for flame out! It's already been boiled, it's already been processed. Worst case scenario you will have slightly higher hop utilization but that isn't a bad thing when considering most hops in kits are old and have been broken down and repackaged many times which introduces o2 as well as naturally degrading AA% over time.

 

[Matt B]

I've never had any negative impact on a beer using moss or floc with an extract base. I have noticed that it doesn't seem to settle in the kettle post-boil as quickly as it does when used in an all grain beer but again, no negative result. My extract beers with floc have been so clear (when all said and done, meaning at serving/pouring) they look filtered when they are not. I don't even use gelatin, biofine, etc. No impact on head retention either. The moss/floc simply aids in precipitation of solids, that includes hop material. So although you may not have as much proteins from grain sources to drop out it still does help with overall post-boil clarity.

Also I forgot one HUGE thing above!!
Save 90% of your extract (liquid or dry) for flame out! It's already been boiled, it's already been processed. Worst case scenario you will have slightly higher hop utilization but that isn't a bad thing when considering most hops in kits are old and have been broken down and repackaged many times which introduces o2 as well as naturally degrading AA% over time.

I thought you needed more malt to fully utilize your hops? Is 10% enough? So there is NO need to add more than that earlier in the boil?

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

I thought you needed more malt to fully utilize your hops? Is 10% enough? So there is NO need to add more than that earlier in the boil?

Keep in mind most kits contain steeping grains which also contribute to hop utilization. 10% of your extract is plenty. Some may argue this, I speak from spending 16 months straight converting recipes back and forth between all grain and extract (and back, then back again, then back again lol) in a commercial setting using 5 gallon, 1 barrel, and 2 barrel equipment sizes. Adding more then that will contribute to the "twang" many experience with extract.

As a matter of fact: 2 of my brewery's recipes use briess golden light dme for 100% of their fermentable sugars in addition to a medley of steeped specialty grains. One is an IPA and the other is a Stout. On both of those beers I save 100% of the extract for flame out and let the "wort" from the steeped specialties be the only "malt" that is actually boiled.

 

[Matt B]

Awesome! I wasn't planning to brew again until I had gone through some of these last two batches. But now I'm wanting to so I can try this. I'd heard of adding the extract late in the boil, but not this much of it nor this late.

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

Awesome! I wasn't planning to brew again until I had gone through some of these last two batches. But now I'm wanting to so I can try this. I'd heard of adding the extract late in the boil, but not this much of it nor this late.

Empty fermenters are wasted fermenters, Keep 'em full! Especially when naturally carbing in a bottle at home, you want to keep a constant rotation. When I used to homebrew more often I would run my primary for 2 weeks then bottle and let those sit for 3 more weeks before storing in the fridge for 2-3 days and finally drinking. I was at almost 6 weeks "grain to glass" so I would just keep brewing. Within a couple months I always had 2-4 fermenters full, 2-4 batches conditioning in bottles, and 2-4 batches ready to drink... at all times.

 

[Matt B]

Lol I don't drink that much beer actually. I always liked the brewing process more than the drinking process. I don't think I have enough bottles to do three batches. Though, I might once I start drinking them.

I think I might do one more before holding off. I'd love to have a good Scottish ale and I think my LHBS can order me the BB Scottish Ale kit.

 

[Matt B]

Looks like their recipe for a Scottish Ale is:

FERMENTABLES
3.3 lb. Amber LME
1 lb. Amber DME

SPECIALTY GRAINS
4 oz. Caramel 60L
4 oz. Smoked
4 oz. Chocolate
1 oz. Roasted Barley

HOPS
.5 oz. El Dorado
1 oz. GR Tettnang

YEAST
1 Sachet

Which looks pretty good.

I'm assuming the yeast is Nottingham, but not 100% sure.

 

[OpenSights]

Thanks for the info tri clamp ninja! Glad I subscribed to this thread!

 

[Tony_nc]

Great info tri clamp ninja. I am in the process of trying to open a LHBS in my area. I was researching BB kits and came across this thread. I thought about offering the BB kits but storage times worry me. I think I may just come up with some popular recipes and make them up myself.

 

[kh54s10]

Great info tri clamp ninja. I am in the process of trying to open a LHBS in my area. I was researching BB kits and came across this thread. I thought about offering the BB kits but storage times worry me. I think I may just come up with some popular recipes and make them up myself.

Brewer's Best seem to be the most popular commercially produced kits. They have been proven to be good recipes before going on the market. If you make your own you will have to test them to make sure you are putting out a good recipe. If you just come up with a recipe, make it as a kit and it proves to be inferior your reputation will suffer.

My first kits were from Northern Brewer. They were well researched by the time they designed the kit, and they sell nationwide so turn over is quick. I bought a kit from my local LHBS and was less than impressed with that one. But then again that was 7 years ago and I haven't bought a kit since then.

I wouldn't worry too much about the storage time of the BB kits, they should be fine for many months, just don't over order. Adding your own kits would be a plus if they are good. If you could make them up fresh for each customer that would be a great selling point. They could also give you a higher profit margin.

One LHBS that I frequented would discount the kits (and other perishables) that got older to move them out and make room for more inventory.

 

[Tony_nc]

Thanks for the input kh54s10!
I've been planning for years and have been brewing for about 22 years. I know I will have a few hiccups along the way but I feel I have a good plan. I want to offer a place not to just buy a quick kit or supplies but to come in and hang out like a barbershop. A place to get out of the house and try a sample of HB. A place to look forward to all week and feel like family when you get there.

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