Beginner Bottling Quandry

I'm currently trying to decide which route to go with for the bottling of my beer. Although the beer won't be made until February/March '09, I'm researching to take care of all the odds and ends beforehand. Assuming I get the itch after my first couple of batches, which I'm sure will happen, I plan to eventually incorporate a kegging system.

However, since I don't know for sure that things will pan out that way, I want to start with bottles. That brings me to my current predicament. I first thought of using 2 cases of 12oz bottles since that's what is needed for a 5 gallon batch. After snooping around on Midwest's store, I saw that they had 22oz bottles which I would only need 24 of instead of 48 12oz's. This would definitely help with space constraints.

I also found a mini kegging system known as the Party Pig. If I were to use that, I would be able to put half of a batch in the Pig and split the rest between whichever bottle size I decided to go with. Which setup would be optimal for a first time brewer?

I say go with 22oz bottles...but I know for some people these are hard to find in large quantities. I started out bottling with 12oz, which work just fine of course but that's a lot of damn bottles to delabel, clean, sanitize and fill. If you go with 22's, you cut that workload in half...and you have a GREAT excuse for buying a bunch of fantastic special release stuff because they usually come in those bottles .

You can usually find a case of new 22's for $10 at most HBS.

I bottle 6-12 in 22's for myself and the rest in 12's for both giving away to friends and when I only want one beer for dinner. You will most likely have friends wanting your brew and it's much easier to replace a 12 oz. that doesn't find it's way back home than a 22 oz.

I've never done the party pig thing and am halfway on my way to kegging but from what I hear the party pig is a decent piece of equipment but you will most likely go to full blown kegging sometime in the future so whether you want to invest on equipment that you know you'll outgrow is up to you.

The 12 oz ones are a bit of a pain in the ass but they are easy to come by and work great for more or less everything. I'd say if you can find some beer you want to drink that comes in 22s go for it but don't go out and buy new bottles... unless you have your heart set on fliptops... I usually bottle in just whatever is around, typically mostly 12 oz but there are some 22s, a dozen quart stubbies, a 1/2 gal fliptop growler, and some random-sized other stuff (sam smith bottles etc) in my fleet. Just keep buying beer and no twist-offs allowed, you'll be fine.

Where's the leg and bottle from keg option? If you're stuck with bottling, most go with larger because you have to clean/sanitize/fill/cap less bottles. Regular bottles are great for handing out etc, and it's easier to give away a smaller easier to find bottle then a 22 oz bottle if you're not sure you're going to get it back. Get some good microbrews to sample and save the bottles; It's win win.

The only bit of advice I have here is to bulk prime in another barrel that way it does not matter if you have different sizes of bottles. And get a proper capper, bench press.

5 gallons will fill 54 12oz or 29 22oz bottles.. nothing sucks on bottling day more than running out of bottles.

This is what I'm thinking, as soon as I can keg, I'm gonna. That, to me, is the best option. I know it can be pricey, but in the long run I think it'll be worth it.

I'll get a keg eventually, but I don't want to shell out that much cash up front if this ends up not being the thing for me. I doubt I'll want to stop after my first batch, but you never know. I just think the Pig would be a good idea because it would not only save space and give me less work on bottling day, I'd have some idea of what it'd be like once I'm ready to move onto kegs. Thanks for the answers, everyone.