The right choice of homebrewing equipment and resources is important when you start your home brewery. We will look at starter kits that also make great gift ideas for your loved ones. Have a look at our suggested homebrewing gifts, great resources to get starting with brewing beer at home!
Homebrewing Books
There is a wide variety of beer brewing books out there that introduce you to the wonderful world of homebrewing. The first question to ask yourself is, on what level would I like to try and enter the hobby? If you are prepared to make a reasonable investment (~$50-$100 for equipment and your first recipe kit) you can start brewing partial mash or extract beers. Larger investments allow you to purchase the kit, that is suited for all-grain brewing. Below, you will find some books that will help you start at the extract and all-grain brew entry level.
“How to Brew” by John Palmer is the resource for the homebrewing enthusiast. Whilst it is a great resource, covering all aspects of beer brewing (extract and all-grain), to some, it is rather technical and perhaps inaccessible to the novice brewer. Whatever your point of view, most brewers that carry on homebrewing will end up buying this book.
Another useful resource and wildly popular amongst brewers is “The Complete Joy of Homebrewing” by Charlie Papazian. Similar to “How to Brew”, this book provides an accurate and enthusiastic account of how to brew killer beers. The book has a large scope, covering most, if not all aspects of brewing beer at home. If you do not want to get into too much detail and simply get on with it, this is could be the homebrewing resource guide for you.
The next book, is more technical but opens up your world to beer design. As the title suggests, “Designing Great Beers” by Ray Daniels takes you through the various beer styles out there, informing the reader what elements are commonly found in prize-winning beers. If you wish to make beer for competitions, this book will set you on the path to success. The book comes with recipe suggestions for each style, helpful calculation methods to make your own recipe and beer style descriptions.
Homebrewing equipment
There is no question that equipment choice is personal. For the starting brewer, however, available choice does not have to be extensive, unless you wish to invest big from the start. Below you will find some of the homebrewing equipment you will require. We deliberately focussed on the basic and cheaper kit. For more expensive homebrewing purchases, we recommend informing yourself well (at your local brew shop) before splashing out big.
The 32 Pint Homebrew Beer Making Starter Kit is perhaps the most cost-effective buy to get you started. When buying this kit, it is worth getting another bucket (for secondary fermentation and filling bottles). Besides the kit listed below, you will need to make sure you have a large stainless steel or aluminium pan.
When you have a large boiling pot, you are nearly there! You are pretty much set up to make your first homebrew. But where are you going to put it in?
One vessel to store your beer in is the beer bottle. There are two options, plastic bottles with screw tops or glass beer bottles. The advantage of glass bottles is that you can use ones from commercial breweries (as long as they not have screw caps). Using commercial beers is straightforward (and a good excuse to drink them), but you will need to clean them well after use. You also will need beer bottle caps and a bottle capper. While swing top cappers are popular buys, many brewers tend to gravitate towards the benchtop cappers at some stage.
Here it is, we hope this quick guide to homebrewing equipment and resources was helpful to you. Remember our suggestions are guides and in no way an endorsement of featured products.
Happy Brewing!
The Brewing Browser Team.
Here at BrewingBrowser, we want to eliminate any barriers that stop you from embarking on your brewer journey. If you want to learn more about microbiology, microscopy or brewing in general, please check out our Homebrewing-101, Guide or homebrewing equipment sections on our site (brewingbrowser.com).