Home brewing isn’t about convenience or even cost (though it can be less expensive once you have set up with your initial brew kit).  It is a fulfilling hobby for thousands and thousands of people that makes them happy (even before they sample the brew) and keeps them busy and instead of thinking about the economy they are trying to decide what combination of hops and grains they will use in their next batch.

For others it is an attempt to create something that has never been created before, they want to create a new beer that is a perfect match for their taste buds and gives them the satisfaction of creating a brew that is unlike anything else.

A lot of recipes you find produced by the large breweries have been handed down through generations of family brewers and this is the way it was historically done.  In the current era there is a greater understanding of what different hops, grains, yeasts and even the water can do to change the flavor of the end brew and there are very few family recipes that aren’t used by commercial breweries.

Because of the varying supply of hops, grains, pre-made malt extracts you can create a beer specifically for your taste.  Experimenting and trying different recipes is a large part of the fun of home brewing, not too mention the taste testing of you creative new home brew.

Even if you are brewing your very first batch of home brew beer you can still create an excellent beer simply by purchasing a brew kit that contains everything you need.  If it isn’t perfect then you can try to change it up a little and brew another batch to see if you have found perfection or not.

Brew kits make easy for anyone to create a good home brew and most of them come with instructions that will help you get your first home brew done easily but if you are like a vast majority of home brewers you will find that you aren’t quite happy with the end result and you will have some ideas on how to improve it.

Every home beer brewer has their own version of, “The Worlds Best Beer Recipe” but unfortunately not all taste buds agree.  That is the best part about creating you own home brew beer, is that you can tailor the recipe so that you will be making, “The Worlds Best Home Brew Beer” at least until you create the next batch.

For your first home brew I recommend that you purchase a brewing kit with all the ingredients you need to make your first custom beer.  Once you have that under your belt you can buy all kinds of pre-made malt extracts pre-hopped or un-hopped or you can create your own wort (the liquid created in the mashing process) from a variety of grains and hops to bring out that specific flavor you are looking for.

If you are purchasing a full kit that includes the malt extract you will have to decide on what style of home brew you would like to make this varies from person to person and includes options like dark, pale and amber ales, English, German, American and even fruit beers, yes I said fruit.

Now that you have your equipment and your have chosen your style and flavor it is time to create the actual brew.

One of the most common mistakes made by beginning home brewers is that they overlook the importance of sanitation.  Everything and anything that will come in contact with your unfermented home brew beer needs to be completely sanitary.

Use of a commercial sanitizer is your best bet for this process.  Don’t rush this let the sanitizer have the time it needs to do its job and don’t forget to sanitize your stirring spoon as well as your fermenter.

Sanitizer can kill the yeast that will be critical to the creation of your home brew so you need to rinse everything very well to make sure the sanitizer is completely removed.

Combine your water and malt extract (either pre-made or your own custom mix) in your brew kettle and bring it to a good rolling boil.  Be careful that you don’t let it boil over.

The next step is to cool it down to below one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. A good way to do this is to place the brew kettle in a sink partially filled with cool water.

Now it is time to put your brew into your well sanitized, well rinsed fermenter and to top it off to the full mark (usually five gallons)

Then we will add the most important ingredient, the yeast. This not only make your home brew beer a true beer but it also has an effect on the flavor.  There is a wide variety of yeasts to choose from and again this will depend on your personal taste.

Let your home brew ferment from eight to ten days (usually until the bubbling stops) then let it stand at room temperature for a couple more days.  I know you want to try it right now but it is better to let it fully flavor.

Now you are ready to put your home brew into bottles.  Fill your bottles until you are about one inch from the top and put on the cap.  Depending on the brewing kit you purchased you might have to let it carbonate for a few days but some of the better brewing kits have carbonation pods on them so you can sample your brew earlier.

That’s it you are done and it is time to enjoy the fresh taste of your own home brew beer.

That’s right, according to many historians shortly after barley was domesticated the Sumerian and Mesopotamians were creating their own form of home brewed beer as far back as 10,000 B.C. Technology was a little different back then and the end result of the home brewing would have been different but if you saw it today you would still be able to make it out as a type of beer. There are even people trying to recreate it today!

It wasn’t just the Sumerians that were creating their own home brew, the practice was spread around the world. The Chinese, Egyptians and Europeans all have been brewing beer for thousands of years. The Native Americans even had their own version but instead of barley they used corn. To be honest I haven’t had a corn based beer yet but it is definitely an interesting concept.

Remember back in the day these were all basically home brew beers, yes there were some social gathering areas like inns and pubs that you might consider a microbrew instead of a home brew but basically the only difference is one was sold and the other just enjoyed.

In Europe during the middle ages, the monks took became the caretakers of literature and science and the art of brewing beer happened to fall under the science division. If you are like me you might have hard time believing that religion was responsible for perfecting and improving the beer brewing process, especially since a lot of religions consider beer the nectar of the devil. In the middle ages the monks were the experimenters and the scientists, they studied and experimented with the brewing process adding and removing ingredients, changing the recipe and standardizing the brewing process. In the course of their experiments they are the ones that discovered hops could be used during the brewing process to flavor and preserve beer, this was truly the birth of all modern beers.

Even with all the studying and experiments the monks performed they still had a serious problem creating a consistent brew and beer was a hit and miss endeavor for a long time. It wasn’t until Louis Pasteur, one of the first microbiologists, came up with the germ theory that brewers finally understood what was causing the differences in beers brewed with identical recipes.

You might be a little confused about this what do germs have to do with beer?

Louis Pasteur was experimenting with fermentation using a boiling broth when he came up with the germ theory. In other words he was working with his own form of home brew when he discovered germs, so I guess you could say that home brewed beer changed the face of medicine and the world. I am sure all of you have heard of pasteurized milk which has saved an untold number of lives over the years, this came from Louis Pasteur’s home brew experiments and the germ theory.

Before the germ theory brewers didn’t truly understand that their brews depended on wild airborne yeast to create the fermentation. With this discovery brewers were finally able to control the conversion of sugar into alcohol and produce a consistent product.

Why beer instead of wine? Some of the reason is personal taste but most of it has to do with geological location. The basic difference between beer and wine is wine is usually from fermented fruits (usually grapes) and beer is created from fermented grains (usually barley). Grapes grow better in warm climates and barley grow better in cool climates, this is why places like Germany and England became known for their beers and France for it wine. Germany and England had extra barley and France had extra grapes.

Home Brew Beer in America

I already mentioned that some Native American cultures had their own form of beer made with a corn base but when the Europeans started to migrate to the Americas they brought their barley and their taste for beer with them and started their own home brews.

These home brews quickly became microbrews supplying the local communities from the neighborhood tavern and over the years some became full blown breweries supplying thousands of people over large areas.

Then came prohibition and all commercial production, at least legal commercial production, was stopped and most of the breweries changed over to soft drinks. There were a lot of people creating their own bootleg liquor but beer wasn’t a major part of the gangster alcohol production, they preferred more bang for their buck and smaller containers for the same impact so they mostly created hard liquors like gin and whiskey. But you can be assured that home brew beer was still being created throughout the country.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt repealed the Prohibition Act and the commercial breweries started mass producing beer once again. Personally, I don’t know if this was a blessing or a curse because as production grew and grew they started watering down the process and since the end of World War II the United States has been left with a vast majority of the commercial beers being, in my opinion, bland and flavorless. But that is changing, home brew beer and microbrews are popping up all over the place and people are starting to realize that they were missing something with the commercial brews.

If you like beer and you haven’t tried a home brew beer or any of the microbrews I advise you to go out and sample some, you may be pleasantly surprised.