The Long-Lost Friend: Beer Blogging

Right now, I’m looking at the German as well as the three English texts I have systematically, to see how they differ.  I’m about halfway through, and some discoveries have come to light.  The most notable for many readers will be an amendment of Hohman’s molasses beer recipe, which is as follows:

To make good Beer

Take a handful of hops, five or six gallons of water , about three table-spoonsful of ginger , half a gallon of molasses ; filter the water, hops and ginger into a tub containing the molasses.

Beers made with molasses were quite popular in earlier times.  William Penn discusses a molasses beer, with sassafras or pine flavoring added, as one of his colony’s most favorite drinks.  Washington had his own recipe, and a resident of Windsor, North Carolina, recorded a series of such recipes around Hohman’s time, one of which a local historical society member brewed.  I should note that the common ratio he cites of ten parts water to one part molasses is reflected in Hohman’s recipe.

Nonetheless, the recipe given above is not quite accurate.  When examining the German tonight, I found that the third ingredient, in the original German, was something called “yellow ginger.”  I chased that around for a while – Google Books has been of great help here – only to find that the ingredient is not a variety of ginger, but turmeric.

So, there you have it.  I’m not a drinker myself, so I wouldn’t venture to guess how this might turn out if it were actually brewed.  Perhaps some readers will have their own ideas.