Brew from Scratch Project - Chapter One

I started home brewing in 1983.  I was living in South Dakota at the time and the beer options were few and not good.  "Old Dog's Head" was my home brew brand.  As is usually the case there were successes and failures but I always enjoyed the process.

Later I moved to Wisconsin.  And in parallel with that we began to enjoy a renaissance of small breweries that turn out magnificent ales and lagers.  I can interrupt my evening walk with a stop at a brewery right down the hill from me.  

But I am still interested in the brewing process and have decided to try a "total from scratch" process.  Grow the hops.  Grow and malt the barley.  I don't think I will carry a bucket of water up from the river but you never know.  The springs that fed the F.X. Schmidmeyer brewery are nearby and still running clear.  With some diligent boiling to deal with any microbes it might serve.

So over the next months you may have to endure a few updates.

First you have to grow stuff.

As part of an extensive back yard remodel I did have to consider pulling out the old fence.  But this section at least will be left up until fall.  I have for years been growing Cascade hops on it.  A few days before I took this picture I was squinting at the ground wondering where the hops sprouts were.  In about 72 hours they had grown a foot.

Hops are a good "crop" for a mediocre agriculturist to undertake.  Essentially a weed, it is probably hard to not get a bountiful crop after the vines have been established a few years.  And these have been growing every spring since I was last actively home brewing some 15 years ago.




Of course you need more than hops.  The absolute base ingredient of beer - well, other than wheat beer and such - is barley.  Again, very easy to grow, its essentially grass.  I bought a small bag with the following label.

I admit I had not known the Latin name for barley.  Back in my Roman archaeology days I have excavated around the periphery of a granary or "horreum".  So barley evidently is "common grain".   Maybe the granary was full of this.

I don't have a place to plant it but one of my sons has an acreage and is letting me till up a patch for the barley.  No doubt he'll accept payment in liquid form this fall.

Stay tuned.  

This is the first post in the Scratch Brew Project but the last post of this week.  Complicated travels and such.  Back with what I hope is interesting stuff on Monday.