Brewing Overview

There are many ways to make good beer.  This page should be used as a source of very high level information on the most common ways home brewers are making beer today.  If you are looking for more information I highly recommend John Palmer's How to Brew: Everything You Need To Know To Brew Beer Right The First Time.  For a basic understanding of equipment please read on!

Equipment

There is some basic equipment that every home brewer needs.  There are different ways to build your equipment and a multitude of upgrades that you may end up making down the road, but when you begin, the basics are pretty simple.  The equipment I list here will focus on 5 gallon batches as that is what many people start with.  You can scale up or down for equipment.  It should be noted that the size of the batch will add minimal time and effort to your brew day, however the larger systems do end up requiring some extra equipment.

Extract

To start with you'll need some sort of vessel to boil the wort in.  This can be a simple pot that you probably can already find in your kitchen.  I started with this boil kettle.  This kettle is perfect for a full boil, however you can go smaller and do a partial boil.  I attempted this for my first two batches and quickly found that I much prefered doing a full boil so my recomendation is to start with the bigger pot. If you find yourself on beer forums, you can read the debate on stainless steel pots vs. aluminum.  I will put it out there now... it does not matter.  Get what you like and what you can afford.  Both will boil your wort just fine.

You'll obviously need some way to heat the wort as well as any water you'll use during the process. Your kitchen stove works just fine for this until you get into higher volumes of water.  When I brew 5 gallon batches, my boil volume is generally 6.5 gallons.  My stove is incapable of getting this much water to boil which is why I use a propane burner.  This will be one factor that helps you decide if you do a full or partial boil.

My recommendation for everything else you need is to purchase a home brew kit.  These kits vary in complexity but eliminate the guess work from your first equipment purchase.  They are also very inexpensive and will provide you with everything you need to make your first batch.  The typical kit comes with two buckets.  One is for fermenting and one for bottling.  It will have a hydrometer which allows you to measure how much alcohol is in your beer as well as sanitizer, a bottle capper, and an auto siphon for transferring liquids between containers.  Some kits will come with bottles and bottle caps however my suggestion is to just save your old bottles as long as they're pop top and re-use them.  You can usually offer to refill a few for your friends and you'll have empty bottles rolling your way in no time.

This is all of the basic equipment you'll need.  Assuming you have a large enough pot to boil 2.5 gallons of liquid in at home, you could feasibly brew for well under $100.  The only other components that are required are the ingredients.  Extract kits can be purchased either online or through any local home brew shop.  Kits come with step by step instructions so you'll always know what you're doing and in a little under 14 days you'll have 5 gallons of fresh beer that you can sit back and enjoy with the pride of knowing that you made it yourself.

All Grain

All grain brewing does everything that extract does except it adds two steps: the mash and the lauter or sparge.  When you do an extract brew, you will brew with Liquid and/or Dry Malt Extract.  This replaces the grains that are used in all grain brewing and takes out some of the complexity of the process.  This extract is more expensive than raw grain as you are basically paying a company to convert the grains for you.  In order to brew all grain, you'll need everything that is listed in extract plus a couple more pieces of equipment.

First, you'll need something to convert the grain in, a process known as the mash.  This is known as a mash tun.  At it's core, the mash tun is simply a vessel that has the ability to hold "x" pounds of grain and "x" gallons of water at a constant temperature for between 1-1.5 hours.  These can be purchased or custom built by the brewer.   A 10 gallon Coleman cooler can be fitted with a false bottom.  This keeps the grain off the bottom and allows the wort to drain while leaving the grain behind.  These coolers work very well at maintaining temperature and will last for a very long time.

The second piece of equipment needed in the all grain process is the hot liquor tank.  This vessel holds the water that is used to "rinse" the grain during the sparge process.  A second Coleman cooler works well for this also.  Instead of a false bottom, the HLT is fitted with a sparge arm.  The sparge arm is what the hot water will flow out of and allows the brewer to sprinkle water into the mash tun so as to avoid channeling while sparging.  During the sparge process the wort is being drained into the boil kettle and the rest of the process is the exact same as extract brewing.


Hopefully this information gives you some idea of what is required for the brewing process.  Every piece of equipment can be made as elaborate as you wish and there are multiple ways to utilize each.  It can also be made as simple as you want.  The key to remember is that the basics of brewing involve converting grain to sugars, whether it be you that does it or a company that converts it to malt extract, boil the wort, ferment the results, and enjoy all of your hard work.  As long as your equipment allows you to accomplish those steps, you will produce great beer.