I thought I would post some stuff for the beginners on this thread.
I've only been brewing about a year myself and am up to brew 27. The learning curve is steep. Here's my "Top 10 Things That Most Improved My Beer Over The Last Year":
1. Use malt not sugar. At worst, use dextrose. Sucrose (ordinary sugar) makes your beer taste like cider and is just not meant to be in beer, except sometimes in small quantities or when inverted with citric acid. As a beginner just don't use it.
2. Since you are using all malt, use a decent yeast. Your kit yeast is pathetic and will quit too early if you use all malt in your brews. DCL safales are good dried yeasts. Rehydrate your dried yeasts. Liquid yeasts are even better but take a bit of farting around. Start with good dried yeasts.
3. Temperature. Keep ales at or below 22C. I don't brew lagers because I can't get them cold enough. I have brewed a few down to 16C and it's just too hot and they taste horrible.
4. Sanitation. Be really anal about it. Neo-pink, brewshield, bleach, iodophur all seem good. My fave is orthophosporic acid. Take everything apart that comes apart, including your taps, and sanitise the lot. It's easy to take taps apart. I just put my biggest philips head (or something else long, thin and not too pointy) up inside the tap and give it a firm rap downwards. Pops apart easy.
5. Racking your beer from one fermenter into a fresh fermenter to get it off the yeast cake helps in clearing your beer and enables you to leave it in the fermenter for longer without risk of autolysis.
6. Bulk priming, if you bottle, is the easiest way to prime your beer.
7. Don't listen to advice from your homebrew shop until they have earnt your trust because they generally pitch at the lowest common denominator. In retrospect I cannot believe some of the amazing bulldust I have been told in hbshops.
8. All hard and fast rules may have an exception and experimentation is a good way to find the exceptions. Experimentation is also a great way to make 23 litres of fine malt vinegar.
9. Forums like this and others are (in my opinion) virtually the best way to slowly learn because you will always find someone with the same question and someone who has worked through the same question. Most people here are not selling anything and you will hear three or four different views and you can figure stuff out for yourself. The best way to learn. You will soon figure out who knows what they're talking about. Also very handy are websites like grumpys and the country brewer which both have beginners instructions on them. Australian craftbrewers also very good. There are a bazillion others out there, mostly seppo.
10. I have to include lagering because others say it works miracles but I have had limited experience with it. It means cold storing your finished beer for a few weeks before kegging/bottling. You need a spare fridge or an understanding (or beer-loving) spouse. I find that racking into a clean fermenter and letting your beer sit in the coldest part of the house (not actually lagering) does help with clearing your beer and is also useful if you are into dry-hopping your beers.
Others may have other suggestions but these simple things are worth implementing.
Even though it is a Friday, I better go and do some work...
