This book (free version online) is what got me started in homebrewing way back when. Its a pretty great introduction and contains just about everything a new brewer needs to know to get started (although some of the info is a bit dated).
I haven't read this in years, but great advice for going all-grain in there as I recall.
I've been brewing for around half a year now. It's a lot of fun and not really all that hard once you've done it once. Probably the most important things are to not skip on vital equipment (like a large kettle for a 5 gallon batch, who says a bunch of 1 gallon pots will be fine, huh?) and be patient. So far we haven't had a bad batch although I'm not a big fan of our latest Belgian. You can get a basic brewing kit for pretty cheap if you just do extracts.
I'll have to check it out later. I've never tried brewing my own beer but I do roast my own coffee, so I'm kind of curious about the process. If it's something I can try on a weekend afternoon with mostly tools on hand I'll probably give it a whirl at some point. BTW, the 'See the new Beta Site!' ribbon in the upper left of the web page is absolutely hilarious to me for some reason...
If you want to brew with the least amount of equipment you would need at least the following on your first brew day: * Sanitizer - Cleanliness is incredibly important to the process. I prefer Starsan. Works great and is no rinse. * Brew Pot - Any standard stock pot will work. However, a bigger pot will make your beer turn out better. (Although you can get away with just using a standard 3 gallon one and topping off with bottled, distilled water.) * Fermentor - You will need something to keep the wort in as it becomes beer. It will need to be oversized by ~1 gallon to provide room for the krausen (foam that forms as yeast do their thing). Buckets with lids are the standard here. * Airlock and grommet - You need a way to let out CO2 without letting in air. An airlock does this perfectly and a grommet keeps it airtight. What you need for bottling: * Bottles - a standard homebrew batch is 5 gallons so you will need 48-52 bottles. Easiest way is to just save any poptop beer bottles and use those. * Caps - something to close the bottles! * Capper - to put the caps on * Racking Cane and Hosing - to pull beer out of fermentor. Like I said this is just your absolute minimum list. To make things easier I would recommend- * Bottle Filler - A gravity/spring loaded rod that only dispenses beer when the bottom is pressed against the inside of a bottle. * A separate bottling bucket - Allows a more even mix of priming sugar and prevents trub (beer gunk) from getting into bottles. * Thermometer and Hydrometer - Pretty much consider these essentials. Allow you to control your brew more accurately. * Secondary Fermentor - This is a pretty contested topic in the world of homebrew. Some people say that they are just an additional infection / oxidation risk. Others (like me) prefer to use them and feel they allow you to make clearer, better beer. A carboy is the standard option here.