Hello again! Just your friendly novice brewer from up north here with a strictly theoretical question (I wouldn't dare experiment yet with my level of experience in brewing). I've read in an article about hops that before the 11th century, Europeans would use all sorts of bitter herbs and flowers like dandelions, marigolds, horehound, burdock root, ground ivy and heather as bittering agents instead of hops. I imagine hops have supplanted these herbs because they've proven to be reliable or something, but I'm curious to see if any of you have heard of, or even tried using these things instead of hops?
I'm curious what a beer brewed with dandelions (not sure if you'd use the roots, leaves, flower or buds) would taste like, but I'm guessing it might be akin to dandelion wine?
I'm a student of history you see, and it's just interesting to find out how the ancients did it. Nowadays we're pretty lucky with all this technology, fine ingredients and equipment... It gets you thinking how our ancestors brewed, you know?
Thanks again for your input!
Wormwood is a good one, but it's very potent. Just a few grams in a 5 gallon batch will do the trick, anything more will just be unpleasant. Hops have somewhat of a flavour profile to them, but wormwood seems to be raw bitterness without much backing that.
I believe bog myrtle, heather tips and spruce tips can be used as well.
Dunno about bitterness, but Heather (fraoch) works real well in a bunch of British beers.
Gruit was an herb mixture used before hops:
http://www.homebrewing.com/articles/gruit.php (http://www.homebrewing.com/articles/gruit.php)
Also, experimentation is fun, don't worry about being a newbie, just experiment within your comfort level. Generally the worst that can happen is a batch gets poured out.
I know a guy back in Moncton who brews with yarrow, he absolutely refuses to touch hops. Never tried yarrow before though, so I can't say much for it...
I've been researching the same thing and found the below, it appears most of the herbs do grow in NB.
www.gruitale.com (http://www.gruitale.com)
B
Heh, this claims to enhance sexual performance *laugh*.
Guess I'll be steering well clear of this stuff, I got too many kids already ;)