Brooklyn Brew Shop & my experiences home brewing

I've been brewing my own beer for a few years now - you can check out my brief post about it here - but last week (thanks to an Indigo gift card from my mom), I bought the new Brooklyn Brew Shop brewing kit. The kit boasts itself as a small-scale operation - that allows you to brew in your kitchen, with no need for bulky equipment or lots of space. The way it does this is that is only brews 1 gallon, rather than the normal 5 I'm used to.

It seems like a downfall - but in all reality, the smaller yield has its upsides too. 

The kit and ingredient pack I brewed first...yeah...there's
actually coffee and donut ingredients in it.

So, you're thinking about buying one yourself? I'm not going to review whether or not to make your own beer - I've already suggested in previous posts that you should - only the Brooklyn Brew Shop kit itself.

The Good:

• The kit is small, and versatile - you don't need a basement or shed to do your brewing
• The kit includes (and brews) directly from grains - which means you're making the wort and mash yourself - instead of getting the syrupy (already processed) stuff in most other kits. So far, it's actually been much more of a learning experience, understanding much more detail about the beer process.
• The directions are pretty easy to read, and pretty straight forward (they're online, and don't actually come in the kit - which would have been nice). 
• You can order refills online - and have them shipped to your door, or closest Indigo/Chapters store.
• The kit is made of quality materials - a glass fermenter, an airlock, thick vinyl tubing, all pays for itself, not including the actual ingredients. It will be easy to clean and use again.
• It yields only a gallon of beer - so you don't end up with 60 bottles of something nearly undrinkable.

The Bad:

• It's not as simple as it makes itself out to be. This is only bad because I wasn't prepared for it. I'm used to the already boiled wort coming in a can. It's usually a simple boil and then yeast addition, and then fermentation started (maybe 30 minutes). This process was a few hours (actually more, but at my own fault - I didn't have the right sized pot), and was very tedious. It starts out easy, but about an hour in, you realize that it's only going to get harder - adding specific ingredients at certain temperatures, at specific time increments. Like I said, a GREAT learning experience, but nothing like I imagined.
• The cost is a lot higher than I'm used to. The kit itself is only fifty bucks, but each refill is about 25 bucks, and since you're only brewing a gallon at a time, you'll end up spending about 2 bucks per beer in the end. While this isn't any more than you'd spend buying a quality craft beer at the LCBO, it's much higher than the 25-50 cents I'm used to spending per beer with my 5 gallon brews.

All in all, it's been a good experience so far - so long as you put aside half a day (your first time at least) - you'll be much better off than I was (starting this at 8PM). Although I had to give up more of my time, I expect the result of working directly with the grains, and hops will give me a far superior beer in the end. 

Once I get through the two mixes I got when I bought the kit, I'm going to try and order some raw materials from the guys over at TorontoBrewing.ca  - and brew according to some of the 1 gallon recipes I've found out there. This should drastically lower the cost per beer, even when only brewing a gallon at a time - so long as I buy in bulk. 

So - would I suggest this to you? Hell yeah - it marketed itself as a simple kit, but I assure you, this is far superior to any pre-made beer-kit I've ever worked with. This will not only allow you to get started - but help you graduate to bigger, should you choose to do so. 

Note however, that my beer is not yet bottled or ready to drink, so I could change my mind about all of this in a couple weeks :)