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Question:
how did people ferment alchohol before the effects of yeast were known? did they just keep the stuff open to the air? if so, wouldn’t most alchohol be ridiculously gross? if so, how did commercial breweries exist?
Hey now… a lot of people still drink Budmillercoors and we know that they are ridiculously gross. Alcohol is alcohol to some, and they don’t care how they get blitzed, just as long as they are completely out of circulation before the party ends. Lambics (authentic, original ones anyway) are still brewed in the open air. They rely on the presence of a certain type of microbe either present in the region or in the wood of the roof of the buildings. Large flat trays full of liquid resting open to the outdoors… I’m sure that the first beers were pretty bad, but as we can see, they have been getting better. Heck, many wines still ferment using the yeasts that naturally grow on the skins after the wine has been pressed. They probably figured (accurately) that that is what was turning the grapes into silly juice and used that fact to their advantage. They didn’t have to know exactly what was happening for scientific method to help them out. I wonder, it’s possible that this was some of the earliest scientific work done… Kinda puts beer in a whole new light. Beer–the precursor to the space shuttle, Fermilab, and Ginsu knives… — If I spoke for TI, they’d fire me. I don’t and they don’t.
Response:
While we’re on the subject of history, I visited Jamestown Virginia (you know the first successful settlement of Euro-types in the New World) last fall and the tour guide said the first permenant structure built (even before the church) by these savy/thirsty settlers was the brew house. The rest IS history.. Walt Davis
Response:
While we’re on the subject of history, I visited Jamestown Virginia (you know the first successful settlement of Euro-types in the New World) last fall and the tour guide said the first permenant structure built (even before the church) by these savy/thirsty settlers was the brew house. The rest IS history..
‘Scuse me, but I thought the first settlers (those despatched from the Norfolk/ Northamptonshire areas of England), were quakers ? If so, and I could be wrong, what the heck were they doing drinking beer ? Regards — Bicester Compuserve : 100332,641 Fax : 0869 240324
Response:
While we’re on the subject of history, I visited Jamestown Virginia (you know the first successful settlement of Euro-types in the New World) last fall and the tour guide said the first permenant structure built (even before the church) by these savy/thirsty settlers was the brew house. The rest IS history.. ‘Scuse me, but I thought the first settlers (those despatched from the Norfolk/ Northamptonshire areas of England), were quakers ? If so, and I could be wrong, what the heck were they doing drinking beer ?
Peter, I think the key word here is "successful". There were several settlements that did not survive, the most famous/notorious being that on Roanoke Island–there is still some mystery about what happened to the settlement there. Cheers, Dave in Sydney — David S. Draper School of Earth Sciences, Macquarie University Fax: +61-2-805-8428 Voice: +61-2-805-8347
Response:
how did people ferment alchohol before the effects of yeast were known? did they just keep the stuff open to the air?
Yes. This is still how lambics are made in Belgium. if so, wouldn’t most alchohol be ridiculously gross?
Yes. But safer to drink than most water at the time (thanks to the boil), and some breweries produced less gross beer than others, thanks to their endemic microflora profiles. if so, how did commercial breweries exist?
Somebody noticed that they could "turbocharge" the start of fermentation by adding some fermenting beer from a previous batch. Then they began to realize that if they used fermenting beer from a less-gross brewery to start fermentation in a real swillhouse, its beer would improve. Still, it was understood that you couldn’t operate a brewery just anywhere, nor all year round. – Martin — = Martin Lodahl Systems Analyst, Capacity Planning, Pacific*Bell = = If it’s good for ancient Druids runnin’ nekkid through the wuids, = = Drinkin’ strange fermented fluids, it’s good enough for me! (Unk.) =
Response:
how did people ferment alchohol before the effects of yeast were known? did they just keep the stuff open to the air? if so, wouldn’t most alchohol be ridiculously gross? if so, how did commercial breweries exist? bob vesterman.
Response:
| how did people ferment alchohol before the effects of yeast were known? | did they just keep the stuff open to the air? Some brewers still do this (Lambic), but repitching a bit of (accidentally:) nice tasting beer was the most common practice for traditional brewers. | if so, wouldn’t most alchohol | be ridiculously gross? No, not neccesarily: I made a pretty decent saison-like beer by leaving 5L of wort outside for a night. I guess that with selective cropping from flukes you can go a long way in building yoour own ‘house-yeast’ (after all, brewing yeasts are generally not built from scratch, they’re out in the wild) How about ‘Saccharomyces Cerevisae Vestermannis Back-yardis’ for a new strain 
| if so, how did commercial breweries exist? I’ll bet that most of them brewed more interesting beer than the current mega’s. | | bob vesterman. | Utrecht University, Geophysics dept, Utrecht, the Netherlands