BetterSense
Well-Known Member
As an intellectual exercise I have recently been interested in how I can make small changes to the things I do that might make them much more sustainable in a pre-industrial or post-industrial setting. For example, I learned how to make cyanotypes. I think it's cool to be able to make photographs without electricity or computers. After all, they made photographs without electricity for like 100 years, and without computers for about another 100 years.
Brewing beer obviously can be done without electricity or industry. You can grow barley, malt it, kiln it with wood or straw or coke, and brew it with wood or steam. But packaging seems a bit hard.
You can bottle-condition beer, but only if you have bottle caps. It might be possible to make bottle caps out of thin metal. Otherwise, Grolsch bottles. Or corks and wire bails.
For kegging, though, you would be out of luck without commercial CO2. You could naturally carbonate the kegs, but would only be able to serve a little bit before the pressure dropped and it went flat. I suppose you could put a bit more sugar in them and re-carbonate at that point...but how did they do it before cylinders of compressed CO2?
Brewing beer obviously can be done without electricity or industry. You can grow barley, malt it, kiln it with wood or straw or coke, and brew it with wood or steam. But packaging seems a bit hard.
You can bottle-condition beer, but only if you have bottle caps. It might be possible to make bottle caps out of thin metal. Otherwise, Grolsch bottles. Or corks and wire bails.
For kegging, though, you would be out of luck without commercial CO2. You could naturally carbonate the kegs, but would only be able to serve a little bit before the pressure dropped and it went flat. I suppose you could put a bit more sugar in them and re-carbonate at that point...but how did they do it before cylinders of compressed CO2?