Article: Beer Archaeologists Are Reviving Ancient Ales — With Some Strange Results

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ryanmetcalf
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Article: Beer Archaeologists Are Reviving Ancient Ales — With Some Strange Results

#1 Post by ryanmetcalf » Sun May 26, 2019 2:08 pm

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/20 ... ge-results
"The one thing that we've been really quite surprised by is not a single one of them is undrinkable," he says. "Every one of them has gotten done and we're like, 'That is so weird. That is just so cool.' "

There's the Viking-inspired beer based on information gleaned from sagas and the debris of ancient shipwrecks. It's made with juniper branches and baker's yeast, which gives it a slight but surprising whiff of banana. (Rupp regrets that he had to ferment it in regular brewing equipment rather than a more historically accurate trough made from a freshly cut and hollowed out juniper tree.)

Another, called Beersheba, is based on references and artifacts primarily from Israel. It involves three types of grain and pomegranate juice, in the style of King Zimri-Lim, who, Rupp read, was known to send slaves into the mountains to get snow for his icehouse so that his beer could be served cold. It's one of Rupp's personal favorites, despite smelling a little like baby spit-up and tasting like a funky fruit rollup.

A beer called Benedictus came about when Rupp teamed up with a couple of Italian monks to re-create a monastic recipe calling for wormwood and lavender and dating to A.D. 825. It smells like a spicy men's shampoo and tastes like drinking an herb garden. The Peruvian chicha, on the other hand, is sour and summery.

The brewery's latest is a porter meant to show what George Washington would have been swigging at Mount Vernon during his retirement years.

"It's also maybe a little too drinkable, as I would attest on the first night that this got released," says Rupp.

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Re: Beer Archaeologists Are Reviving Ancient Ales — With Some Strange Results

#2 Post by ryanmetcalf » Sun May 26, 2019 2:10 pm

Has anyone tried making a Chicha? Saw a few jokes and comments here on the forum in 2010 and reference to Chuck having some at a 2013 meeting, I'd definitely be interested in giving it a try some time

https://draftmag.com/how-to-make-chicha/
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/ ... icha-beer/
Traditional Method: The first step to making traditional chicha is moistening the maize with water, rolling it into a small ball and placing in your mouth. Work the maize thoroughly with the tongue until it is completely saturated with saliva. The natural enzymes (ptyalin) from human saliva work to convert the cornstarch into fermentable sugar. Then, the chewed up corn (called muko) is dried out. You’ll use two pounds of the cornmeal for this step.

To make the beer, combine the dried out muko with the other pound of raw cornmeal along with any other additives you think would be tasty. For the recipe below, we use squash pulp and prickly pear cactus fruits, but you can use pineapple, cinnamon, cloves, strawberries or limes. Heat the three gallons of water to 150° F (65° C) and add it to your ingredients. Let it stand until cool. Ladle out the top layer of liquid (called upi) and set aside. Next, scoop out the jelly-like middle layer (called misqui kketa) and cook in a pot on the stove until it turns a caramel-like color. While this is cooking, press the grains and other ingredients by using a strainer or a lid to strain the liquid from the grain. Add this liquid to the initial liquid you drew off (upi) and boil for an hour. Once the jelly-like middle layer turns to a caramel-like color, add it to the boiling liquid. Cool the final mixture to 70° F (21° C), pour into a fermenter and add yeast. Allow for fermentation to complete (about a week), siphon into bottles, prime and cap.

Ingredients:

3 pounds coarsely ground cornmeal
1 pound squash pulp (any will do, from pumpkin to winter squash)
1 pound prickly pear cactus fruits
3 gallons of water
ale yeast
Modern Method: For those of you who don’t want to sit around for hours chewing up corn (we know who you are), use the following recipe. Crush the germinated corn coarsely and pour in the brewpot with 8 quarts of cold water. Sit and let sit one hour. Bring it to a boil, add the sugar, then lower the heat and simmer three hours (stirring regularly). Add whatever spices you desire at the end of the boil. In this recipe we use cloves but you can use anything from cinnamon to ginger. Remove and let it sit for one hour. Next, strain the liquid into a fermenter using a strainer, cheese cloth or any other method you prefer. Once it cools to 70° F (21° C), pitch the yeast and ferment at room temperature (between 60 and 75° F) for five days. Rack to secondary and ferment for one to two weeks until clarified. Bottle using 1 teaspoon corn sugar per bottle for priming. Finally, let it sit two more weeks after bottling before drinking.

Ingredients (1 gallon)

8 quarts water
1 pound germinated corn (jora)
2 cups brown sugar
8 whole allspice or cloves
ale yeast

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