mwc9711
Active Member
After many a search on this site and elsewhere, I have found almost 0 information on gruit/unhopped/herbed/medievel ales from those who have brewed them. I've looked all over the web, and the only helpful site has been Gruitale.com, although they have very little in the way of trial and error accounts. I've also read Sacred and Healing Herbal Beers, but once again a lot of history, and little methodology. Ideally we can start to compile a sort of database for Gruit/any other non-hopped or ancient ale. So here's my two cents.
First gruit experement: Used a simple pale ale base, and bittered with .15oz wormwood, .15oz yarrow and .15 oz wild rosemary. This was a 1 gallon experiment batch, because I feared I would create something vile. I boiled the herbs for 10 min, and then "dry herbed" with the same amount of herbs as I used in the boil. Let ferment for two week. Bottled using honey as a primer, but got very little carbonation. Didn't really measure the honey, although I probably should have. Anyway, at first the batch tasted strange, but it soon blended together to give a tart, lightly sour and very refreshing beer.
Anyone who has experimented with ale sans hops of any kind, please share.
First gruit experement: Used a simple pale ale base, and bittered with .15oz wormwood, .15oz yarrow and .15 oz wild rosemary. This was a 1 gallon experiment batch, because I feared I would create something vile. I boiled the herbs for 10 min, and then "dry herbed" with the same amount of herbs as I used in the boil. Let ferment for two week. Bottled using honey as a primer, but got very little carbonation. Didn't really measure the honey, although I probably should have. Anyway, at first the batch tasted strange, but it soon blended together to give a tart, lightly sour and very refreshing beer.
Anyone who has experimented with ale sans hops of any kind, please share.