Boozing, Hooching, and Brewing all relate back to the wonderful art of fermentation. That is turning sugars into the sweet, sweet alcohol!

So you might be asking why the hell would I make my own booze when I can go down to the store and pickup a case of natty light for $14 and drown my misery in something that tastes like piss? Well, if you live a state or country with alcohol taxes, it can be well worth the money to buy the raw materials, and with time create booze at half the cost while you coast along with whats left of your unemployment benefits in your parent's house.

Buying in bulk is your friend here. A 25lb bag of sugar will run you very little in terms of potential alcohol compared to retail alcohol. Per pound, sugar offers about 6% ABV per gallon of fermented alcohol. In those terms alone that means you could have about 25 gallons of an okay beer or 12 gallons of serious wine.

IM CONVINCED WHAT DO I NEED TO START HOOCHIN? Welp, your going to need a few things

• A container that can be sealed lightly and tightly, preferably one that has a wide opening for fruits if you want to get fancy and reuse you bottles so they can be cleaned.
• Yeast. Any yeast can readily ferment up to and over 10% ABV with time, even wild harvested ones or common bread yeast. However, if you want to expedite the process I recommend finding your local brew store or getting some yeasts online. EC-1118, 71B, 4x4, are all good and capable of getting to over 15% in a little over a week. Yeasts can be reused a good amount if your keeping them cool in a low alcohol solution with food and nutrient, like you would a sourdough starter. Wild yeast can be harvested from grapes and raisins and coaxed alive by small additions of sugar and mashed fruits.
• Fruit. Grapes have everything a wine could want, and apples are also pretty good. Even the straight juices from these fruits can yield a good brew. 3-5 lbs of fruit per gallon is what I'd recommend for most brews. An apple juice offers about 5% just from the sugars within, so plan accordingly. GET JUICES WITHOUT PRESERVATIVES, AND A WORD OF WARNING ABOUT CITRUS BELOW
• Time, water, and a cool damp place.

OKAY I DID ALL THAT AND NOW WHAT SHOULD I BE CAREFUL ABOUT?

• Spoilage. 10% ABV is the lowest you really want to aim for if you plan on keeping your brew for any considerable chunk of time more than a month or so. With regards to wild molds If its white its fine, If its green its bad. Always try to keep things clean as you brew.
• Time. Some brews are going to taste "hot" for a while after they finish converting the sugar to alcohol. Some will also taste/smell sharply acidic or even like feet if the yeasts were stressed. This can all pass with time as your booze refines itself.
• Headspace. Keep the lid slightly loose as the ferment starts, and dont go having it filled to the brim as the ferment starts. you want space otherwise your container could explode or shoot fruit juice or pulp everywhere. I've had it happen and it aint fun to clean up.
• Fruit. Wash down your fruit for pesticides, as well citrus fruits can be tricky. Some like fermenting them, other say they get real funky. Consensus seems to be that they like short ferments like tepache/pineapple beer withing a week or twoo or really long times to sit and settle (1-2 years). Fermenting with fresh fruit might also lead to it sitting at the top or the fermenter and can dry out and mold. give them a good swirl every day or two to prevent this.
• Sanitation. Be sure to wash out your containers with a small and dilute solution of bleach and soap to sanitize the fermenting space and you generally dont have to worry too much about spoilage organisms. Really. The worst thing I've had was a small amount of a vinegar organism getting into my wine because I stirred it too much. This loses alcohol, but I like sour beers so it wasnt like a sour wine lost too much in my opinion.
• Methanol. This is not a thing for homebrewing in any considerable sense but I figure I'd put it here. Unless you are distilling your booze into fire water, and even then you'd have to be making a lot (gallons of hooch) of it to get an appreciable amount of methanol that you could poison yourself with.
• Cloudiness. Some people swear that drinking cloudy booze can give you the shits and wicked farts. Hasn't been my experience, which is that cloudiness tastes beery and yeasty. So I assume most of those people also get beer shits in general. But still, clear booze is pretty booze. when your ferment is done after the first 2 weeks of sitting around, you may want to pour/siphon it off the yeast and fruit at the bottom and top and top off that container with water. Stick it in the fridge for about a week or so sealed and very very still. The yeast will settle out and from there you can pour it off those lees and start a whole nother ferment with that if you like. At that point your booze should be nice and dry and ready to drink or put away for long term storage.
• Acidity and Tannins. Some fruits and juices dont have enough acids to keep a brew clean and pretty. Things like bananas need a splash of about half a lemon's juice to the gallon to make sure the yeasts are happy. Tannins are also something you might find lacking in your brews. You can supplement this with a cup of strongly brewed tea, or by using the more of the fruits peel. To use bananas again, if you decide against using the peels because you think their a little over ripe and icky, just brew a cup of tea or two and add it to your gallon.
• Bottles. HDPE or #2 plastic in the states is the best reusable plastic you can get, at least state side for holding alcohol, especially if it isnt clear. You can clean it with bleach or acids like you could glass and it wont break down. You'll recognize it as the gallon milk jugs, my cat litter, Simply Purfect TM, is the costco brand and it holds about 4.5 Gallons of liquid when full.
• Oxygen. Once your brew is done fermenting and releasing CO2, oxygen exposure will start to fuck with it and make it weird. You can fix this by adding water to you brew when you keep it tightly closed in storage.

Hope this helps ya and encourages you to embark on the cheap homebrewing adventures that have helped keep me sane and drunk in these trying times. If you think I missed something HMU in the comments.