Advice needed

[mashani]

Dave, I think you are over shooting with him. You're having him commit a bunch of dollars that he doesn't have to, and a process (LME/DME, steeped grains, hops) that is too advanced if you want him to succeed.

Give him your LBK, point him towards the Mr. Beer site, and suggest he start with some of the Craft Series (which are much better than the others). After a few of those, he can look at some recipes including dry hopping. Then some of the partial mash recipes (i.e. steeped grains). THEN, move to kits like what you found, although those are cost prohibitive at $20 for 1 gallon.

There is zero reason for a cash outlay beyond ingredients at this point. Let him have some wins.

I did pretty much exactly this with one of my friends, he did a couple of cans in my old LBKs, then later I showed him how to add some DME and hops to tweak them and brew with DME + steep. He pretty much has been very happy doing this and he likes what he's making, as apparently do his friends as they keep bumming beer off of him, and the LBKs work great for him.