My interest in brewing began long before I ever brewed my first batch. My mother gifted me a small kit when I was in college. But, something held me back from actually brewing my first batch for 30+ years. Why was I so afraid? Because I was convinced that unless my equipment was perfectly cleaned and sanitized, it would kill me. I couldn’t imagine what kinds of horrible afflictions I might succumb to were I to have so much as a drop of beer contaminated with one microbe of bacteria. In short, I preferred to leave my life in the hands of the professionals. Believe me, I spent my youth plying myself with gallons of Magic Hat # 9, Long Trail Ale, and Allagash White. When those beers didn’t kill me, I tested out barrels of other beers testing my hypothesis. I’m not an alcoholic, I’m a scientist. There’s a difference.
A few years ago, I confided in my friend Kevin that I always wanted to brew my own beer, but I was just plain scared. Kevin laughed & said “what about the monks?!” What ABOUT the monks? He explained that monks were brewing beer thousands of years ago without modern sanitation products. “Do you think the monks had Star San?” Actually beer making dates back to as early as 5000 BC. I remained skeptical. Kevin assured me that he brewed beer in his home state of Maine many moons ago. They even tossed a few raisins into each bottle to add a little extra “kick” of carbonation.
We agreed to brew a batch, but I insisted that I be in charge of sanitation. Honestly. How could Kevin be trusted with his lackadaisical attitude toward our health and safety? We bought the equipment and the ingredients to make a standard Kolsch beer. The entire time we were brewing, I was sweating and fretting about cleanliness. Kevin kept saying “what about the monks? What about the monks?” For two weeks, the beer sat in a bucket in my garage collecting lord knows what kinds of lethal bacteria that would surely lead to our demise. What would the end be like? Would only Kevin and I perish in a Romeo and Romeo type scenario? Or perhaps there would be many casualties were Kevin to insist on a party? I would just imagine inviting my friends over for a tall goblet of ice cold death punch.
Then I looked it up.
Yeah. A simple google search revealed that beer can’t kill you. Not in that way, anyway. Nothing pathogenic can grow in beer. Some websites even claim that beer can’t make you sick. Again. Not in that way. (See “hangovers”)
Since then, we’ve brewed everything from Pale Ale to Belgian Triplel. We even brewed a version of Catamount, a discontinued beer we both remember from our days growing up in New England.
We call the “brand” of our beer “Dead Monk” in honor of that one imaginary Monk who collapsed the moment the beer touched his lips.
I’m always looking for interesting viral recipes to try. Send them to me or forward them on Instagram!