Just pour in the mix, add water and in a few days you have beer ready to drink.

Instant Keg
(excerpts from Popular Mechanics)

A simple brewing system that makes more sense for typical households is The Beer Machine®. You just combine water, beer mix and yeast in the barrel shaped device and in less than three weeks, you're tapping cold beer from your fridge. Unlike BrewSack, The Beer Machine® is reusable. The 2.6-gallon (20 pints) keg consumes just a bit more shelf space than a spring-water dispenser of the same capacity.

The Beer Machine® is both brewery and draft-beer dispenser. It's a charming bit of engineering, with front-facing tap and a CO₂ dispenser. The latter lets you add more carbonation to the brew, according to your taste, or helps equalize pressure in the keg for easy dispensing while protecting the beer from any taste-robbing oxygen. You'll appreciate the elegance of the design when you assemble The Beer Machine -about an hour's work including cleaning. Gaskets and press-fit clamps seal the keg and secure its external parts.

Once the sanitized machine is assembled you add room-temp water, a brewing ingredient and a packet of supplied yeast, then install the pressure cap. The company offers different styles of beer. Fermentation takes about six days at a consistent 68 to 72 F range. After this, pop The Beer Machine®; in the fridge for 10 more days before sampling.

Appearances can deceive, and our initial impression of The Beer Machine®; put it in the gimmick category with crock pots and breadmakers. We can't wait to make another crock of Pilsener Light (17 points). Light here describes body and character, not calories. This pale, golden brew is fresh, dry and smooth. The frothy head restrained carbonation and slight maltiness reminded us of the easy-quaffing draft lagers of Berlin.

For the record, we first tapped The Beer Machine®; without adding CO₂ and found its natural carbonation just right, with a picture-perfect head. Per the instructions, eventually we had to use CO₂ to get pressure for dispensing. Expect to use three cartridges of CO₂ per barrel.

The Beer Machine®; proved the easiest way to brew yet yielded superior results second only to the more labor-intensive tratitional brewing kit. True Brew's Irish Stout (18 points) was worth every drop of effort but the judging was the most difficult.

The most famous "dry" stout is Dublin's Guinness, but it would be unfair to use this as a standard becuase Guinness is unique even among Irish stouts. The yeast alone is different from any other. The Irish Stout compared well to another Irish brand, Murphy's, from Cork.

The rich, crean-thick head clung to the glass all the way to the end of the clear, espresso-dark pint. Body was full, no wateriness, and the taste was right-on - a balance of toasty malt and hoppy dryness. All agreed that at 10 weeks old, the stout was a tad sweeter and a bit more carbonated that commercial brews.

On the other hand, 10 weeks may be a bit longer than many thirsty throats may want to wait. If that's the case, then the speedy The Beer Machine®; is the better thirst quencher.

S.B. Popular Mechanics