I have yet to meet a casual survivalist who doesn't like beer. We at Pickles& Ammo have found home brewing beer much easier than we originally anticipated. All you need is good ingredients, a bit of equiptment, a friend or two, and a passion for super delicious beer. The most important thing is keeping it clean. We found the article Not Exactly Sterile useful in determining just how to go about this. We aren't big on the chemicals, so we mostly use dry heat, super hot soapy water, and a ton of white vinegar. It is good to keep in mind that people brewed their own beer long before the advent of petrol chemicals. And using too much bleach will make your beer taste like a swimming pool. Buying top notch ingredients will also make a difference in the quality of the final product. If you are lucky enough to have a local brewery supply company near by, go in and chat them up. Chances are they will have all kinds of wisdom to impart. Beer people for the most part are pretty easy going. We have been to many a brew shop and have had only one bad experience. I won't name the shop, but I will say it was in San Francisco. We were just getting started and had a bunch of fun-loving questions. The owner of the shop was belittling and basically a jackass. If we weren't so determined we might have walked out thinking that brewing beer was way beyond the scope of mere mortals and called it a day. Luckily we are stubborn and decided to say "nuts to him" and shop somewhere else. More specifically a delightful online shop called Seven Bridges Cooperative . We even called them with questions and they helped us like it was nothing. We have also had good experiences with Oak Barrel Winecraft in Berkeley. We at Pickles and Ammo believe that you should know how to make what you love. After all, who would want to survive without beer? That first batch of beer we brewed, by the way, was and is still some of the best beer I have ever drank in my life. So nuts to that guy.
