The Complete Joy of Homebrewing

The Complete Joy of Homebrewing is the book that got me started. Charles Papazian is an enthusiastic booster of the homebrewing hobby, having started himself in the mid 70s. He is one of the founders of the American Hombrewer’s Association and it’s current president (possibly for life).

What makes “The Complete Joy” such a standout for me is how nicely Papazian leads the reader down the primrose path toward advanced breweing. The first chapter “cuts the shuck and jive” and jumps right into your first very simple, very basic brew. Follow his directions to the letter and you just can’t go wrong. Once going through this first task, he breaks downs the different ingrediants that go into beer and how they affect the four major beer components - aroma, body, color and taste. The reader is then gently introduced to more advanced brewing methods, different beer styles and a huge resource of recipes that should just about cover everyone’s tastes.

Once you’ve mastered “intermediate brewing” (extract brewing with steeping grains), he leads you into partial mash brewing and then, finally, to all-grain brewing. At no time does he make it seem difficult or boring, constantly reassuring the fretting reader to “Don’t worry, relax, have a homebrew.”

If you’re interested in getting started but, like me, would like to jump ahead a bit in your learning without buying a bookshelf worth of books, this is truly the complete answer. You will outgrow this book - he doesn’t go into too much detail about formulating your own recipes or exploring some of the odder variety of brewing ingrediants - but not until you’ve gotten enough brews under your belt to notice it.

Buy “The Complete Joy of Homebrewing” at Amazon.com

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