Advice On New Brewers Set Up

[pint of lager]

ESB is a bit confusing. When used as a beer style, it means Extra Special Bitter, an English style of beer. When used in reference to brew shops, it means Eastern Suburbs Brewing in Sydney. Run by Mel. They make their own kits of extract. These include the 1.7kg lines and the often talked about 3kg lines. Mel also sells the 15 litre wort kits in a drum, just add water and yeast.

The 3kg tins, although on the face of it, appear expensive, they are very good value. They are 3 kg of Liquid Malt Extract (LME), include finishing hops in the malt and a good quality saf yeast under the lid.

K&K, prehopped LME in a 1.5 or 1.7 kg tin usually called the Kit and a Kilo of brew addittive. Often called dump and stir.

K&K can be enhanced with using better quality kilo of ingredients, adding specialty hops or some specialty grain, which is steeped and the resulting fluid boiled, then added to the fermenter. More advanced steps are racking, using liquid yeasts, brewing proper lagers and mini mashing. Then you move into all grain territory.

 

[macr]

http://www.esbeer.com.au
For reference: Grumpy's: http://www.grumpys.com.au/index.php3

K&K: kit and kilo (of sugar/dextrose/malt extract),

Thanx for that. Another couple of useful links added to my Beermarks :chug: I mean bookmarks !

 

[macr]

G'day macr. Good to see another Newcastle brewer on the forum. Welcome.

Shawn.

Thanx Shawn. It is good to meet you and good to be on the forum :beer:

 

[macr]

ESB is a bit confusing. When used as a beer style, it means Extra Special Bitter, an English style of beer. <snip>
K&K, prehopped LME in a 1.5 or 1.7 kg tin usually called the Kit and a Kilo of brew addittive. Often called dump and stir.<snip>

Woah, there is a lot yet to learn then! Thanx for all the info. I will have to digest this slowly unlike my :chug:!
Today my batch is bubbling about once every 20 minutes, so it won't be long until I test and let sit for a couple more days. I guess I will be bottling on the weekend. The first batch is the default Coopers lager, with all the default ingredients. I will fit this batch to the default bottles, and from then on I will be bottling in glass. Hopefully the rest of the beers I make will be of a high quality. Not saying that the first batch isn't. But I know it could of been better.

 

[pint of lager]

Woah, there is a lot yet to learn then! Thanx for all the info. I will have to digest this slowly unlike my :chug:!
Snip

Hopefully the rest of the beers I make will be of a high quality. Not saying that the first batch isn't. But I know it could of been better.

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Yes, there is a lot to learn. Brewing is a great hobby, you can take it to whatever level you want. Be it simple K&K or onwards to PHD.

No matter what your brew level, be it your first k&K or your 100'th 50,000 litre brew, the following applies:

POL's Axiom: Brew the best beer you can with the best ingredients and to the best of your abilities.

For entry level K&K, concentrate on sanitation and temperature control. These basics are very important to every level brewer. Keep reading and searching. Welcome to the passion.