why do so many people F with kit beer?

[cheezydemon3]

Epicly put homercidal............

For those that love to follow, we wish you the best, but for those of us that lead, just stay out of our way and don't criticise what you don't understand.........

On the other hand, if you do buy a kit, why f with it? you copuld have bought all of the ingredients plus or minus your changes cheaper?

 

[theveganbrewer]

Some of us like to think out of the box and experiment, I dunno, I thought thats what made home brewing a hobby for me, being able to take a beer an make it my own. I can not afford a mash tun nore can I afford everything yet for all grain, so therefore I use kit beer.

10-gallon cooler mash tun for about 60-70 bucks, worth it! Will save on ingredients.

 

[unionrdr]

I don't use kits in the normal sense. Just a cooper's can or two,& some plain DME. Mix them up color/flavor-wise to get it close to yet another I like. It's fun to recombine them,depending on what I intend the outcome to be. Just got used to what works & what doesn't.
Def need to try a yeast pitch calculator,since I use a couple other calculators already. It'd be nice to be able to cut ferment times,Control temps precisely for even better beers.
But extracts can make good beer if combined properly. Above temps,pitch.etc...But whatever floats your boat. So let's try not to shoot down what others are doing just because we think we da shizz. Can't we all just get along?

 

[mountainman13]

I don't think I've ever made a kit as it was intended. I guess I just like to F with stuff.

 

[BamaRooster]

To each his own I guess. I am a neewb and on my third kit, nut brown ale, I threw some coffee into the boil for the last 5 minutes and the end product, while not really a nut brown ale, was wonderful. I like to F with stuff but that's just who I am. I call it learning. Besides, if I F with my kit and F it up, I am the one who is gonna be stuck with it. My first kit was pitched at around 100 degree's, used cleaner to sanitize, forgot to put liquid in the airlock and only let it sit in the primary for 4 days, and boy that is some awful beer, but it's MY awful beer.

 

[unionrdr]

Well said,BR. Like this saying my 9th grade math teacher had above the chalkboard-"Do your own thing,but don't stop me from doing mine".

 

[daksin]

I think a lot of noobs equate fiddling with their kits to ownership of the finished product. If they did everything the kit says word for word with all of the supplied ingredients, they feel like it's Northern Brewer's beer, or AHS's beer, or whatever, and not theirs.

By screwing with it, they feel like they are making it unique, something that only they could have made. In reality, they're just adding failure modes, increasing the chances they'll be dissatisfied with their first brew.

This isn't my philosophy- my mom and my wife make the same cookies with the same recipe and neither are even remotely similar cookies- but that's what it sounds like to me when I hear "hey, I just got my first kit- I'm going to add six pounds of bacon and three cups of creme de menthe."

 

[unionrdr]

I don't think it's setting up the ol' fail mode unless it's some off beat stuff from the kitchen,garden,produce department,that sort of thing. I don't like all that off the wall fruity chocominty nuts-n-banana biscuits-n-gravy bacon & egg ales. I like water,hops,malts,& yeast...some zest & grains of paradise,coriander,etc is cool. There's plenty of styles in that description to suit me for a while.
But if you really wanna try these other additions,do it within reason,research it,& it'll come out a little better.

 

[Firebat138]

Sounds like the OP wants to make a good Natural Light...

 

[unionrdr]

Bite your tongue! Putting that in the FV would surely anger the beer gods!

 

[david_42]

When I buy a kit, it's because I want to try that specific beer. Therefor I do not mess with the kit. Anything can happen on the second round.

 

[edie]

why do so many people F with kit beer?


because they want to

 

[BenVanned]

I am also a noob. Going to bottle my first batch tomorrow. I do plan on experimenting with various steeping grains and hopefully move to all grain. I will not be adding candy to any beer though.

 

[danmdevries]

For the same reason I take apart and reassemble pretty much any piece of machinery I own. Usually in the process i think of a way I can mod it to my liking and go for it. If it works, good, I'll mess with it again or do the same to something else. If it doesn't work, I won't do the same thing again.

Same question can be posed as to why people modify cars. Some do it, break stuff n wonder why. Some do it well and are happy with the result. Could say "if I wanted a car with 400hp I would've bought it that way" others say "I think I can get 400hp out of what Ive got, let's try"

 

[SwampassJ]

I am still a noob so don't take this as harsh...but I read soooo many posts about people adding all kinds of crap to their kit beer,,stuff like coca powder,mint,honey,candy,,and much more. And then they post about "off flavors",,, Well DUH !!! I have never had a commercial beer witch was "flavored" that I enjoyed. I like beer to taste like beer not candy. maybe I am missing something?

I'm going to just leave this here.

 

[emjay]

I'm going to just leave this here.

Hah! Hilariously hypocritical.

I like regular beer too, but a chocolate stout is fantastic. An authentic raspberry (framboise) lambic is absolutely amazing. And my own personal Coconut Rum-Barrel Tropical Stout is a damn fine beer.

For those people who have said that once you add extra stuff like this, your "beer" is no longer really beer, I can't imagine a more retarded attitude to have as a homebrewer. Not just because I disagree that it becomes something other than beer, but because even if it did, why would it matter? If something tastes good... brew it! Just because you identify yourself as a homebrewer who makes beer, you're somehow completely unable (or unwilling) to brew/drink something that simply falls outside of an arbitrary definition? How silly...

Do yourself a favor and focus on brewing for enjoyment, not ridiculous semantics. If you just don't enjoy beers (or whatever you want to call them) with anything other than grain, hops, water, and yeast, then that's fine... but avoiding other ingredients simply because you don't define the resulting product as "beer" is flat-out absurd.

 

[EROK]

I am still a noob so don't take this as harsh...but I read soooo many posts about people adding all kinds of crap to their kit beer,,stuff like coca powder,mint,honey,candy,,and much more. And then they post about "off flavors",,, Well DUH !!! I have never had a commercial beer witch was "flavored" that I enjoyed. I like beer to taste like beer not candy. maybe I am missing something?

Hahhaahah ! My wife thinks every beer I make is too hoppy, and she thinks that the beers should be sweet and taste like a candy bar. It drives me nuts !

 

[Baldy_Beer_Brewery]

Every time I see a post by someone wanting to know how much coffee to add to their beer I think of Drew Carey's Cap-Beer-Cino.

But I'd suppose the main reason people do this with kits is that new brewers tend to start with kits and yet they still want to add their own touch to their beer. Another reason could be that many new brewers want to make something they think their wife or friends would like so they feel adding cherry, strawberry, chocolate or some other flavoring will do the trick.

 

[MikeyLXT]

The same reason people alter a cooking recipes. They think they can make it better. On a forum you generally only get questions when something goes very wrong. You don't hear about all the success stories.

 

[emjay]

Every time I see a post by someone wanting to know how much coffee to add to their beer I think of Drew Carey's Cap-Beer-Cino.

I haven't seen the show since it ended, well before I started this hobby, and while I have thought of Buzz Beer occasionally in response to homebrewing discussions, posts about coffee beers have surprisingly never spurred it (though now I'm sure it will everytime!) Probably because coffee beers really aren't all that unusual, even comnercially. Though granted, they're usually porters and stouts, and IIRC, that one was SOMEHOW a very light-colored beer.

One thing for sure though is that I'd KILL to have the system they used, assuming I remember it correctly

Oddly enough, I don't seem to remember seeing any actual *brewing* take place.

 

[cheezydemon3]

I am still a noob so don't take this as harsh... witch was "flavored" that I enjoyed........maybe I am missing something?

MY GOD!!!!! we are some insensetive ass-hats.

THERE IS A WITCH FORBIDDING HIM TO F WITH HIS KITS AND WE ALL MISSED HIS CRY FOR HELP!!!!!!!!!!!

A "flavored" witch to boot!

Push her into the pot brother!!!!! DO IT!!!!!!

THAT would be an adjunct to remember by god!


Give her what for.

 

[mlyday]

I think the key to doing this correctly, is to brew the beer once straight up, no additions, to see what the blank slate tastes like. Then if you want to add stuff you know what the added ingredients are contributing to the flavor. This would help you with recipie creation more than anything.

 

[madbaldman]

The same reason people alter a cooking recipes. They think they can make it better. On a forum you generally only get questions when something goes very wrong. You don't hear about all the success stories.

Often times someone new at cooking will tend to focus on what ingredients they can add that result in great flavor, instead of focusing on cooking techniques. You can come up with a great dry rub recipe, but if it's sitting on dried out, overcooked chicken, it's not going to be good.

Someone new at brewing would probably be better served experimenting with some small batch SMASH beers and different yeast strains instead of looking for something cool to throw in the brew kettle. Experimentation is great, but get the basics down first.

 

[Pdeezy]

You and Forrest from AHS would get along well.

I think Spam and the Gestapo would get along well.

 

[jdubb75]

I am not ready to make my own creations yet ,,but I always thought it would be cool to make a beer flavored with things found in my back yard such as wild berries maple leaves and acorns . I know it sounds CRAZY but I just have to know!

I am still a noob so don't take this as harsh...but I read soooo many posts about people adding all kinds of crap to their kit beer,,stuff like coca powder,mint,honey,candy,,and much more. And then they post about "off flavors",,, Well DUH !!! I have never had a commercial beer witch was "flavored" that I enjoyed. I like beer to taste like beer not candy. maybe I am missing something?

That's good stuff...

I like using kits to try to dial in my process. I am also learning how different things affect flavors in certain ways. I've tried several kits...some i've really liked and some I haven't. I've kept notes along the way and will more than likely re-brew some that I've liked to maybe use as a "base" to experiment with.

To each their own, though. Flavor your beer with acorns or drink your "non-flavored" commercial beer. That's the cool thing about living in this country...we have a lot of freedoms.

 

[MikeyLXT]

Often times someone new at cooking will tend to focus on what ingredients they can add that result in great flavor, instead of focusing on cooking techniques. You can come up with a great dry rub recipe, but if it's sitting on dried out, overcooked chicken, it's not going to be good.

Someone new at brewing would probably be better served experimenting with some small batch SMASH beers and different yeast strains instead of looking for something cool to throw in the brew kettle. Experimentation is great, but get the basics down first.

Oh I fully agree. Get the basics down before you start experimenting. But to each their own.

 

[cheezydemon3]

MY GOD!!!!! we are some insensetive ass-hats.

THERE IS A WITCH FORBIDDING HIM TO F WITH HIS KITS AND WE ALL MISSED HIS CRY FOR HELP!!!!!!!!!!!

A "flavored" witch to boot!

Push her into the pot brother!!!!! DO IT!!!!!!

THAT would be an adjunct to remember by god!


Give her what for.

Holy HELL!!!! A witch ale would be awesome!

It would be better though if you could "dry witch" rather than adding her to the boil, HOWEVER, adding a live witch, kicking and screaming into a carboy might be hazardous.

 

[cheezydemon3]

Holy HELL!!!! A witch ale would be awesome!

It would be better though if you could "dry witch" rather than adding her to the boil, HOWEVER, adding a live witch, kicking and screaming into a carboy might be hazardous.

Actually a live witch can be used to dry witch many times, as long as she is agreeable and you like the aroma she imparts.

 

[unionrdr]

Hmmm...Blair Witch barley wine?...

 

[jaycount]

Alot of people want to make something unique that they can share with people and say "I added x ingredient, it really made it good". I have to agree it doesn't feel as personal to say "I bought this stuff and followed the directions and made this beer". Just like with cooking, people want to leave their personal mark.

For me, every kit I've ever "tweaked" has come out crappy. I've decided when I do kits, leave it alone. If I want to do my own thing, just start the beer from scratch

Some of the stuff people do on here is pretty funny though. "I brewed a blonde ale and added a couple pounds of Choco malt extract and 4 lbs of honey". Dang... But hey, if they're happy with the results, who's to complain?