Beer

For the precious remaining years before an ‘enthusiastic hobby’ becomes ‘rampant alcoholism’, allow me to celebrate the ambrosial tonic that is beer. Few things on earth are so simple to make, yet so wondrous in their effect. Beer sustains societies, defines nations and brings people together. With the dawn of the amber liquid, grain was no longer doomed as a nutritious, staple food source; it became the delicious, irresponsible and migraine-inducing miracle it was destined to be.

Before we continue, we need to talk about how beer is made. Brewing is a complicated process that has evolved over countless generations and requires expert skill. The process involves the following:

1. Fill a container with malted barley, hops, water and yeast
2. Wait

In summary, yeast is the real hero of beer-making. It transforms sugar into a living, breathing, bubbly friend (carbon dioxide) that you eventually spend way too much time with (alcohol).

Since there was farming, there was beer and since there was beer, there was civilisation. In the Zagros Mountains of modern Iran, chemical tests on clay vessels show barley was being used for brewing more than 5,000 years ago.* In China, a similar process was used to make booze from cooked rice over 7,000 years ago! Thankfully, wild yeast in the air can ferment pretty much anything that contains carbohydrates. We can only thank the brave soul who decided – presumably for gags – to down that first tepid bowl of chunky, micro-organism-ridden bread water.

"Have a go bro, this shit will pickle your insides."**

By the middle ages, ale was commonplace from Britain to Poland and was usually brewed at home. At a time when the Catholic Church was its most corrupt and cruel, it demonstrated its one and only redeeming characteristic – commercial beer production. Carolingian Abbotts first used hops in the 9th Century; which gave beer a longer shelf-life and its unique taste. The world’s oldest surviving brewery, in fact, is an abbey in Weihenstephan, Bavaria, which opened its doors in 1040. Even today, the best beer in the world is produced by Belgian Trappist monks.

The industrial revolution lead to what we would recognise today as beer, the development of the thermometer and hydrometer being major steps in improving the quality of mass-produced product. In 1856, Louis Pasteur discovered of the role of yeast in fermentation, helping to protect the brewing process from unwanted micro-organisms. In recent decades, there has been a shift from the fruitier, cloudier varieties (ales) to clearer, crisper beers (lagers) in conjunction with the use of pasteurisation and artificial carbonation. Most popular tap (crap) beers today are lagers.

The importance of beer to our civilisation cannot be exaggerated. For the medieval peasant, ale was not only sustenance for hours of toil in the field; the brewing process made it a darn sight safer to drink than the water of the day. In contrast, modern brewing methods have brought this idea full circle, with beer beginning to taste more and more like water. Next time you order a beer, try the darkest, scariest looking one you can find and imagine a world where that was the closest thing you could get to Mount Franklin. Hallelujah.

* The effects must have been a success. Only a few thousand years later, Sumerians were worshipping Ninkasi, the Brewery Goddess with useful recipes.

** Worst Mummification Joke 2011 nominee right there.