How did you get into brewing?

[Glynn Foster]

Continuing in the pointless new forum posts....

How did you get into (home)brewing?

For me it was mostly my brother back home starting to home brew first (since then all 3 of us do). I've been meaning to try for a while until I finally bit the bullet and went up to Great Expectations in the Hutt (utterly disappointing experience). Got it into my head that I was going to use glass bottles, so went next door and bought 4 swap-a-crates of Speights. It was a tough 2 weeks drinking to get through them in time for my first bottling. Unfortunately my first brew was also fizzy and tasteless....

[Stu McKinlay]

only the homebrew

[Matthew]

Great photos. It's interesting seeing other peoples setup.

[Stu McKinlay]

cheers

yeh, i often think of motorising the mill or getting a pump
but, in the end, i am a "handbrewer" and I do enjoy the hands on aspect

if i brewed more than 12-15 batches of beer a year than I'd consider some automation

[jt]

At least a bigger hopper Stu ?

[Stu McKinlay]

the little hopper gives such better light for photo essays though!

[Alelover]

My story in a nutshell! I moved here from the UK and was totally disappointed in the quality of the mainstream beers, having experienced the craft brewing in the UK for so many years. It took me a while to find the craft brews here, as there is little in the way of advertising of them. I love what is on offer here now that I have found them, but the cost is quite high if you like to drink as regularly as I do! So i decided I was going to brew my own AG beer. This was Christmas 2008, I am now on my 6th batch, which is in my and many others view pretty reasonable beer. My kit can be viewed on here in my photos. I am enjoying what I am doing and would love to push towards commercial/brewpub status.

Which leads me to another question on here to those who have made it to commercial levels:- What is required to enable you to set up as a commercial operation? Licencing / business set up etc. May be a section in the library or something on here as to how to set it up would help and encourage others to do it? Cheer!

[Simon David kelly]

Now that is a proper brew-day ... mines a single pot in a tiny back room in a cloud of swear words.

Must ask what is going on in the shower??

[Stu McKinlay]

filling FE1 with iodophor

[Martin townshend]

geek

[Stu McKinlay]

so jealous of my gumboots Martin

ps. your stout is superb - on at the malthouse now.

[MrC]

Nice photos Stu. Even gave me a couple of ideas on how to improve my system. Cheers.

Is there evidence of an unphotographed boil-over this photo ;-)

[Stu McKinlay]

good spotting