Mr beer

[william2010]

My wife got me started on this whole thong ny buying me a Mr beer kit. I made it and I am a very impatient when it comes to things I want. Lol. So I tried one after two weeks like it said on the instructions. I thought oh yea this is good. Brought it to my father in law and he said its to yeasty. So I let it sit for a few more weeks and it was great. After that I bought all the equipment and got my homemade ipa recipe brewing and thought hey why not do another Mr beer for fun. It's good cheap and almost seems faster. So I got me an American devil ipa and wow. Its really good. It's nice to have at least somethjng to drink that you made when your first starting. They always say home brew while drinking a homebrew . So I can say that this ipa is pretty damn good.

 

[Erroneous]

That's great that you're liking the process and the results! In time you might want to move onto either BIAB with your Mr Beer fermenter (much cheaper, and its all grain!) or move on up to 5 or 10 gallon batches. Brewing is an addiction!

 

[william2010]

Biab?

 

[dallasdb]

BIAB= brew in a bag

 

[TaylorInOK]

Mr Beer is the gateway drug to brewing. Yay for Mr. Beer, but OMG Batman when you discover partial mash and all grain.

 

[Draken]

Mr Beer is the gateway drug to brewing. Yay for Mr. Beer, but OMG Batman when you discover partial mash and all grain.

Many home brewers make competition winning beer with extracts and steeping. AG and PM are just an additional possible step in brewing, definately not required to create good beer.

Also for your next brew use some US-05 or 04 instead of the MR Beer yeast.

 

[Beer-lord]

I wasn't very impressed with the Am. Devil IPA. It was ok but just not for my tastes though I used 2 cans, added some DME and more hops with some carapils.
I still use the LBK to do small batches but these days, it's almost all grain recipes. Some 5 gallon and some 2.5 gallon. The LBK makes a great fermenter that is easy to keep cool in an ice chest in the summer time when temps inside are just too warm are fluctuate too much. I can keep the fermenter at 63 just by changing out ice packs each day.
Better yet, it fits in a dorm fridge and with a Johnson controller, is great for fermenting or lagering. However, many of the standard kits just don't cut it for me though I firmly agree, it's a great start to home brewing.

 

[DerekTC]

The best advice I ever got when doing Mr. Beer was to always use the 3/4 method:

3 weeks fermenting in the little brown keg
4 weeks carbonating/conditioning in the bottles.

It's hard to wait 7 weeks - especially if you're on your first few batches - but I found that it made a WORLD of difference in my Mr. Beer batches.

Also - it only took me 4 batches of Mr. Beer before I bought a 5 gal. set-up. It really is a gateway drug!

 

[BrewinHooligan]

Also - it only took me 4 batches of Mr. Beer before I bought a 5 gal. set-up. It really is a gateway drug!

Same here! 4 Mr Beer batches and I jumped to 5 gallon, all grain batches. When I added a pound of DME to a Mr Beer kit and replaced the fromunda yeast for something like US-05 I did make some pretty decent beer with Mr Beer though.

 

[rodwha]

How do you guys control the temp with those little kegs? I have one also, but don't feel submersing it in a tub of water like my buckets is all that sanitary with the spigot down there. I then considered lagering in it, but my fridge is too cold. And so it sits there.

 

[Erroneous]

You could always spray sanitizer in a bag and attach that with a rubber band. Do the bath shallow enough, drape a towel over it. If you have a fan then aim it at it.

 

[TaylorInOK]

Many home brewers make competition winning beer with extracts and steeping. AG and PM are just an additional possible step in brewing, definately not required to create good beer.

So what's your point? You just responded to a light-hearted post as a completed D.B. Why so serious?

 

[Beer-lord]

How do you guys control the temp with those little kegs? I have one also, but don't feel submersing it in a tub of water like my buckets is all that sanitary with the spigot down there. I then considered lagering in it, but my fridge is too cold. And so it sits there.

I have a few of the little 'blue' refreezable ice packs I got at kmart and the LBK fits in my ice chest. I put 2 small ones in twice a day and it keeps the temp in the low 60's. Works perfectly. Kmart had the small ice packs for $1.89 each. I got 6 of them so I can have 4 ready at all times.

I started in the 80's and did all grain. I stopped when I had a kid in the early 90's and started back again because of the Mr. Beer keg. I knew I wouldn't use their kits too much (but you can make good beer with some if you tweak them) and now I use 3 of the little kegs to make 2.5 gallon (I use more water than may be safe in them) batches. Sometimes I make a 5 gallon batch and split between 2 kegs. They do make great fermenters.
Finally, my LHBS will make any recipe I ask for in any size so I buy the grain and supplies from them and brew away. I can experiment with different recipes and keep a pipeline I like going. If a batch isn't much to my liking, I'm only stuck with half the normal amount. This is not for everyone but works for me.

 

[BrewinHooligan]

How do you guys control the temp with those little kegs? I have one also, but don't feel submersing it in a tub of water like my buckets is all that sanitary with the spigot down there. I then considered lagering in it, but my fridge is too cold. And so it sits there.

Find a small cooler that has room for the LBK and frozen bottles. I'm in AZ and with an ambient temp of 75 in the house, I can keep temps in the mid to low 60s swapping out a frozen 2 liter bottle once a day.

 

[rodwha]

Frozen water bottles in a cooler without water will keep the temps in the mid 60's inside that little fermenter well?

 

[BrewinHooligan]

It works amazingly well with zero use of water

 

[hwilshusen]

I started with a MR Beer also. I still use it when I am pressed for time.

I am confused on one thing though. How did being bought a Mr Beer get you in a thong?

My wife got me started on this whole thong ny buying me a Mr beer kit.

 

[SmoothSmoke]

Mr Beer is the gateway drug to brewing. Yay for Mr. Beer, but OMG Batman when you discover partial mash and all grain.

This^^^ totally on the money. I saw a Mr Beer kit at a store a few times, that was what sparked my interest. Then came to this site, read up a bit and realized that it might be quite easy to make some good brew.