trying to get away from recipe kits

[michaelob]

im a rookie only have 3 brew under my belt. all recipe kits from midwest and all turned out great. Im not set up for all grain but i want more control. I guess my question is I know how to buy the yeasts and extract ,but in the kits the have specialty grains. how do I go about the grains? I drink aot of beer so cutting the cost down would be cool to.

 

[pkiller001]

I think trying to make your own recipes may be a bit of a challenge at this point. I'm about 10 brews down the road from you (maybe a few more), and have tried once: it's tricky to get everything to balance.

My advice: either buy a recipe book and start there, or start checking the recipes on this forum and start doing those instead of kits. You can talk to your LHBS owner about any substitutions you may need to make. This way you can start honing in on specific clones of beers you like, and start learning which grains do what to your final product.

-a

 

[jason.mundy]

Try downloading some brewing software. For example, I use beersmith.

The software will let you experiment with a recipe. You can add different grains. Different hops. Adjust the timing of the hops.

The software is a handy tool for experimentation. It will show you the estimated SG, FG, color, SRM, and bitterness with each ingredient change. Too bad it won't let you taste it too

Save the recipes of the kits that you buy. Keep those in the brewing software too. You can use that to replicate the kit without actually buying it as a kit.

 

[McGarnigle]

I don't think doing your own recipes is tricky, providing you're not trying to push the envelope. You can look at a few recipes of a style and mix-n-match. Or just switch hops and yeast form an existing recipe.

I don't know if you'll save money this way, though. The savings comes from going to all grain or perhaps partial mash. If you're doing an extract+specialty grain batch, a kit may be cheaper than buying ingredients individually (unless you buy bulk).

 

[pkiller001]

I don't think doing your own recipes is tricky, providing you're not trying to push the envelope. You can look at a few recipes of a style and mix-n-match. Or just switch hops and yeast form an existing recipe.

Maybe I should qualify my earlier statement. You can certainly formulate your own recipes by mixing and matching grains from various recipes; especially if using an online recipe program that will help you reach certain style goals. You'll most likely end up with a very drinkable beer -- but until you develop a good understanding of what various specialty malts do to the finished product I think this process can be a little overwhelming. At least I find it a bit overwhelming! :cross:

For what it's worth, here are two online spreadsheet programs I've used to decent effect:
http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator
http://hopville.com/
both are pretty self explanatory, and free.

I don't know if you'll save money this way, though. The savings comes from going to all grain or perhaps partial mash. If you're doing an extract+specialty grain batch, a kit may be cheaper than buying ingredients individually (unless you buy bulk).

I agree on this point: you may not really save much money in comparison to pre-packaged kits; you will still be paying less per case than for professionally brewed beer, however.

 

[mcstout]

I like the site hopville.com. It allows you to see what changes in the grainbill are going to do to the overall product, such as IBU, color, etc.
You can get specialty just about anywhere you can get regular grains.

 

[Donner]

I went through the 'away from kits' time when i started, but after a while i realized that not all kits are created equal and shouldn't be judged the same. For instance, 'kit' sometimes refers to the no boil stuff, but also to the clone recipes that places the AHBS sells.

If you look at the house kits from High Gravity, you'll see that they are basically just recipes they have come up with and sell in kit form (with caps, bags etc). These kits are made with fresh grains and fresh extract and are nothing like the boxed and sealed kits you find some places. I'm sure the kits from other big retailers are the same if they include grains.

If nothing else, some recipes are easily modified to be extract plus grains. I'd suggest you spend some time in the database here and find some recipes you think sound good. Then google how to convert grain weight to extract and go from there. A word of caution, though, not all recipes easily convert to extract as some grains require mashing as opposed to steeping. Most simple recipes on this sight should either convert or have an extract recipe available.

If you are interested in creating your own recipe then i'd suggest study a few recipes that are proven. You'll start to get a better sense of what goes together and what kind of results you can expect.

 

[thisjrp4]

Ive been brewing for 8 years now and I think one of the best ways to begin formulating your own recipes or figuring out what grains and hops to use is to read...a lot. A magazine like Brew Your Own is great because they have articles about different styles and include recipes that can help you figure out how much of each type of grain goes into a certain style. Also you should check out Designing Great Beers by Ray Daniels, it is a great book that goes into detail about the grains and hops used in various styles. It also has a lot of info about different grains, hops, yeast, etc.

 

[Donner]

Oh, i should also add two things. One, most retailers that package their own kits will allow you to subtract things like bottle caps, irish moss and other items that you might already have in stock. This will help keep the cost down a bit. If you really want to make brewing cheaper you have to move away from extract. There are a few exceptions, but not everyone can brew enough or store extract in bulk. Just look at the price differences at places for all-grain, PM and extract batches and you'll see the pattern.

Second, you might check out brewmasters warehouse. The brew builder is great for seeing what different ingredients do to a recipe. Plus, his recipe database is huge and several recipes have extract versions listed along with all-grain and you can see how the change based on that.

 

[david_42]

The only way to decrease your per-batch cost is to go to all-grain, buy a crusher and buy in bulk. On a batch-by-batch basic for an extract brewer, pre-built kits will almost always be cheaper.

 

[Donner]

The only way to decrease your per-batch cost is to go to all-grain, buy a crusher and buy in bulk. On a batch-by-batch basic for an extract brewer, pre-built kits will almost always be cheaper.

just to be clear, david_42 is speaking about the way to get the lowest cost-per-batch. You will decrease your cost-per-batch simply by going from all extract to a partial mash. It will decrease again going to all-grain. Once you do all-grain the way to reduce cost is to buy a mill and buy grain and hops in bulk, as david_42 stated.

Extract is basically having someone else do the mashing. Extra steps increase the cost. Less extract you use the less the beer should cost.

 

[michaelob]

thanks for the info. I wasnt looking for total control. I was looking to make little changes for my personal taste.