A lot of my friends tried or do home brew at home point or another and 99% of them make what I consider to be "homebrew swill". Tastes "green", "raw", and always tastes like "homebrew" to me.

Interestingly enough, they ALL seem to think their beers are *good*, etc, etc.

Here's what I've learned so far about home brewing from the 1% that continually make a fantastic home brew:

a) Sanitation, sanitation, sanitation.
b) Forget the bottles (Unless you are Brewer).
c) Cornelous Kegs only.
d) Keep your recipe's simple, stupid.
e) if and when you actually make something that doesn't taste like "home brew", don't pretend you think you know what you are doing and "move on" to more complex beers, as all you're going to make is crap.

The few people that I know that make a really *good* home brew all use cornelius keg and C02 systems. No bottles. They are meticulous, and very adamant on the sanitation bit.