Midwest Homebrewing & Winemaking Supplies
5825 Excelsior Blvd.
St. Louis Park, MN 55416
952-925-9854 • 888-449-2739
www.midwestsupplies.com
What does a “full boil” mean, and is it
better than a partial boil? Why?
A full boil means that you are boiling the full amount of wort—in most cases, 5.5-6 gallons, to allow for boil-off.
Many homebrewers do nothing but a partial boil and have great success. However, you can have a bit more control
over many aspects by boiling the full 5 gallons.
You eliminate nearly all risk of bacterial contamination.
There will always be some bacteria present in your beer, but a full boil will greatly reduce the chance that your
beer will have any off-flavors. Many water systems have bacteria present, and since you are not topping off your
fermenter with unboiled water, you eliminate the chance that this will contaminate your beer.
Better hop utilization.
Since your water to malt extract ratio is much higher, more of the alpha acids are able to be absorbed into the liquid,
yielding better utilization. It is wise to get a full, rolling boil going to get good bitterness from your hops. Also, you’ll
want to leave the lid off of the boil or leave a gap of 1 to 2 inches, so the compounds that cause undesirable flavors and
aromas can be boiled off.
Vastly improved color and flavor.
Since your concentration of sugars is much lower, the wort doesn’t caramelize as it does in a partial boil.
Caramelization darkens the wort, and has a big effect on the flavor of your beer. Most brewers would agree that a
full boil has the biggest impact on the flavor of your beer.
So what kettle should I get?
This depends on a few different factors—are you brewing inside or out? What size batches would you like to brew?
Do you think you may eventually expand your love of homebrewing to become an all-grain brewer? At Midwest, we
have a brew pot to fill every need from the 20-minute boil extract brewer all the way up to professional grade allgrain setups. Let’s go over what you should consider when shopping for a brew pot.
Will you be brewing inside?
If you’ll be brewing inside, you are somewhat limited as to your choice of kettle. If you try to do a full boil on a tengallon batch on your stovetop, all that liquid won’t come to a boil for about 5 hours on high flame, if it comes to
a boil at all (Midwest does not recommend brewing on an electric stovetop). Therefore, a full boil on a five-gallon
batch is pretty much the limit of what you can do indoors. A homebrewer wanting to do full boils indoors on 5
gallon batches should consider a brew kettle between 7.5 and 10 gallons in capacity. Any of the kettles pictured
below will work great.
Stainless Steel
Kettle-7.5 Gallon
HD Stainless Steel
Brewpot-32 Qt.
Polar Ware
BrewRite-40 Qt.
HD Stainless Steel
Brewpot-40 Qt.
Polar Ware
Stainless Steel
Brewpot-42 Qt.
Will you be brewing outside or in your garage?
If you’ll be brewing outside, that opens up a few more options. Since you can use a propane burner (NEVER use
a propane burner indoors!), you won’t be limited as to the size batches you’ll be brewing, up to 45 gallons! This
means you can choose any kettle you like, but there are a few other factors to consider, so lets discuss those.
What size batches would you like to brew?
Most homebrewers getting into the hobby start out by making 5-gallon batches. This is because pretty much all of
the equipment and recipes are built for that volume. If you want to do larger batches, it should be a multiple of 5. As
for extract brewing, you can just double the amount of each ingredient (water, specialty grains, malt extract, hops,
and yeast) in any given recipe to make a 10-gallon batch. Likewise, you may triple the amounts for a 15-gallon batch.
An extract brewer who loves the hobby will never regret buying one of these bigger kettles. Not only will the ability
to perform a full boil greatly improve the overall quality of your beer, but if you ever decide to make the jump to
all-grain brewing, your bigger kettle will be able to be used in your new setup, unlike a smaller brew pot.
Polar Ware
Polar Ware
HD Stainless Steel HD Stainless Steel HD Stainless Steel
BrewRite-60 Qt.
BrewRite-80 Qt.
Brewpot-60 Qt.
Brewpot-80 Qt.
Brewpot-100 Qt.
Think you might like to brew all-grain someday? Maybe tomorrow?
If you’ve been extract brewing for a while and you’ve got 50+ batches under
your belt, you may be curious as to what all-grain brewing is all about. Or
maybe you’ve already decided to begin building your dream system. A good
heavy duty kettle is always a good place to start. And Midwest has lots of
cool kettles loaded with features that will make brewing large extract batches
easier. But what’s really great about these kettles is that they can be used
as a mash tun (extra equipment required) or
a hot liquor tank. So even if you buy one to
brew extract, you’ll never outgrow it no matter
Polar Ware Stainless Steel how into the hobby you may get. These kettles
Brewpot w/Sight Gauge
all feature a spigot at the bottom of the pot.
• Available in 60 or 80 Qt. Sizes This is so that you’ll be able to drain the kettle
into your fermenter using gravity instead of trying to heft 10 gallons of wort, which
we do not recommend! Other features these kettles may have are sight gauges and
thermometers. A sight gauge allows you to see how much liquid you have in the kettle.
A thermometer will obviously allow you to monitor your temperature while steeping
grains, boiling or chilling your wort. When performing an all-grain mash, you must
hold the mash at specific temperatures for different parts of the mash. While all these BoilerMaker by Blichmann
• Available in 10, 15, 20, 30 features are quite convenient for the extract brewer, they are absolutely required for
and 55 gallon sizes
the all-grain brewer. Click here to learn more about all-grain brewing.
Or, build your own!
If you’re handy and own some tools, you can save some money by building your own kettle. Start with any of the
unmodified kettles, then add a weldless kettle conversion kit, a sight gauge, and a thermometer. You’ll need the
proper tools to drill holes through the stainless steel kettle. Be sure that all of your seals are watertight before you
brew with your new kettle.