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Getting Started in Homebrew - THE EQUIPMENT
I'm going to offer a few suggestions for getting started... all of these come from very limited experience, but very recent experience. I'm hopeful that with a decent but recently developed understanding I'll be able to explain things in a relatively straight forward way that easy to understand.
My goal in making beer was finding a way to make beer up to the quality one can get when buying a 6-pack of microbrew (~$8), with a balance of speed, ease, enjoyment, and low cost. As you decrease speed, decrease ease, and increase cost you can always get better beer, but I'm trying to find the happy balance. Feel free to offer suggestions or revisions, but please be clear about how your suggestion affects each of these variables so it's clear for the casual reader.
Equipment -
Much of the equipment you need has the important caveat that you MUST be able to clean it at the micro-organism level. Some, but not all pieces will touch the wort/beer at times when it is at a temperature that makes it susceptible to spoilage. This is the main point of anxiety for the home-brewer.. you work hard and spend money and the whole thing goes to shit. This is one of the issues about which I was most concerned and really paralyzed me with fear and kept me from really diving in. I hope I can alleviate some of you concerns with some tips I've come to realize that helped me get over the hump.
When buying equipment there seem to be two main factors cost and ease. They are most often inversely proportional. Much of the equipment needed can be purchased at various medical supply stores or hardware store, and crafted on your own. This will likely decrease cost, but is not easy if you are totally unfamiliar with where to get these things. A lot of advice suggests "oh, go to this kinda store and pick up this and this and this... it's relatively easy to put it all together". This is probably very true once one has taken all the time and effort needed to figure out proper hose lengths and diameters, values, fasteners, etc. So if you have previously done this, it sounds easy to do it again. But for a first timer, I'm fairly convinced that this is a silly way to go about getting started unless you have someone to hold your hand while you do it.
The alternative is to buy a kit with all essential pieces included and go from there. For the true do it yourself-er this most likely sounds like a turn off, but I think if you're just getting started and want to get your feet wet this is truly the way to go. For <$75 (http://www.northernbrewer.com/starterkits.html) you can get a starter kit with all the essential pieces. If that's more than you want to spend, you'll need to go with the hunt and gather mode... good luck! This set will include everything you need for a good long while. As you have success and increased interest it will be easy to upgrade pieces as you go. (e.g. glass carboys, using a full-boil wort, a turkey fryer, the wort chiller, kegs, keg-arator, etc.) There are kits that can be purchased that are less expensive still, but this basic setup allows for a large range of beers and lots of flexibility.
This set up will brew you 5 gallons of beer (or ~ 2 cases of beer). A few other essentials are empty bottles, a brew pot, a liquid thermometer, a long-handled stainless steel stirring spoon, and ingredients for whatever kind of beer you'd like to make.
The Thermometer - Something cheap like this: http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...VL._SS500_.jpg works fine... digital ones are also fine, but you will be using this to measure liquids and you must be able to sterilize it as you will be measuring liquids at potentially unsafe temperatures.
The Pot - The pot for cooking the wort (which is what the beer flavored sugar water is called) can be any canning pot, or lobster pot that should be able to hold 2.5-3 gallons of water. Many will already have a pot of this type available.
The Bottles - The bottles is another thing that slowed me down a lot. I like to drink beer, but I don't usually buy a ton of beer that comes in pop-top bottles. So collecting in excess of 48 bottles that I was confident could be easily cleaned was something that really sabotaged my interest. I've come up with a few suggestions. In terms of collecting bottles, 1) put the word out to all your friends that you need pop-top bottles (rinsed out preferably), 2) have a beer tasting party where everyone brings a six-pack of quality microbrew beer (most of which should be pop-tops), 3) go to the local recycling center and see if you can buy recycled bottles back from them (i'm not sure if this would work but i don't see why it wouldn't, 4) just buy new clean bottles from a brew store. (other suggestions?)
Having really good boxes to put your bottles in is also essential, so don't throw those away. In terms of cleaning, a thorough rinse after a bottle is poured will be sufficient until it's time to bottle your beer. If you can get your hands on large boxes that will hold a case of beer bottles it's even better as you can keep a cover over them. I really wanted to avoid having to scrub the shit out of each bottle that I used, and I'm fairly confident one can avoid all that step if it's well rinsed after drinking, stored in dry place, and *immediately before bottling* is then allowed to soak in cleaning solution (and thereafter rinsed).
The Local Brew Store: If you have a store that carries home brewing products nearby, check out their prices and selection. More on the local brew store in the next post.
I'll close this out for now as it's approaching epic length.
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Home Brewing with Kingnat
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Originally Posted by mrhappy333
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and body. And the guys you're splitting the dme with are right, you definitely get 100% malt with the dme, and only 85% with lme, however lmes are accordingly cheaper. Also lmes have gone through less processing and imo are less removed from the original barley, not that I have any reason to believe that it helps or hurts a beer.
