Doomsday scenario and brewing

So has anybody ever thought about what you would do if there was ever some doomsday event and you couldn't get your stuff to brew?

Like the other day I was watching a show on these people stockpiling stuff for doomsday. IE. food, water, fire making material. So i got to wondering, maybe I could learn to grow the grains and hops and harvest wild yeast. Or co-op with others who knew how to grow it for beer. Or even change over to wine and grow some muscadines or grapes.

So has anybody else thought about how you might get by after doomsday?

Does anybody do everything on their own and not rely on suppliers?

I have five years worth of grain, hops, water and yeast stockpiled in my underground bunker.

MisterTipsy said:

I have five years worth of grain, hops, water and yeast stockpiled in my underground bunker.

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YES! thats what im talking about.

unionrdr said:

Water would be a precious commodity at that point. If you servived to start with.

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assuming you survive and have other sources of food or excess grains and such.

Or maybe make an all corn beer with no hops? is that even possible?

Yeah, there's about a hundred different threads talking about this. Post apoclayptic, Zombiepocalype, etc.

Post Z-day brew system

If society as we know it collapsed...

What Preparation are You Making for the Coming Apocalypse?

Talks like this on here are about as common as talks about hops and water...and zombies.


That's why we even have the epic GaP (Grocery and Produce) Beer Experiment thread about fermenting liquid with non-traditional ingredients. The idea would be to raid grocery stores for fermentables and mashables.

The main reason that beer, wines, meads, ciders...alcohol in general is so important to society after a collapse (or in the old days) is because nothing pathogenic can grow in them. People drank beer because water could kill them.....

So our knowlege will be extremely valuable, from a purely health and safety reason. Also basic knowlege of creating and distilling alcohol will be important too. In fact on the history channel's "The Colony" l one of the "survivalists" was a homebrewer and he made alcohol from a sugar wash and distilled it into fuel for their escape vehicle and for wound cleaning.

Basically we'll all declare ourselves kings of the sacred barley water and trade beer for nubile slave girls.


I even designed my label for the "snake oil".......er I mean beer...



I figure I'll have my kingdom pretty well covered.

jrodskreet said:

Or maybe make an all corn beer with no hops? is that even possible?

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Yes,my Apache ancestors called it Tizwin (pronounced Tizween). Also made by Kiowa & Comanchi,all of the Athabascan people who came over the bering straight land bridge some 35,000 years ago. Variations are also made in Mexico,South America,etc. Said to be a bit nasty,just for getting buzzed.

Hops grow like weeds here.
I would have to build/set up a malt kiln, buts its barley country.

I don't have enough fermentor reactor capacity to keep the combines running exclusively on biodiesel though

I have discussed this with my friends whose plan it is to retire to some remote area and set up a commune in the case of the zombie apocalypse. They would have all essential jobs to do (teachers, carpenters, hunters, etc) and my one an only occupation would be to brew beer. I am ok with that.

How is this not a video game yet?!? Also, you should stockpile already brewed beer for currency purposes. It'll be worth a lot after the apocalypse for similar reasons that led people in the middle ages to drink beer

Nature will provide plenty of fermentables and flavorings. It may not be beer as we know it, but it'll be better than nothing! And possibly safer than the post-apocalyptic water...

On the question of corn beer, I just posted this yesterday in regard to a discussion about starch haze resulting from unmashed corn:

As an archaeologist, I often have to pore over 18th century documents in researching sites. Here's something I came across today in the 1732 writings of William Byrd:

"He farther told me he had brewed as good ale of malt made of Indian corn as he ever tasted; all the objection was he could neither by art or standing ever bring it to be fine in the cask. The quantity of corn he employed in brewing a cask of forty gallons was two bushels and a half, which made it very strong and pleasant."

Couldn't bring it to be fine in the cask? Yeah, I bet he had a little starch haze with all that corn!

But the lesson is- his beer was still good! (by 1732 standards, anyway)

HeadyKilowatt said:

"He farther told me he had brewed as good ale of malt made of Indian corn as he ever tasted; all the objection was he could neither by art or standing ever bring it to be fine in the cask. The quantity of corn he employed in brewing a cask of forty gallons was two bushels and a half, which made it very strong and pleasant."

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Time for a recipe!

December 21, 2012..................



Just less than 6 months left!






Or is that just as far in the future the Mayans calculated their calendar?

The funny thing is if you translated their calendar to ours, this date would've occurred in the middle of last year

sieglere said:

The funny thing is if you translated their calendar to ours, this date would've occurred in the middle of last year

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What's funny is that you are wrong.

When the collapse of the economy escalates the societal collapse and those who have not begin to take by force from those who have and the police and army leave their posts to defend their own families and the killing begins it will be necessary to spend 24 to 36 months in the wild as a hunter gatherer. After that period anyone who survives will need to have the primitive skills and tools necessary to establish small self sufficient communities to support themselves. The growing of grain and hops will part of those skills, including the malting of grain for flour and brewing. Primitive methods of water utilization and purification will be needed. The knowledge to do this currently exists you just need to seek it out now. So to answer the question I will brew as I do now just using the raw materials I produce myself. The process is not complicated including harvesting and cultivating yeast.
The question in my mind is not if the collapse occurs, but when. Stockpiles built now will require defending against those who come by force to take. Those who can live in the wild for 24 to 36 months will be able to rebuild once the killing ends, and there will be killing and lots of it. Mobility in the wild and knowledge, skill and experience of living in the wild while being mobile are the survival skills needed to be away from the killing.
So my advice is to learn now all you can, practice the primitive skills, test your skills in fun weekends in the wilderness.

Nuf said...

I feel like Tom Hanks would've been much happier in cast away if he made his own coconut liquor rather than Wilson....Or maybe a lot fatter

At least now I know I will be worth keeping alive.

jrodskreet said:

At least now I know I will be worth keeping alive.

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When society collapse and resorts to cannibalism, nobody eats the guy who can make beer.

That's an indispensible skill!

bwarbiany said:

When society collapse and resorts to cannibalism, nobody eats the guy who can make beer.

That's an indispensible skill!

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Love it!!!!

But I dunno our beer guts may be looked at as a few extra beer marinated steaks to some folks.

bwarbiany said:

When society collapse and resorts to cannibalism, nobody eats the guy who can make beer.

That's an indispensible skill!

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best post ever

Revvy said:

Love it!!!!

But I dunno our beer guts may be looked at as a few extra beer marinated steaks to some folks.

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No kidding, we're going to be the Kobe beef of the apocalypse.

y'all should take up bee keeping. Unlimited fermentables! I live by a lake so there's my water. I hope to buy a small hive sometime later this year. Water + honey + yeast= alcohol = Profit!

knotquiteawake said:

y'all should take up bee keeping. Unlimited fermentables! I live by a lake so there's my water. I hope to buy a small hive sometime later this year. Water + honey + yeast= alcohol = Profit!

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This post is full of win!

There is also maple and birch sap that can be boiled down to make syrup and syrup is not much different than honey...

Mead would be a much easier industry than beer making if you hit the end of the world. Of course you know all the honeybees are disappearing... indicating the end of the world is near.

http://www.primitiveways.com/
I have hardcopies of most of the articles on that site.

Knapping arrow/spear points from broken toilets and ceramic tubs is my favorite.

My first plan of action is to GTFO the city. I have a Land Cruiser so I won't need to stick to paved roads.
Once I'm far enough out in the desert, and have found defensible ground, I (and the people I've taken with me) will set up a small colony and live off the land until things calm down.

I'm in charge of brewing, distilling and water purification.

knotquiteawake said:

Mead would be a much easier industry than beer making if you hit the end of the world. Of course you know all the honeybees are disappearing... indicating the end of the world is near.

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This is actually not true anymore. What was happening is people that did not keep the bee's hives clean got mites. The mites carried a virus/disease that was contagious and caused the bees to leave the hive and die away from it. (Almost as if they were trying to save the hive.) The people that sanitized + cleaned their hives and hive areas never got the mites...

Revvy said:

But I dunno our beer guts may be looked at as a few extra beer marinated steaks to some folks.

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We may be like the meth heads in prison and can just sell our urine. Maybe that will be enough.

jrodskreet said:

We may be like the meth heads in prison and can just sell our urine. Maybe that will be enough.

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WHAT? Is that true? And how do you know?

Zamial said:

This is actually not true anymore. What was happening is people that did not keep the bee's hives clean got mites. The mites carried a virus/disease that was contagious and caused the bees to leave the hive and die away from it. (Almost as if they were trying to save the hive.) The people that sanitized + cleaned their hives and hive areas never got the mites...

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Interesting. Is there a natural action among wild honey bee hives that performs the cleaning action of are there now only domestic honeybee colonies remaining?