If you’re new to my blog, I recommend you start at the beginning to have the opportunity to truly learn from my mistakes and laugh at my failures.

My intro post can be found here:

>>Click here to read Intro & My First Home Beer Brewing Kit

From there you can navigate forward using the Archive on the right side of the page.

What Should I Buy?

(everything new brewers need to get started)

Since diving headlong into this new addiction, I’ve annoyed a lot of people with my constant Facebook updates. I’ve also intrigued some.  People have started asking me how to go about getting started and what is the minimum equipment they should have.

This article assumes you will be starting out brewing extract beers.  I recommend you start with extract unless you have an experienced all-grain brewer helping you as it is an easier way to get comfortable with the brew process.  Extract is faster, requires less equipment and still produces delicious beer.

If you read my first post you know that I started with a $100 kit for Christmas.  You also know I immediately began purchasing additional equipment.  I’ve since lost my job, my car, sold my house and pimped out my girlfriend to cover the costs of my “hobby”.  Okay – only some of those are true.

This post will give you my opinion of what equipment is absolutely necessary and what equipment might make life a lot easier, but you can get away with not purchasing (or building) right away.

I’ve included links to view and/or purchase this equipment from my preferred online brew supply store, Adventures In Home Brewing.

1)  Fermentation & Bottling Vessels – Buckets, Carboys & Accessories:

 

Obviously you need somewhere to ferment your beer.  The standard beginner setup would be a 7.8 gallon primary fermentation bucket and a second, smaller (6 or 6.5 gallon) bottling bucket with spigot.  While you can get away with just a single bucket, you may have some issues with the clarity of your beer if you’re bottling off the puddle to sludge (aka trub) that settles after fermentation.  In my opinion, a second vessel is required.

You’ll need a grommetted lid and an airlock for your primary to keep contaminants out.

Additionally, you may opt to purchase buckets and carboys in different sizes to act as secondary vessels and for different size batches.  The more the merrier.

When racking to a secondary, remember that oxygen is not your friend.  Reducing head space to a minimum, by racking to a vessel that holds very close to the exact volume of wort to be racked is ideal (unless continuing fermentation in secondary through adjuncts like fruit or added sugars/fermentables which will create a new CO2 blanket).

Note – I don’t generally rack to secondary unless doing long-term, bulk aging or adding new fermentables like fruit.  There is a lot of debate about the benefits of secondary, but the recent consensus seems to be that it’s unnecessary and I agree with the consensus.

Required:

7.8 Gallon Primary Fermenting Bucket (with grommetted lid)
6.5 Gallon Secondary / Bottling Bucket (hole cut for spigot)
Airlock (I use 3-piece, any standard airlock is fine)
Spigot (for bottling)
Racking Cane & Siphon Hose (for transferring between vessels)

Heat Pad (if you need warmer fermentation than your room temp)
Glass Carboys (varying sizes available)
Auto Siphon (makes racking MUCH easier)
Adhesive Thermometers (for monitoring fermentation temps)

Brewing Equipment:

At minimum you’ll need a place to boil your wort.  Any large stainless steel (or aluminum) pot will do.  Beyond that there are a lot of nifty gadgets that can save time and reduce the risk of contaminants getting into your cooling concoction and make cleanup easier.

Required:

Stainless Steel Brew Pot (the bigger the better… less chance of a boiled-over mess).  I started with a 5-gallon stock pot on the kitchen stove and pretty quickly upgraded to an 8 gallon turkey fryer pot and burner for outdoor brewing.  When I decided to go all-grain, a big boy pot was required.  The “brewery” (read: garage) currently has a keggle (which is a half barrel keg converted into a brew kettle) and (2) 16 gallon stainless steel brew kettles.  I personally prefer the commercially purchased kettles over the keggle.  They really don’t cost that much more, require no modifications and they are a lot lighter.

Long Plastic or Stainless Steel Spoon (do you need to ask?)
Muslin Bags (kinda like tea bags for hops and grains to keep the mess out of your wort)
Wort Chiller (cools your wort to pitching temp very quickly…  adapter may be needed**)
Strainer (scoop the floaties off your wort before it is put into the fermentation vessel)
Floating Thermometer (for monitoring mash/steeping temps)
Scale (for weighing ingredients)

3)  Cleaning & Sanitizing:

When it comes to brewing successfully, cleanliness is godliness.  The best beer in the world can easily be ruined with poor sanitation practices.  You will, at least, need a sanitizing concentrate for your bottles, buckets and anything that comes in contact with your beer/wort. I’m sure you’ve got sponges and rags kicking around that can be used for basic cleanup.  Spray bottles are great for misting sanitizer onto surfaces and equipment.  If recycling bottles (they aren’t cheap), there are a bunch of accessories which I think border on required, but I will list as optional.

Required:

Sanitizer (I use StarSan)

Cleanser (you don’t want to use regular soap. OxyClean Free can work, however.)
Bottle Tree (hang clean bottles upside down to dry)
Bottle Washer (blasts inside of bottles with water from your tap… adapter may be needed**)
Carboy Washer (makes it easy to spray out gunk from the bottom of your carboys)
Vinator Bottle Washer (shoots sanitizer solution into your bottles)
Bottle Brush (for scrubbing out dirty bottles… they come in carboy size as well)

4)  Bottling:

Whether you buy them or recycle and reuse them, you need bottles (unless, of course you’re kegging).  There are a few different types.  I’ll list all as optional since you may or may not opt to purchase them brand new, but rather acquire them in other ways. A typical 5 gallon batch will fill roughly 50 bottles.  As for the actual process of bottling, you’ve got your bucket with spigot above.  Otherwise, caps and a way to apply them and a bottling wand with a small piece of tubing is all you need.

Required:

Caps (varying colors available)
Bottle Capper (there are different types… I use the red one)
Bottling Wand (easily fill bottles without splashing and stop when full with spring tip)

12 Ounce Glass Bottles (brown is preferred as it keeps light out)
Growlers (varying sizes and colors)
Swing Top Bottles (I recycle Grolsch bottles)
Growler Caps (varying sizes)
Replacement Swing Tops (gaskets are available separately as well)
Cases (milk crates and empty commercial beer cases/boxes work fine)

5)  Testing & Miscellaneous:

You’ll want to be able to calculate your beer’s alcohol content and monitor fermentation progress.  While you can just drop your sanitized hydrometer right in your fermenter, it’s recommended you extract a sample to reduce the risk of contamination and to get a clearer, more accurate read.

Required:

Hydrometer (for measuring gravity and calculating alcohol content)

Brewing Software – I use Beersmith to help me with recipe formulation
Test Jar (holds a beer sample for hydrometer reading)
Thief (this nifty gadget allows you to remove a small sample from a bucket or carboy)
Stir Plate – Yeast Starter Kit

(One one thing I learned early on is that pitching a healthy yeast colony is crucial to brewing good beer.  A stir plate setup allows you to quickly build a healthy yeast colony from a yeast starter. I recommend against using an airlock with the starter, however.  You want air exchange as the colony reproduces.  A sanitized piece of foil placed loosely over the top is better or they make foam stoppers which can be pushed into the flask opening).

** Watch out for those adapters! Mine put about a dozen bloody razor blade slices in my hand before I even knew it was happening.  I now use a rubber kitchen glove anytime I need to remove or attach it.

I hope you found this helpful.  Please feel free to share with your friends.  If you think I missed something that should be on this list, please let me know!  Until next time…

Next Article:  “How To:  Going All Grain”

—————————————————————————————————