BREWING YOUR OWN BEER: WHAT YOU NEED TO GET STARTED

BREWING YOUR OWN BEER: WHAT YOU NEED TO GET STARTED

So you want to make your own beer. How hard could it be, right? Really, its not that hard, and Ill have a nice home beer brewing equipment for you soon that outlines every aspect of the process.

Before you get all fired up about it, though, let me be the voice of reason and point out that youre going to have to spend a pretty nice chunk of change before you can even make your first batch.

While the actual process of brewing is simple, it is pretty time consuming, and when you first get started, there is quite the long list of equipment and ingredients that first need to be bought.

Not all of these are cheap, either, but after your initial investment, the home brewing process is actually much more affordable than buying beer at the store. Lets take a look at what all youll need to get ready to brew.

Every single article or guide that I have read is sure to emphasize this one key point: sanitize like a maniac. Every item that will have even the slightest contact with your beer at any phase of the brewing process needs to be as clean as you can get it.

You can, of course, use a mixture of bleach and hot water to soak everything, and then rinse everything thoroughly. This can add additional time to the process that you dont necessarily have to spend.

Many sanitizers do not require rinsing and most are on the inexpensive side, costing less than $5 on average and up to $15 for a large container. One package or bottle will last you through many brewing sessions, so they are a fantastic deal. I would definitely make the small investment in a good no-rinse sanitizer if I was planning to brew on a regular basis.

I suppose that you could use any old stock pot for making your wort, but I wouldnt recommend it. First, when youre boiling your wort (pronounced wert- see my guide to beer for more on that), you will need plenty of extra room to avoid overflowing the pot.

Most home beer recipes make five gallons, so you need at least an 8 gallon pot to have enough additional space during the boiling process. This is not your average-size stock pot.