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ryantate21

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Hi my name is Ryan and i live in Serbia,

I will be making my first home brew as soon as soon as my grain is ready for the mill, but over here it is near impossible to get your hands on hops, are there any alternatives i could use?

I was thinking along the lines of dry cinnamon and roasted chestnuts or hazelnuts.

Any feedback or ideas would be highly appreciated.

Ryan.
 
Thanks for the links, both helpful and interesting reads. There is a few bio markets/health stores here that i think will suply majority of the herbs mentioned.

What results would you expect from citrus fruit zests or roasted nuts?
 
Thanks for the links, both helpful and interesting reads. There is a few bio markets/health stores here that i think will suply majority of the herbs mentioned.

What results would you expect from citrus fruit zests or roasted nuts?

NOt sure of nuts, but citrus/coriander leaves a nice fruity flavor behind. Very nice in wheats,hefes, and wits.


And FYI Wormwood is BITTER!!!
 
thanks a lot for the advice... I've got a feeling a lot of experimenting will be involved in the first few batches, fingers crossed i can get a nice tasting brew!
 
Good luck to you, but something tells me that without hops for bittering your brew won't come out tasting like anything you're familiar with. Not that it won't taste great, just different.

Have you prospected the idea of growing your own hops? Granted I'm on another side of the world, but sources for hop rhizomes aren't too hard to come by here.
 
You might also want to try rosemary. A guy in my homebrew club brewed an IPA with nothing but rosemary. It was surprisingly good!! The rosemary gave it a nice piney flavor and aroma. Just be careful because it is easy to over do it.
 
Before hops, brewers used something called "gruit" to balance the flavors in their beer. I'm not sure that will be any easier to find in your area, but it's worth checking out:

http://www.gruitale.com/intro_en.htm
http://www.homebrewing.com/articles/gruit.php

...the first link is especially excellent, and one that I used extensively in planning some gruits that I did in the past. I've also ordered some herbs from the site, and was very satisfied.

Good luck to you, but something tells me that without hops for bittering your brew won't come out tasting like anything you're familiar with. Not that it won't taste great, just different.

Gruit is indeed very different from anything that most people know beer to be...it tends to be a bit on the tart side (especially if you use yarrow for bittering), and has much more of an herbal/earthy quality to it. Not unpleasant at all, especially if you let it age for a while, but definitely not like "normal" modern beer...

You might also want to try rosemary. A guy in my homebrew club brewed an IPA with nothing but rosemary. It was surprisingly good!! The rosemary gave it a nice piney flavor and aroma. Just be careful because it is easy to over do it.

Rosemary can be used as a bittering herb and flavoring herb...the March or Wild rosemary that is one of the traditional brewing herbs is actually in the rhododendron family though.
 
some health food stores will also carry hops as a nutritional supplement if they have bulk herbs etc - worth asking them if they can get them if you can't find them elsewhere

you would be going in blind since they won't list the variety or AA% but certainly worth looking into
 
Ryan,

I'm south of you and this is I did. Locate a brewery in Serbia. I imagine its more wine country like here in Bulgaria, but....

Introduce yourself and explain you are looking for a very small amount of hops (from their perspective). At a minimum I would expect they would find homebrewing so interesting they would give you the name of their supplier. Perhaps they might even toss you a few oz.

http://beerme.com/region.php?467
 
Ryan,

I'm south of you and this is I did. Locate a brewery in Serbia. I imagine its more wine country like here in Bulgaria, but....

Introduce yourself and explain you are looking for a very small amount of hops (from their perspective). At a minimum I would expect they would find homebrewing so interesting they would give you the name of their supplier. Perhaps they might even toss you a few oz.

http://beerme.com/region.php?467

Very nice.
 
you could also use heather flowers or yarrow flowers. yarrow should be growing in that region, although i have no idea on your seasons so i don't know if it is flowering or not. also, both might be available at the health food store you mentioned.
 
hemp or it's more giggily, stickier cousin also makes a fine beer......so i've heard....
 
I wonder if you could order hop rhizomes from outside the country, and grow hops yourself?

I move a lot with work, so i wouldn't be in one place long enough to get propper growth, but definatly something i will do once i eventually settle down in one place

Ryan,

I'm south of you and this is I did. Locate a brewery in Serbia. I imagine its more wine country like here in Bulgaria, but....

Introduce yourself and explain you are looking for a very small amount of hops (from their perspective). At a minimum I would expect they would find homebrewing so interesting they would give you the name of their supplier. Perhaps they might even toss you a few oz.

http://beerme.com/region.php?467

Great link, got in contact with one of the breweries and im meeting one of their reps. Hopfully it will solve the whole issue!

you could also use heather flowers or yarrow flowers. yarrow should be growing in that region, although i have no idea on your seasons so i don't know if it is flowering or not. also, both might be available at the health food store you mentioned.

thats something i will check over the weekend, thanks for the tip :)
 
Wormwood,but use caution with the amout you use. I used yarrow from a healthfood store, and all i can say is lemon, it thought i used a moderate amount also
 
Wormwood? Im reading 1/4 to 1/2 oz is more than sufficient. It contains thujone which can be harmfull or fatal in large amounts.You may be interested in a book called Sacred herbal Healing Beers wich has extensive descriptions of herbs used in brewing.
I used about 1/8 oz yarrow(dried) in a two gallon batch, and has been very lemony last one i tried was 4-5 weeks in the bottle.Hoping it changes, but is a pretty refreshing beer for summer i guess if you like lemonade. Probably depends on your source,fresh is recommended. Maybe something went wrong in my brewing process, but what i got was very tart lemon.
Im a newbie fan of juniper though, i really dig rogues juniper pale ale .
 
I made 2 wormwood ales. I still have some left. I used 1/8 oz in the last one and it was still to much. It is near pure tannis which is bitter in a BAD way. It grabs at the back of the tongue and throat. I would use a very little bit and boil it in water for 10 minutes then discard the water and add it to the boil in an effort to reduce the tannins.

The whole Thurjne thing and it having "effects" is 100% pure BS. It was a clever medieval sales pitch used to move wretched tasting booze that has lasted through the ages. The only thing wormwood ales/drinks do for to you is make you drunk.
 
Couldn't you get it sent from the UK?
There is a site/shop run by a guy called Rob who sends hops to Thailand for me. I'm sure that he wouldn't mind shipping to where you are.
 
ill make a few 1 gal batches with the same wort and see what results it produces with different measurements of woodworm. A refreshing summer brew would go down a treat over here, summer weather is very hot and dry!

badlee, could you give me the site where you order and I will see if its a possibility for serbia too?
 
Heather Tips are an essential ingredient in traditional Scottish Heather Ale. Use in the boil to add bitterness, or at the end of the boil for the distinct floral Heather flavor and aroma. Heather adds an earthy, herbal flavor and a light floral peat moss and fresh mown hay aroma. In the boil, heather will add some bitterness- Heather was actually outlawed at one point in England because the Scots used Heather for bittering instead of importing English hops. Heather can also be added to the secondary fermenter, or used as a filter bed for the mash runoff. Use 1 oz. to 8 oz. during the boil or in the secondary fermentor. Heather has been used in traditional medicine to treat urinary & kidney problems, and has mild sedative properties
 
I think yarrow made me feel like i was kind of differnet the next day, and believe me ive experemented enough to know what differnt feels like.Ive also used tons of herbs,(not in beer) and im a pretty big ginseng fan,for good energy. Not sayin to use ginseng but i have heard of green tea beer, which i drink alot of this energizing tea.
 
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