My paternal grandmother, Helen S. Wright, included the recipes for several beers including this on in her book Old Time Recipes for Home Made Wine. Although I don’t know if Grandmother Wright ever had even a sip of beer, let alone hop beer, I am very fond of the IPA beers that contain a lot of hops and choose it above all others if given the chance. I also like the hop plant and have one growing on an arbor in my garden so I can enjoy the beautiful foliage and unique flowers.
Here is my grandmother’s recipe for hop beer in her own words:
Turn five quarts of water on six ounces of hops; boil three hours. Strain off the liquor; turn on four quarts more of water, and twelve spoonfuls of ginger, and boil the hops three hours longer. Strain and mix it with the other liquor, and stir in two quarts of molasses. Brown, very dry, one-half pound of bread, and put in, -rusked bread is best. Pound it fine, and brown it in a pot, like coffee. After cooling to be about luke-warm, add one pint of new yeast that is free from salt. Keep the beer covered, in a temperate situation, till fermentation has ceased, which is known by the settling of the froth; then turn it into a keg or bottles, and keep it in a cool place.
To buy Old Time Recipes for Home Made Wines by Helen S. Wright from Amazon.com Click Here.
Karen Meyers