Preface:
It’s been snowing non-stop for 4 days; you live in Georgia, and you ran out of Natty Light 2 days ago. PROBLEMS, what are you going to do? Besides the Cabin Fever and you are chasing your wife with an axe like the shining you need sustenance. You need Beer!
Materials
The tools you need are simple: an electric drip coffee maker with hot plate, a coffee filter, 2 1-liter glass sample jars with air-tight lids, 2 handkerchiefs, 2 rubber bands, and a source of clean (preferably R/O) water.
You’ll have to be more creative with your ingredients. Your need grains, malt, hops, and something for flavor. Simple grains such as those found in common cereals – Raisin Bran, Cracked Wheat, Kashi, whatever you can find – are decent sources of starches and usually contain enough enzymes to break the most complex proteins down. Fruit and nuts will add flavor, but are not important. The grains should be ground as fine as possible, rolled under a rolling pin or crushed in a mortar and pestle. The smaller the grains the greater the reactive surface area.
ugh...
Malt is tricky. It is possible to create an all grain beer, but with the inferior products you’re brewing with, you want to give the yeast more to eat. The best you can hope for is vegemite, marmite, or some other yeast extract. These products are extracted from brewer’s yeast to begin with, so they already contain ideal food for yeast to thrive on. The problem is that they also tend to be very salty. Fortunately, you’re in luck, because the process involved in brewing this knee deep snow will leave the salt happily stuck to the inside of your coffee maker and not in your mash.
Originally, I promoted stashing hops in my basement, since now they would be the hardest to find. Over the last year I have received advice from brewers and scientists alike assuring me that there are most certainly alternatives to hops that you can find in any home. Everything from orange peels to sage leaf are effective, keeping in mind they may add a very different flavor to your beer. One home-brewer even recommended a completely different weed altogether. However, in keeping with the theme of this recipe, Alfalfa pellets, wormwood, heather, ti leaves, oak leaves, nettles, spruce tips "parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme" being used for beer flavor. To quote Ted Danyluk, "herbs such as alecost, betony, dandelion, horehound, milk thistle, nettle, sage and yarrow can be used" as well. A quick walk in the frozen woods can help you find anything you need MacGyver.
Finally, you’ll need to find some yeast. Ask your wife if she has baker’s yeast…Most grocery stores will have bakers’ yeast. If you’re very lucky they might have brewers’ yeast. Time to stock up before catastrophe befalls your future.
Finally, you’ll need to find some yeast. Ask your wife if she has baker’s yeast…Most grocery stores will have bakers’ yeast. If you’re very lucky they might have brewers’ yeast. Time to stock up before catastrophe befalls your future.
Methods
Sanitation is key, wash everything with an iodine solution or, if there are no other options, ethanol. Contamination is your enemy. Everything must be clean. Boil the handkerchiefs, rubber bands, sample jars, and lids.
1. Grind up your ‘grains’ (but not so much that it becomes powder).
2. Place your ‘grains’ in coffee pot (not the filter basket, the carafe).
3. Run 2 cups of clean water through coffee maker and let it sit on the hot plate for an hour. This releases all the good chemicals from you ‘grains’ and creates a fluid called wort.
4. Strain the wort through the coffee filter and place the filter full of ‘grain’ into the filter basket. Add the ‘malt’ to the filter basket. Pour the strained liquid back into coffee maker and add 1 cup of water.
5. Run the wort through the coffee maker 5 times, each time adding 1 cup of water.
6. Pour the wort into the saucepan and boil for 45 minutes. Two minutes before boiling is done, add the hops.
7. Carefully pour the wort into the canning jars.
8. Let the wort cool to between 60 and 70 F. Once it is cool enough to touch the outside of the jars without burning, pitched the Bakers’ Yeast into the mixture.
9. Seal jar with a handkerchief and rubber band over the mouth, and let sit for 3 to 5 days.
10. And table spoon of sugar to the jar and seal with the lids, making sure they’re air tight.
11. Store in a cool, dark place where it will not be disturbed for a week.
Results
A cool, smooth brew, flavored with whatever you found. It may be very bad, it may be good. It will be beer. You will be a hero!
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