Northern Brewer Homebrewing Starter Kit Buyer Guide

Whether you’re looking for yourself or for a friend wanting to get into the hobby of homebrewing, you’ve come to the right place. There are a lot of options and while there’s no right or wrong choice, there are definitely options that can suit your specific needs. We’re here to help you decide which brewing starter kit is the best choice for you.

What All of Our Kits Have in Common

No matter which kit you choose, rest assured they all include what you need to get started & make great beer! We offer a variety of starter kits to ensure you find the right one. And while you can do that with an all-grain brewing method, the kits below all start you off with extract brewing - which makes for a quicker and easier introduction to the world of homebrewing. So the first thing to ask yourself is, how much beer do I want to make?

Volume: 1 Gallon vs. 5 Gallon

Homebrewers are fans of making beer anywhere from the kitchen to the garage and even their backyard. For small apartment or kitchen brewing 1 gallon batches are likely best, but if you have the room or plan on brewing outside you may want to consider 5 gallon batches. To put that into perspective; a 1 gallon kit makes about 10-ish beers, versus the 5 gallon kit coming in at around 50 beers.

UNDERSTANDING YOUR EQUIPMENT

Once you’ve landed on which size kit you’re going with, you can choose what kettle you’ll be brewing your beer in. For brewing a 1 gallon batch, you may already be set with what you have in your kitchen - a large spaghetti pot (about 2 gallons)  works great for 1 gallon brewing! If you don’t have a large enough pot, you can add a 2-gallon stainless kettle to your cart. The 5 gallon brewing kits however, give you multiple options for large brew kettles. The Brew Share Enjoy kit comes with a 5 gallon stainless steel kettle (for use with a stovetop or propane burner), the Premium Craft Brewery in a Box kit features the 8 gallon MegaPot 1.2 brew kettle, and our Electric Brew Share Enjoy kit lets you brew anywhere with the fully portable Gigawort® Electric Brewing Kettle. Or you can always select your own brew kettle with the Deluxe Starter kit!

The fermenter is where your beer will be sitting for a few weeks, turning into alcohol - aka where the magic happens. The first difference here is glass vs. plastic. A glass carboy is durable and great for long-term aging (and fun to watch the fermentation), but the downside is they are heavy and inherently fragile. Plastic fermentation pails are lightweight, easy to handle and clean, won’t break, but will need to be replaced from time to time. The best of both worlds is the siphonless big mouth bubbler, which is easy to handle and clean, allows you to keep an eye on active fermentation and best of all: no siphon transferring.

Each starter kit comes with a recipe kit that includes all of the ingredients you need. This means you’ll get a box with just the right amount of malt extract, specialty grains, hops, and yeast to make the perfect brew. And you’ll receive step-by-step instructions that will walk you through the process from brewday to bottling.

1 GALLON

Craft Beer Making Kit with Siphonless Fermenter

Make one gallon of your choice of Caribou Slobber, Kama Citra, American Wheat, or Irish Red.

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Craft Beer Making Gift Set - Kama Citra Session IPA

Everything you'll need to make, bottle, and enjoy our popular Kama Citra Session IPA.

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5 GALLON

Brew Share Enjoy Homebrew Starter Kit

Want more beer for your buck? This kit provides the tubing, buckets, brushes and other items you'll need to brew your choice of Block Party Amber Ale, Chinook IPA, or Hank's Hefeweizen.

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Electric Brew Share Enjoy Homebrew Starter Kit

A few upgrades from the previous kit - most notably the ability to brew pretty much anywhere with an outlet and not rely on propane burners. Another standout feature is the included immersion wort chiller!

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Deluxe Homebrew Starter Kit

Our best seller and most comprehensive starter kit includes everything you need to make your choice of Fresh Squished IPA, Irish Red Ale, Caribou Slobber Brown Ale or Bavarian Hefeweizen - with the choice of several upgrades.

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Premium Craft Brewery in a Box

Just starting out? Want to upgrade your gear? This kit features a heavy duty 8 gallon MegaPot 1.2 with ball valve, Silver Serpent wort chiller, and siphonless Big Mouth Bubbler with harness as well as optional add-ons.

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NEXT STEPS:

BREW, SHARE, & ENJOY

Found the right one for you? Awesome! Still have questions? Of course you do! That was a lot of info you may not be familiar with yet, but luckily for you - we have quite an abundance of helpful blog articles and videos that cover equipment, ingredients, and of course, brewing for the first time. We also have a very knowledgeable team who love helping others on their brewing adventure and you can email us anytime at Brewmaster@NorthernBrewer.com with questions!

FOR MORE ON HOMEBREW BASICS:

How to Make Beer

The Four Basic Steps

Northern Brewer University

Homebrew Video Courses