enamel brew pots?

Biggest problem I know of is they are fragile, If you drop it and crack the enamel its trash, instant rust.

Avery

Brew on brother! SW US desert

I've bought a few kits from Listermann's. I can't really judge their quality since I'm no brewing expert. If you put an IPA and a Brown ale in front of me and asked me to tell which was which... I'd have a 50 /

50 chance of guessing it right. Anyway, I like his Porter kit. And his prices are pretty good.

Karl S.

I started out brewing many years ago with my mothers old chipped and dented, enamel canning pot. Worked fine. Never noticed any off flavors. They say it gives the beer an iron taste but I think it is mostly BS. How much iron can get into the wort during a one hour boil? I'd say not to worry about the pot and buy a better one when you can afford it. As to the stale malt in your first kit, I'd be surprised if that were the problem. I'm not saying it wasn't but it is more likely that you had an infection some where along the way. I just brewed a decent ale out of some old malt that was at least five years old and was in a container that was not air tight. I tasted it first and it didn't have any off flavors. It's possible for it to go bad. I have had a batch in a plastic pouch start to swell before I got around to using it. I used it any way and the beer was fine.

if you check The photo on the back of Palmer's "How to brew"

you will see a large enamel canning pot

he apparently has nothing against them

Technically,unchipped enamel will work fine

Yodar who used one till he got his turkey fryer

Interesting that I was just breezing through one of Papazian's books today & he happens to mention in the Brewing Wares section about enamal pots, he says they are inexpensive & easy to find but wear out after time, subject to chipping, fatigue & so on.

He goes on to say that if you are a hardcore homebrewer the money you spend on enamel pots would buy you a nice hefty Stainless. I went to the local Coors distributing warehouse & bought retired kegs for $10 each (all in tip top shape btw), 5 minutes on Ebay I had three 1/2" brass ball valves, three

304 Stainless nipples & a trip to my local brew shop bought me the "bulkhead conversion kits" all for under $30. Granted it was another $20 to plasma the top off & drill the 7/8" hole for the bulkhead kit, but hey...you try to buy 3 fully fitted, 15.5 gallon 304 Stainless kettles for $100. I do need to get a bazooka tube and a false bottom, that will be the most expensive parts, but hey I haven't done too bad so far. (I'm not cheap, I'm frugal, plus I'm a big do-it-yourselfer).

Just like using copper/brass fittings (I use brass on my keg kettle & elsewhere) enamels work just fine, I wouldn't use them to ferment in though. Prolonged contact with exposed steel/copper/brass inside may lend to the metallic off flavors everyone mentions. Everyone says copper/brass leach nasty stuff into your wort/beer, but if you look at some of the huge old timey brewing kettles...what are they made of...uuuuh...well, they were called Coppers for a reason.

Long story short, even the man who (literally) wrote the book on homebrewing suggests it's ok to use enamels, do it!! Actually, I used one when I started too (not that I'm comparing myself to Papazian, not even close). The only thing I noticed is the beers I brewed in the enamels didn't store very long, perhaps it was the kettle, or perhaps it was something I did wrong, the world may never know.

Wow..sorry I tend to harangue...if you want to, use an enamel pot. HEH!

Best luck

Kent