We purchased the Northern Brewer Siphonless 1 Gallon Craft Beer Making Starter Kit Equipment and Beer Recipe Kit and tested it making several home brew batches. Our kit came with the Fresh Squished IPA recipe. The kit was well packaged and included everything you need to get started with the exception of bottles and a brewing pot. we used a two gallon stainless steel pot with lid as our brewing pot. The kit came with well written instructions that were easy to understand even for the first time brewer.
Unfortunately, when we assembled the plastic spigot to the glass fermenter, the glass around the hole for the spigot cracked. We reached out to Northern Brewer and within 24 hours they responded and had shipped a replacement which arrived within a few days. We carefully installed the spigot on the replacement fermenter making sure not to over tighten and did not have an issue with the second fermenter.
Once we assembled the fermenter and did an inventory of the items in the kit, we were ready to make our first batch. The recipe included grains and a bag for steeping which was easy to use and made for quick disposal of the used grains. The kit also included dry malt extract, several bags of hops that were added to the wort at different intervals, a package of yeast and fizz drops that are used during bottling to reinvigorate the yeast which creates the carbonation after bottling.
The brewing process took 45 minutes and during this process, the dry malt extract and hops was added to the wort. After a slow boil of 45 minutes, the pot was transferred to a sink of ice water and cooled to 70 degrees. We then transferred the cooled wort into the fermenter that had been sanitized with the included powder sanitizer. Per the instructions, we also sanitized the yeast packet, the airlock and plug, and the scissors used to open the yeast. The fermenter was placed in a dark room for two weeks to allow for the fermentation process to begin.
We noted a small amount of leakage around the spigot. We later tightened the spigot carefully in between batches and the leaking stopped. After two weeks of fermentation, we sanitized our bottles, bottle caps, tube and bottle filler. Bottling day went smoothly with no issues. The fizz drops were super easy to use and you just simply drop one in each bottle after filling. The included capper worked great and the magnet that is built into the capper held the caps in place as they were crimped.
After about ten days (the instructions recommend two weeks) we sampled one of the beers and the taste was amazing for a starter kit extract recipe. Surprisingly, the beer was clearer than expected and had more carbonation than most store bought beers. We were very pleased with the end result for a $69 beer kit.
Overall, we would give this beer kit a 8 out of 10 and think its a great kit to get started with home brewing.
Pros
- inexpensive
- great customer service
- simple to use
- inclusive of all items needed except pot and bottles
- well written instructions
- good quality of components
- includes a complete recipe to get started
Cons
- glass fermenter can break
- will need to buy bottles and brewing pot
- spigot tended to leak but after tightening a few times stopped
