It's been more than a year now since I first got into brewing and so far I've successfully brewed a lager, a wheat, an IPA, and a bitter. However all of these tasty beverages have a common denominator in that they were all kits. That is, all of these beers were made with cans of malt extract and most of the hard work had already been done for me. While there is still brewer's caution to be maintained while making beer this way it still has an overarching theme of simplicity.
Enter, my girlfriend.
Sue witnessed the beginning of my time as a brewer and correctly assumed that I was always interested in exploring other avenues of brewing tasty things to drink. I also have the penchant for constantly talking about things that interest me. For Christmas she got me a one gallon beer kit from the Brooklyn Brew Shop (BBS), a small homebrew start-up company. The kit consisted of a bag of grain, hops, and yeast; all the things I would need to do a mini-batch of all-grain beer. At this point I'd become pretty comfortable with kit brewing and this awesome gift hurtled into my comfort zone like an exciting cyclone of novelty steeped in mysterious, mushy passion.
Or something.
