The Basics of Homebrewing: Supplies

Basic Supplies:

Essentials:

A good, basic guidebook to homebrewing. You always need one handy. Recommend: Byron Burch, Brewing Quality Beers- The Home Brewer's Essential Guidebook (1992) Fulton, CA: Joby Books

One good recipe with ingredients. All you need is one to begin with. I recommend either an amber or a pale ale.

Cooking:

one 5-gallon stainless steel kettle. STAINLESS...not aluminum, wearever, or other such garbage.

one fine-mesh grain-bag. Synthetic works well and is easy to clean.

one long, stainless steel stirring spoon. Not wood or plastic.

Primary Fermentation:

one clean, 5-gallon bucket with spigot at the bottom and a 1 1/2" hole drilled in the lid

one airlock valve w/ 1 1/2" stopper. I recommend the cylindrical, chambered one.

3' of clear plastic racking hose

plastic racking tube with end cap

H2O Bath:

10-gallon plastic tub

cooking thermometer

lots of gel-ice packets, plastic frozen H2O bottles, or lots of ice cubes

Secondary Fermentation:

5-gallon glass carboy

Sanitization:

Iodophore solution. Use it to sanitize EVERYTHING...yes, including you!

TSP: trisodium phosphate. Nasty, caustic stuff used to remove gunk from bottles.
Use caution and wash thoroughly three times before bottling.

one large bottle brush for carboy

one small bottle brush for bottling

Bottling:

one bottling tube with e-z flow pressure valve

measuring cup

corn sugar. Not table sugar, brown sugar or honey... unless you're making explosives.

~ 50 12-oz. brown glass bottles. You can use green, but brown glass is thicker. NEVER use clear glass.

bottle caps

bottle capper

---OR---

~ 38 Grolsch-style bottles with good rubber washers

---OR---

5-gallon stainless steel keg with good rubber o-rings. You can use refurbished soda kegs.

2 keg tap-hoses

CO2 tank with pressure gauge

(c) 2001 Shawn Ford/ Webb-Ed Press