{"id":543,"date":"2015-05-30T01:36:24","date_gmt":"2015-05-30T01:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ancientartpodcast.org\/brew\/?p=543"},"modified":"2015-11-17T00:06:41","modified_gmt":"2015-11-17T00:06:41","slug":"pine-beer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ancientartpodcast.org\/brew\/pine-beer\/","title":{"rendered":"Pine Beer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Douglas<\/a><\/p>\n

Two things in my quest for antiquity:<\/p>\n

(1) I continue to have this yearning to brew beer without hops. Don’t get me wrong. IPA is my go-to beer of choice, but hops is, from my perspective, a fairly recent additive to beer \u2014 in the last mere 8 or 9 centuries.<\/p>\n

(2) I’m curious about the other resins that may have gone into the beers of the ancient Mediterranean world. As I’ve touch on in earlier posts, tree resin would have had preservative, flavoring, and aromatic effects similar (yet different) to modern hops. Resin would also have seeped into the earthenware vessels to help seal them during fermentation and storage.<\/p>\n

\"Douglas<\/a>Setting number 1 (I’ll call it “hoplessness”) on the back burner for now, I’m doing a little dabbling with various resins. Taking advantage of what’s at hand rather than what was accessible to ancient brewers, I reached for some new-growth sprigs of Eastern White Pine. Regrettably, I didn’t take any photos, but the aroma of the freshly cut tips was quite pleasant. For an extra oomph of resin, I also plucked a handful of baby Douglas Fir cones. Very green and dripping with sap.<\/p>\n

What Tree is That?<\/a><\/em>, the Arbor Day Foundation’s nifty online “Tree Identification Field Guide,” helped me identify these two species.<\/p>\n