Worm wood in beer??

i was wondering if anyone has every tried putting wormwood( the same stuff that makes you halocinate in absinth) in beer while brewing?? do you think it would work??

May I suggest using all the functions this website offers to find your answer. Specifically the "Search" function. It does trully amazing things.

If you've never had a absinthe hangover you wouldn't know. My friend brought a bottle back from Europe and we drank it. Man I have never had a hangover like that before. Everything but my head felt bad. I don't think it would be a good thing in beer, hard to tell how much before it would be too much as far as bittering.

springboard from new belguim has wormwood in it...

Yeah...Thujone ain't gonna make you trip nuts. If you want a "delerium" brew you'd be more suited to dry-"shrooming" some psilocybinoids. Betcha that topic hasn't been covered!

EDIT: Now I sit back and RDWHAHB while someone eagerly searches for beer mycology to prove me wrong.

I've had wormwood beer, and it wasn't bad at all. It is a harsher, more stringent bitterness than you find with hops, but it can work. I wouldn't wait around for a visit from the Green Fairy, though.


TL

Here is a good write up on a side by side comparison of two identical beers (gruit actually) one with wormwood the other with out.

Beer Dorks

just thought id post this to combat your statement...
unfortunately Psilocybin and other similar alkaloids break down rapidly in aqueous solutions. So a brew with mushrooms in it would 1 probably taste like **** and 2 probably wouldn't stay potent long enough for you to drink it (if you dry hopped it in the second carboy then it would be around 3 weeks after that that you would be drinking it)

even with a high alcohol beer, and im talking really high, there isn't enough alcohol present to truly extract the psilocybin from the mushrooms. Making an elixir with say everclear or something similar will result in a much better shot at tripping off what you're drinking (i guarantee it will work muhaha). you probably wouldn't get enough noticeable effects to make it worth while using beer, simply too much water...

mrkristofo said:

Yeah...Thujone ain't gonna make you trip nuts. If you want a "delerium" brew you'd be more suited to dry-"shrooming" some psilocybinoids. Betcha that topic hasn't been covered!

EDIT: Now I sit back and RDWHAHB while someone eagerly searches for beer mycology to prove me wrong.

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ThaDutchMasta said:

just thought id post this to combat your statement...
unfortunately Psilocybin and other similar alkaloids break down rapidly in aqueous solutions. So a brew with mushrooms in it would 1 probably taste like **** and 2 probably wouldn't stay potent long enough for you to drink it (if you dry hopped it in the second carboy then it would be around 3 weeks after that that you would be drinking it)

even with a high alcohol beer, and im talking really high, there isn't enough alcohol present to truly extract the psilocybin from the mushrooms. Making an elixir with say everclear or something similar will result in a much better shot at tripping off what you're drinking (i guarantee it will work muhaha). you probably wouldn't get enough noticeable effects to make it worth while using beer, simply too much water...

Click to expand...

There is a way it can be done. I've had it before. Honey will extract the Psilocybin from the fungus. Let them soak in the honey for about six months. then use the honey solution in a high gravity batch. It is great. Though it tastes a little funny (like drinking mushroom beer.)

i know this is a tad bit late in the thread to bring up, but yes shrooms and beer work excellent together. anyone's who has ever made tea with them know the psilocybin is totally h2o extractable. a friend of mine introduced me to this experiment, and it's a great little buzz bringer. He used 1/2-1 oz and boiled with the wort for a full 60 minutes for a five gallon batch or stout. Brought it to a 4th of july party, and we all celebrated with bouts of drunkeness followed by nice clarification of reality. i suggest everyone give it a try once.

WOP31, I think I can see why the wormwood beer turned out so badly. He boiled the wormwood for 60 minutes and probably extracted a buttload of tannins. If I were going to add wormwood, I would add it to the primary after fermentation has slowed a bit.

Yes, it seems to give quite a hangover, I agree! I want to try making some though and I'm wondering if anyone else here has made some. I found a place that sells absinthe kits and I'm thinking of ordering one and giving it a try. The stuff I drank was bitter but I kind of liked it. Any thoughts?

WortMonger said:

If you've never had a absinthe hangover you wouldn't know. My friend brought a bottle back from Europe and we drank it. Man I have never had a hangover like that before. Everything but my head felt bad. I don't think it would be a good thing in beer, hard to tell how much before it would be too much as far as bittering.

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It's actually not the wormwood that gives you the hangover. It's the combination of the alcohol and the wormwood. To avoid this problem people will often make it in really strong hard liquor and burn off the alcohol. That's why they add the sugar cubes to it. Wormwood is bitter plus the concentrated flavor of the booze it's in. Might as well be drinking an IPA mixed with bleach.

True absinthe is distilled a few times to get rid of nasty bitter astringent flavors. If you throw enough worm wood in there to get decent activity from one serving, it will prob make a pretty harsh tasting brew.

e mail me I use B17 leaves all the time in my brews