Home brewing.. which is easier? wine or beer?!
Answers: Im def. more of a dark beer drinker, but im interested in brewing my own wine or beer.. i would like to start with the most simple set up and process as possible, then move up., anyone with any experience have any advice? let me know, i am very interested
Wine is, in general, more forgiving of mistakes in sanitation because of its acidity. The setups are almost identical up to the bottling stage. I use the same equipment for both except that I have different plastic primary fermenters for beer and for wine. The taste of hops from the beer does no good to wine vinted in your beer primary. For what it's worth, I started with beer (an ale, much easier than lager) and then moved on to wine. You might want to read up on both beverages before starting. For beer, I'd suggest either "Homebrewing for Dummies" or Papazian's "New Complete Joy of Hombrewing".
Since beer is brewed and wine isn't, the one that would be easier to brew would be beer. There are several ways to homebrew beer- some people use extracts and syrups, and others go the traditional route of actually cracking and cooking their grain (usually malted barley) and then adding the hops and allowing the liquid to ferment. It is a time consuming and exact process, so if you don't have a high level of patience, you should probably stay away from it.
You may want to do a search via Google for home-brewers or an amateur brewing club in your local area.
Both can be made using a 5 gallon bucket and lid with an airlock, some tubing for siphoning and some bottles, but if you spring for better equipment whatever you make will reflect that investment. basic beer kits and wine are about the same to make, just add water, a quick boil and then fermentation. If you go that route be sure to trow away whatever yeast comes with your kit and spring for some liquid yeast culture, it will make a huge difference. And be sure to sanitize the crap out of everything that that will touch whatever you decide to make.