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9,000-year-old brew hitting the shelves this summer
60-Second Science Blog via Scientific American ^ | 60-Second Science Blog | Brendan Borrell

Posted on 06/10/2009 7:53:01 PM PDT by grey_whiskers

This summer, how would you like to lean back in your lawn chair and toss back a brew made from what may be the world’s oldest recipe for beer? Called Chateau Jiahu, this blend of rice, honey and fruit was intoxicating Chinese villagers 9,000 years ago—long before grape wine had its start in Mesopotamia.

University of Pennsylvania molecular archaeologist Patrick McGovern first described the beverage in 2005 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences based on chemical traces from pottery in the Neolithic village of Jiahu in Northern China. Soon after, McGovern called on Sam Calagione at the Dogfish Head Craft Brewery in Milton, Del., to do the ancient recipe justice. Later this month, you can give it a try when a new batch hits shelves across the country. The Beer Babe blog was impressed, writing that it is “very smooth,” and “not overly sweet.”

(Excerpt) Read more at scientificamerican.com ...


TOPICS: Agriculture; Food; History; Science; Society
KEYWORDS: archaeology; beer; creation; evolution; godsgravesglyphs; history; microbrew; oenology; patrickmcgovern; science; zymurgy
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To: muawiyah

Skunk beer?


81 posted on 06/11/2009 10:54:09 AM PDT by wastedyears (Rock and roll ain't worth the name if it don't make ya strut)
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To: grey_whiskers; GOP_Raider

I’ll certanly give it a try!


82 posted on 06/11/2009 1:21:57 PM PDT by dynachrome (Barack Hussein Obama yunikku khinaaziir)
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To: knews_hound

Home-brew pingarooni. To be perfectly honest, the stuff sounds awful, but on a hot day over the old lawnmower I bet many a Chinese homeowner was happy for it. Or maybe not, considering the can opener wasn’t invented until centuries later...


83 posted on 06/11/2009 1:41:26 PM PDT by Billthedrill
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To: Talisker

“In Japan, sushi is considered a lunch dish.”

Sorry, urban legend. You just can’t get a bluefin tuna from the water to the plate in one morning.

Besides, some sushi toppings are himono, sun dried seafood. Smells like bait after a week on the pier.

I can only tolerate freshness down to about 95 (on a scale of 1 to 100). Japanese regularly eat stuff that registers about 3 on that scale.


84 posted on 06/11/2009 1:48:39 PM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: dsc
Sorry, urban legend. You just can’t get a bluefin tuna from the water to the plate in one morning.

You can go down to the fishing wharves in the very early morning and pick out fish right off the boats, along with all of the chefs and restaraunt fish vendors! You can eat udon with them and talk about the catch! And unless the bluefin is caught out where it can't be brought back in the same day, it's there. Also, I'm not talking about "toppings" (and other than dried seaweed to wrap it, nothing else dried is on any sushi I ever saw) and Japanese don't eat food that's 3 out of 100 on a freshness scale - quite the reverse! Geez, when did Japan do you wrong?

85 posted on 06/11/2009 2:48:41 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: dsc
Sorry, urban legend. You just can’t get a bluefin tuna from the water to the plate in one morning.

You can go down to the fishing wharves in the very early morning and pick out fish right off the boats, along with all of the chefs and restaraunt fish vendors! You can eat udon with them and talk about the catch! And unless the bluefin is caught out where it can't be brought back in the same day, it's there. Also, I'm not talking about "toppings" (and other than dried seaweed to wrap it, nothing else dried is on any sushi I ever saw) and Japanese don't eat food that's 3 out of 100 on a freshness scale - quite the reverse! Geez, when did Japan do you wrong?

86 posted on 06/11/2009 2:48:41 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: stormer

See my FR home page...which beer?

The one thats closest!


87 posted on 06/11/2009 5:17:36 PM PDT by Tainan (Cogito, ergo conservatus)
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To: VoiceOfBruck

old beer ping.


88 posted on 06/11/2009 10:46:44 PM PDT by Zechariah_8_13 ("If we give the bureaucrats our children, we may as well give them everything else." - J. G. Machen)
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To: Just another Joe
This is a mead, not a beer.

Wasn't mead the drink of the gods? Apparently folks thought highly of it way back when.

89 posted on 06/11/2009 10:55:09 PM PDT by Lucius Cornelius Sulla ("men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters." -- Edmund Burke)
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To: Talisker

“Geez, when did Japan do you wrong?”

During the 22 years that I lived there.

Bluefin tuna have been frozen for days by the time the boats make port.

And one does find himono on sushi.

http://www.hanazakura.com/gal/

People go on and on about how the Japanese love seafood and are so great with seafood...they can’t touch the northeast coast of the United States, and on up into Canada.


90 posted on 06/12/2009 5:11:13 PM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: dsc
“Geez, when did Japan do you wrong?”
During the 22 years that I lived there.

Sorry for your bad experiences. I was born there, but I must have missed whatever did you wrong. Sumimasen.

As for the Japanese and the Northeast US, seems like apples and oranges to me, or apples and apples or oranges and oranges. Both places are heavily involved with seafood, and respect it's proper preparation.

Your link was interesting - out of 34 different kinds of sushi, one used himono. As I said, I've never seen it myself.

91 posted on 06/12/2009 5:20:10 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: Talisker

“I was born there”

Oh? What hospital were you born in? How long did you live there?

“but I must have missed whatever did you wrong.”

Yeah, a lot of people aren’t very alert.

“As I said, I’ve never seen it myself.”

Yes, I’ve often remarked that being present in a place is not the same thing as learning that place.


92 posted on 06/13/2009 6:12:08 AM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: Zechariah_8_13

Grandma (on the non-Church of Christ side of the family) used to feed me Hamms beer. Not quite 9000 years, but it tasted like maybe 9000 weeks old.


93 posted on 06/13/2009 6:26:16 PM PDT by VoiceOfBruck (Fear the forehead!)
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To: dsc
Oh? What hospital were you born in? How long did you live there? ...Yeah, a lot of people aren’t very alert. ...Yes, I’ve often remarked that being present in a place is not the same thing as learning that place.

LOL, I don't answer to you, buckwheat. I said I was born there, and implying I'm a liar is mere belligerence. After all, I could question your "22 years," since it's a fairly popular number amongst jackasses, but it simply doesn't matter, since your assertions are so baka.

You trash the entire country of Japan for mysteriously doing you wrong; you claim that the Japanese - of all people - don't eat fresh fish (LOL); and you sneer that my not agreeing with you in these ridiculous assertions means I'm not aware of reality.

Go play on the swings.

94 posted on 06/13/2009 7:32:31 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: Talisker

“I don’t answer to you, buckwheat.”

Or rather, you choose to respond in an extremely unpleasant manner to a reasonable, civil question, a matter of simple conversation.

I did not imply that you are a liar, but your response reminds me that “the guilty flee when no man pursueth.” What in the world is your problem?

“After all, I could question your “22 years”

You could, but anyone who cared to could very easily confirm it.

“...your assertions are so baka.”

You wouldn’t want to say that they are “baka;” you would want to say that they are “bakageta.” It’s analogous to the difference between “fool” and “foolish.”

“You trash the entire country of Japan for mysteriously doing you wrong”

Over-react much?

“you claim that the Japanese - of all people - don’t eat fresh fish”

No, I did not claim that they don’t eat fresh fish. Sometimes they do, but they also eat a **lot** of himono. Neither yet is their palate so wonderfully sophisticated. I have seen Japanese people try to give the leftover fish from their plate to a cat, and the cat scorn it.

It’s pretty funny, really. The cat sniffs it, gives them a dirty look, sproings its tail straight up in the air, and stalks off—the incarnation of wounded dignity.

“and you sneer that my not agreeing with you in these ridiculous assertions means I’m not aware of reality.”

No, not the ridiculous assertions that you invented and attribute to me, but the assertions I actually made.

Guess I’ll know better than to try and make conversation with you again.


95 posted on 06/14/2009 6:53:41 AM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: dsc
You wouldn’t want to say that they are “baka;” you would want to say that they are “bakageta.” It’s analogous to the difference between “fool” and “foolish.”

Thanks, I didn't know that.

Bakageta, then. Although feel free to presume my use of baka everywhere else.

Ciao, buckwheat.

96 posted on 06/14/2009 4:24:36 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: Talisker

“Ciao, buckwheat.”

So, are you a racist, or are you trying to imply that I am?


97 posted on 06/14/2009 6:21:27 PM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: dsc
So, are you a racist, or are you trying to imply that I am?

You've lost me with that one, since I'm the guy defending the integrity of the Japanese people against your slander. You bore me, too. Go away.

98 posted on 06/14/2009 6:26:12 PM PDT by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
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To: Talisker

“You’ve lost me with that one, since I’m the guy defending the integrity of the Japanese people against your slander.”

Wow, you must have needed a helicopter to get up on that high a horse. Talk about self-aggrandizing.

I have been married to a Japanese woman for 22 years. We have 6 kids together.

“Buckwheat” has been a racial slur for decades.

I don’t bore you. I call you on your assertions, and you can’t back them up.

You don’t know squat about Japan, and you don’t want anyone pulling the curtain aside.

Bye now.


99 posted on 06/14/2009 6:35:41 PM PDT by dsc (A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.)
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To: grey_whiskers
Nice story.

Enjoying a Dogfish "Immort Ale" right now.

100 posted on 06/14/2009 6:39:00 PM PDT by Trailerpark Badass (Happiness is a choice!)
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