Not drinking enough!

[aamcle]

I usualy brew AG but I have not been drinking fast enough and small AG batches seem a lot of work per bottle. I bottle 90+% of what I brew.

I don't mind pimping a kit, Hops/Yeast and so on but I want a quality product with no kit twang.

Are there any kits (tins, pouches) that will make 10-12litres of good beer?


Atb. Aamcle

 

[Clarence]

Why not substitute malt extract into your AG recipes ? You can use as much or as little as your recipe calls for and put the rest of the tub, sachet in the fridge. That'll save you all the mashing and sparging time. It's so long since I've done that, that I can't remember the equivalent weight of extract compared with grain, but it'll be on here somewhere.

 

[aamcle]

There are some mini mash kits I may try. DME is silly expensive.

 

[Sadfield]

Surely, the reduction in bottling reduces the work per bottle. Could that work be reduced further with little compromise on quality? Perhaps using the capacity you already have to do full volume mashing, ditching sparging? A sacrifice on efficency, but you'll be spending less on ingredients anyway.

Finding 12L kits would be tricky. Which I guess is the root of this, that the arbitrary 40 pint batch is ingrained in home brewering.

 

[Caramel Ox]

Do you have space to freeze a couple of 5l bottles? Could split the batch pre boil or post boil?

 

[aamcle]

Brewfirm do 10l and they should be worth a try as are mini mash kits.
The newer kits with a pouch are a good posability I could use 1/2 by weight and freeze the rest for later.
Freezing wort is a great idea but I don't have the space but I could manage to freeze a litre or two I saved from a pouch.

Thanks All.

 

[Clarence]

Victim of your own meanness. Start sharing the love and the beer, you'll soon get rid of 40 pints.
BIoody tight-ahse! No sympathy.



Only joking.

 

[MashBag]

Victim of your own meanness. Start sharing the love and the beer, you'll soon get rid of 40 pints.
BIoody tight-ahse! No sympathy.



Only joking.

Back to OP, I don't know what type of kit you use, but it can be made quite simply.

Brewdays can be a lot of work. I opted out because I just had not got that time.

Pimped kits didn't work for me. So I researched and reviewed what I considered to be the timely events.
These are mashing, chilling, boiling & bottling.

After some years of trails..
I don't mash, that happens overnight.
I boil.
I don't chill. That happens if the next night.
I bottle 7-10 days later.

This is an 'idle brewer' process, for those imo who enjoy good beer, not long brewdays. It does attract suspicion and contempt, and it does need space to stay setup, which will get you into trouble in the kitchen.

It's not an answer to your post, but somthing to consider.

Equally, beer does keep, very very well. So do a 23l just less often?

 

[Clarence]

Very much like my process except I get the chill under way and let it finish overnight. Brewing a bit short and topping up with a couple of bottles of well-chilled mineral water helps finish the job in this warm weather.

 

[MashBag]

I used pur to ice in.

 

[aamcle]

Mash. If it works it works.

Incidently I use a GF the type with no timers WiFi or expert systems.
I have just put a brew from the weak portion of a parti guyle into the fridge to finish cooling, I'd add yeast later.
All I had to do was give it a boil and add hops.

May I ask why pimped kits didn't work for you?

Atb. Aamcle

 

[MashBag]

I can't easily explain, but they never got the right taste, after I had been doing AG for a while.

 

[MashBag]

Here's a thought. What about having mash days and separate brew days. If you got some 10litre jerry cans you could mash say 20l, "cube" into two cans. Store and then only brew when you wanted it?

Sort of making your own full volume kits?

 

[aamcle]

That's effectively what I did today. 1/2 a batch boil, cool and pitch. :)

 

[rbunsen]

Have you thought of splitting a two can kit ?

 

[JockyBrewer]

I can't easily explain, but they never got the right taste, after I had been doing AG for a while.

I recently tried doing a liquid malt extract bitter, applying everything I've learned in a decade of fairly successful all grain brewing. I made beer, but it wasn't what I'd class as 'good'. The malt body was just missing, and there were some other odd flavours too.

 

[Sadfield]

I've done one DME full boil brew to use up some I was given, which as OK, nothing special. I think it missed a little freshness or the small grist adjustments AG affords. I think the risk with extract brews would be falling into steeping grains, in time saving it'd be two steps forward, then one step back.

 

[MashBag]

I think we are agreed then, that all grain spoils you

 

[MashBag]

That's effectively what I did today. 1/2 a batch boil, cool and pitch. :)

Not sure. I meant do a whole batch to boil, then ferment ½ & keep ½

 

[Agentgonzo]

Last week I said to my wife "were actually short of empty bottles... I went be able to brew until we've drunk a bit more"

My brother came to visit last weekend. Problems solved!