[dmtaylor]

I brew small 1.7-gallon batches so I always bottle.  I still bottle even when I make the occasional 5-gallon batch for festivals because I never bought proper kegging equipment.  I have experimented with the 5-liter mini-kegs and they work great; however, on my last batch, the old steel keg must have begun to rust as the beer tasted like metal, so that kind of turned me off for a while.  One of these days I'll have to get a new mini-keg and try it again.  I remember I liked kegging a lot since it was so dang easy.  But what I don't like about it is that I can't just have a bottle every once in a while, no, I need to keep the keg cold and drink it all in a month or two.  I'm more lazy than that.  I like to keep a few bottles around for many months or even a year sometimes, and you can't really do that with kegs.  There's certainly advantages/disadvantages both ways.  For a guy who doesn't drink heavily like me, bottling is really the best way for me to go.

[reverseapachemaster]

I bottle for a number of reasons:

1. I brew a lot of small batches and it's just not cost effective to buy one gallon kegs and a whole draft set up when bottles are readily available.

2. I brew a lot of saisons and sours that benefit from higher carbonation than what a draft system is designed to provide.

3. Many of the styles I brew benefit from aging and sometimes aging under carbonation (i.e. brett beers) and there's just no way to have that many beers aging in kegs (at least not for me).

4. I don't have the room in my house right now for a draft system.

I am not anti-kegging though. It's just not as good of an option for the beers I brew, the batch size I brew (right now) and my space limitations. I have four corny kegs that will eventually go into a draft system and I rig up a mobile set up to take beers to parties but for now I am comfortable just using the pile of bottles at my disposal. I have a couple party pigs that I use off and on with some of the pieces removed that emulates cask dispensing but that's not quite the same thing. My next house will have more brewing space and that will give me room for a bar with a draft system...

[coolman26]

Perhaps the irony is that with a kegging set up bottling is a lot easier and more sanitary and better results. Rack beer into a keg, add priming sugar. Purge head space with co2. Shake or roll keg to distribute sugar. Insert bottling wand firmly into the spout on the cobra tap (it fits perfectly) and bottle standing up via co2 pressure rather than hunkering down on the floor. Much faster, easier and better!

+100, This is how I bottle now.  So much easier than the bucket I used for years.

[beersk]

Perhaps the irony is that with a kegging set up bottling is a lot easier and more sanitary and better results. Rack beer into a keg, add priming sugar. Purge head space with co2. Shake or roll keg to distribute sugar. Insert bottling wand firmly into the spout on the cobra tap (it fits perfectly) and bottle standing up via co2 pressure rather than hunkering down on the floor. Much faster, easier and better!

+100, This is how I bottle now.  So much easier than the bucket I used for years.

Same here, this is what I do whenever I bottle now. I seems like a very professional brewery way to bottle.

[pete b]

I have been going back and forth on this. I'm about to put on an addition which will give me more kitchen space. I was thinking of putting a tap system in the kitchen. I decided (I think) its too dangerous. I might still get a keg system but put it somewhere else.

[thirsty]

I bottle but I would love to keg. I just don't have the space for another fridge and kegs and gas and whatnot. It's funny, after the kids moved out we thought we would have a lot of extra space, but no....