It's all relative to the brewer, one man's pride is another man's piss.
If you're into beer without any flavour, then they might just like X brand lager. For the next bloke who likes a traditional style English Bitter or Porter, then they might prefer say, a Mangrove jack's Craft Series Kit.
At the end of the day, you are the one who decides if a beer is for you. By that, I mean a $10.00 kit from a supermarket brewed on a benchtop at 28 degrees C with a kilo of sugar might be just what you're looking for, whereas most guys eventually grasp the concept that what makes or breaks beer is the quality of the ingredients and what you do with them. Temperature control during fermentation with a good yeast, good malts and style depending, maybe some hops - will all contribute to making better beer of various styles.
What I can say is that once a brewer explores temperature controlled fermentation in an old fridge with a digital controller & with a better kit, adding more malt than simple sugar and maybe even add some hops, very few turn back.
It's your beer, made to a level of quality you get to determine - good or bad.
Open up a tin of the latest American Pale Ale by Black Rock and you get greeted by hops flowers smiling back at you. Frankly, it ain't half bad when done on US05 with a bit of Cascade or Nelson Sauvin finishing hops and a kilo and a half of decent malt.
Their golden ale is about on par......do it up with some cascade and nelson sauvin finishing hops and a kilo/kilo and a half of malt.
Mangrove Jacks International Kits and their Basic Australian line-up are IMHO up there with the best available for the styles they've created, better still, step up into the Tradition series and pair the brew with the right yeast and malt.
What price is reasonable for a beer? Many guys want to make a beer for $20.00 .....for 2.5 cartons by volume. So break it down to $7.50 a carton, would you expect quality from Uncle Dan's at $7.50 a carton? I think not.
Good quality Kit $20.00
Malt $12.50
Yeast $4.95
Chemicals and general $1.00
Bottle caps $1.50
Hops - go hard $3.50
For under $45.00 you get 23 Litres (2-2.5 Cartons) of something with colour, flavour and aroma that tastes pretty damn good at under $20.00 a carton.
Going all grain, you'd make it for a fair bit less.
You get to choose, because it's about what you like and what you can afford/justify.
Martin
