Interested in Homebrewing?  Here are some resources to help you get started!

Here are handy logsheets we’ve made for keeping track of beers you’ve tasted, and recipes you’ve created. 

For supplies, please always utilize your local suppliers first – help keep them in business and providing resources to your homebrewing community. Don’t know where to find homebrewing supplies in your area? You are in luck!  The American Homebrewers Association has a Supply Shop finder so you can locate a supplier in your area. Many suppliers have a discount available for AHA members as well, so there are many reasons to join!

Also reach out and take part in local homebrew clubs. The American Homebrewers Association also has a club finder so you can locate a club near you. Many of the local suppliers also sponsor local clubs, or provide meeting space or additional discounts to club members. Homebrew clubs often have relationships with local Craft Breweries as well, with opportunities for club members to take part in behind-the-scenes tours, limited edition tastings, discounts, and other special events.

BOOKS

A great book to get started with is Home Bruin: A Basic Guide to Homebrewing which is by one of our brewers here.  It is based on a guide originally available in South Florida that prompted hundreds of people to begin their brewing adventures.  You also can’t go wrong with any book by Charles Papazian, John Palmer, Stan Hieronymus, or Dave Line. In particular Charles Papazian’s The Complete Joy of Homebrewing is a great next step in your education.

DISCORD

There is a homebrew group on Discord called Beer Joy Homebrew Club that is active and has a lot of users.

REDDIT

There is a very large group on Reddit called r/Homebrewing with a wealth of resources and very active.

FACEBOOK

There are several groups on Facebook if you search for “homebrewing”. Currently “HOMEBREWING 101” is the most active. There is also Homebrew Academy Brewers (see below under Others).

Facebook also has many of the Craft Brewery pages – and craft brewers are often homebrewers gone pro. I’m a fan of Black Hops Brewing in particular as they represent craft brewers who have shared their journey from an idea over drinks to fruition and success.

TWITTER

I don’t know. Twitter is falling apart. It may have gone the way of MySpace and the dinosaurs by the time you read this. The above options are better.

GROUPS.IO

groups.io has similar functionality to the former Yahoo Groups and most active groups on Yahoo gradually transitioned over to it. None of the home-brew groups seem particularly active but a couple local brewing clubs use groups.io to stay in touch.

WEBSITES

There are hundreds of websites with everything from recipes for beginners to calculators for yeast pitch rates by number of cells. Here are some that I use fairly often:

1. www.brewersfriend.com – to list all of the tools and resources they have available would take a couple pages. Recipe builders, conversion calculators, DME/LME substitutions, boil off, SRM, Brix, Chaptalization, Keg PSI, and more. Plus resources on understanding and adjusting brew water and many recipes and articles.

2. www.beercraftr.com – recipes and resources that are aimed at small all grain recipes

3. homebrewacademy.com – lots of recipes and articles aimed at the beginner along with online courses through SkillShare. They also run the associated Facebook group Homebrew Academy Brewers

4. northernbrewer.com – one of the older online retailers, they also have a selection of online video courses as “Northern Brewer University” as well as some additional online calculators and knowledge base. Most of their recipe kits also have free downloadable recipes.

5. morebeer.com – another long-term online retailer that has numerous articles, recipes, and guides available.

6. American Homebrewers Association website at www.homebrewersassociation.com also has numerous resources available, as well as the wealth of information published in Zymurgy magazine with issues back to January 2000 available online to members.

7. Yeast Substitutions – sometimes your supplier won’t have a particular yeast in stock, so you may need to know other yeasts with similar characteristics to use in it’s place. I find BeerMaverick’s tool very useful: yeast-substitutions-chart

8. Likewise you may have to replace grains or malt extracts, so I use the chart at www.brew.is/files/malt.html

9. BeerMaverick also has a great tool for substituting hops if needed at hop-substitutions-chart