"Kein" is just a contraction of "nicht ein". So in principle, you can expand the contraction and use "nicht ein" (properly inflected) insteads, but this adds emphasis, and normally you don't want this emphasis because it sounds unnatural. Sometimes this emphasis is ok, for example if you add "einzigen": Ich habe keinen Apfel. (normal) Ich habe nicht einen Apfel. (sounds strange) Ich habe keinen einzigen Apfel. (normal) Ich habe nicht einen einzigen Apfel. (emphasized)

Similarly, I have asked this question in my german class, and my teacher informed me that 'nicht' translates to 'not' and 'kein' translates to 'no.' Meaning that it depends on the case.

Using nicht is just cumbersome and awkward in comparison. Kein is better in general for those. Nicht is only really used to negate verbs in the sentence.