Chicha

[Tielson's]

Does anyone here know a good chicha recipe???

 

[Revvy]

Are you talking about this?

An alcoholic beer-like drink that was brewed and drunk by the Wari, a civilization that thrived in what is today Peru from about 700 to 1000 C.E., before mysteriously disappearing. The chica made by the Wari was made from the berries of the molle pepper plant. Some people today still drink chica, which is now made from corn.

On page 301 in this Google book, The Chemistry of Common Life is the preparation of Chica http://books.google.com/books?id=bc...g=vMpEAff2RXWkNXeTanXWGBTU8i0&hl=en#PPA301,M1

You know you're supposed to get a bunch of people together to chew on corn then spit it into a fermentaion container don't you?

Technically, chicha is/was make by converting starch into sugar by chewing it, and letting disastase enzymes in human saliva do the starch/sugar conversion - you can do this yourself by chewing bread for a long time, and noting how it gets sweeter. The chewed starch material (maize, cassava, whatever) is spat out and dried, or semi-dried, until the brewer is ready to soak it and ferment it. Some sources say the name chicha is derived from the Spanish word for “spit.”

Now I'm all for exploring ancient brewing techiques and all, but not THAT much.

If you don't want to go that route, here's a recipe that doesn't require mastication, just normal mashing...

http://www.ehow.com/how_2086198_make-chicha-from-corn.html

There's a great article on the Archeology of it. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-07/fm-abd072704.php

I found all this by google....*Hint Hint*

 

[olllllo]

I've casually looked at chica and pulque.

I don't know if a "good" recipe exists.

There was an episode of chicha on the Thirsty Traveler show.

 

[BARBrewer]

Right now im working on seperating the sugar from the outside of the berries of schinus molle, peruvian or california peppertree. Removing the skin, boiling to get sugar into solution, then boiling to reduce into a thicker sugar, since the sugar on each berry is minimal. So far, the aroma and flavor is honey like and peppery in a subtle and pleasant way. Thinking of a way to make a belgian golden with a concentrated syrup of it, sort of a Chicha de Molle Golden.