Starting Gear
#1 Fermentation Vessel - Must Have
This can we wide mouth or narrow mouth, depending on if you’re planning to add a lot of solids (like fruit) or not. It can be glass or plastic. You can repurpose narrow mouth glass vessels for “free” at some grocery stores or wine stores after you drink the juice or wine you bought inside them. Keep in mind that plastic vessels can stain and retain smells more than glass, but they tend to be lighter weight and more affordable.
You can also make your own plastic bucket fermentation vessel with a FOOD GRADE bucket and lid (make SURE it is food grade!!), drilling a hole, and purchasing a silicone grommet.
Either way, we recommend glass, and we recommend having at least 2 vessels. When your brew has finished primary fermentation, you’ll need to transfer it into another vessel for secondary fermentation. If you only have one fermenter, it can be more difficult. Sometimes secondary fermentation can be done directly in bottles (depending on what you’re doing in secondary) or you could transfer to a sanitized pitcher, wash and sanitize your fermenter, and then transfer it back into the original vessel.
If you’re just getting started, you might want to start by getting one vessel in a kit with an airlock and bung (AKA rubber stopper). If you’re confident you want to invest in this hobby, it’s helpful to have multiple fermenters and you might want to invest in multiple vessels.
#2 Airlock. - Must Have
This IS important. The goal with an airlock is to allow carbon dioxide to escape from your brew (preventing bombs) while preventing bugs and contaminants from getting in. You can use multiple layers of clean cheesecloth or fabric tightly secured, or use a piece of tubing going into another vessel filled with liquid (called a blow off tube), or use a plastic S-shape or 2- or 3-piece airlocks. There are also silicone airlocks, but they are quite expensive and I haven’t personally used them, so I can’t recommend them.
We use blow off tubes for very active and/or over full fermenters, but we transition to a plastic airlock as soon as realistically possible. I prefer the 2- or 3- piece airlocks because they’re easier to clean if your brew is active and gets into the airlock; however, the S-shaped airlocks can be more fun to watch and listen to during an active fermentation.
#3 Bottles. - Must Have
Once your brew is done fermenting, you need somewhere to put it! The best thing you can do is reuse the bottles you and your friends are already drinking from! Don’t throw them away or recycle them - reuse them for your own brews! You can reuse beer bottles, kombucha bottles, liquor bottles, and of course - wine and mead bottles. Get creative! Anything glass with a narrow mouth opening should work.
If you need to purchase bottles, the easiest way to start is with swing top or flip top bottles. These bottles (but not all of them!) can be used to build carbonation (if you choose to - but be careful!) or they can hold a noncarbonated finished brew medium term aging without an issue. They can be reused as long as the seals are good and provide excellent versatility and bang for your buck when you’re getting started.
Another option is screw tops, which are great for reusability and more of a professional appearance. Those come in full size and half size wine bottles.
#4 Sanitizer. - Must Have (Debatable)
It is possible to brew a clean batch without sanitizer, but it’s SOOO much easier and cost effective to use it. If your brew gets contaminated, you have to throw the whole batch down the drain (or into the compost pile), which is a huge waste of time and money that could’ve been prevented with proper sanitization.
You could make your own sanitizing solution by diluting bleach; however, this isn’t something we’ve done and we don’t recommend it. Whenever you’re using products like bleach you have to be very careful not to mix with any other chemicals or they may react.
Star San is a no-rinse foaming option that we use and is probably the most common that we’ve seen. It comes in a very concentrated form that must be diluted before being used. Currently the smallest bottle being manufactured is 32oz.
If you don’t want to use Star San or you can’t access it, another alternative is baby bottle sanitizer. Whatever you choose, make sure you’re following the manufacturer’s instructions.
#5 Measuring Gear - Really Nice to Have
Technically, all of these are optional to get started, but that doesn't mean they’re not important when making a brew that tastes great.
Hydrometers
You can make a brew that will ferment without a hydrometer, but it can be much harder. Without a hydrometer, there’s no surefire way to know when your brew is done fermenting (so you have the risk of bottle bombs or not knowing if your brew has stalled). You also won’t know the ABV of your brew.
Hydrometers are typically made out of glass, so you have to be gentle with them. They break easily. However; the Herculometer solved this problem. Their hydrometer is made out of plastic and is “virtually unshatterable.” Even though this product is no longer on Amazon and we won’t earn anything if you purchase it, we think it’s worth sharing. If you prefer to avoid plastic, we’ve got you covered with traditional glass options, too.
World’s Greatest Pitcher
This pitcher might look expensive at first glance, but even though Amazon has a great return policy, there’s many reasons that Amazon says “most people keep this item.” The first thing I noticed is it’s made from thick, high quality plastic that won’t bend or break - even when you have it full of a brew. The handle is sturdy, unlike other pitchers where the handle is the first thing to go, this handle is stable and not going anywhere. The spout is pointed sharply and allows you to have precise control over pouring, even into very small mouth bottles. And the feature we use the most is the raised measurements on the outside of the pitcher. It’s so easy to read exactly how much brew is in your batch (ounces or milliliters!), which you can plug into our Bottling Calculator to optimize using the perfect number and size of bottles without wasting anything!
Scales
Sometimes you’ll be able to buy honey in a container that is exactly the right weight you want in your brew… but it rarely works out that way. When it’s not perfect, you’ll either have to guesstimate or weigh it out. We prefer weighing it. This recommended scale has a capacity up to 33lbs and it’s precise enough to catch changes down to 1g. It meets the vast majority of our needs. On the rare occasion we need to weigh a half gram of an herb or spice, we use a jewelers scale.
#6 Racking Gear - Really Nice to Have
If you’re new to this craft, I’d recommend getting the Auto Siphon Kit that contains the Auto Siphon, tubing, cleaning brush, and bottling wand all in one.
As you progress in the hobby, you may want to pick up additional tubing to use as a blow off tube, or a back up auto siphon (the seals do wear out eventually, and usually it’s at the most inconvenient times). A bottling wand has a spring loaded tip so it stops the flow until you press down on the wand and then it starts again. It’s not a required item, but this makes the moves between each bottle when you’re bottling much easier and less messy, so it’s very nice to have.
