Pine Barrens Beer

[nowashburn]

Hi all,

I brew my own beer at home and for my next batch I would like to try and make a beer that is a tribute to the area in which I live, the pine barrens. Please let me know any suggestions you might have as to ingredients that are local that I can contribute to this batch. I'm looking specifically for berries, fruits, wood flakes, local farmed anything that will taste good in a beer and be a tribute to our beloved barrens. In fact if anyone knows anyone who grown their own hops or a local place that makes their own malted wheat and or barley that would be most excellent.

No idea is too absurd and everything will be considered. Shoot, even artwork, beer styles, beernames will be looked at. Obviously, when done all are welcome to a free brew who contributed.

Cheers,
Eric

[Ben Ruset]

You should look up Russ Juelig. He's a home brewer and also a member of the PPA. He's been interested in doing something along the lines of what you're talking about, as well as starting up a Pine Barrens brew club.

[manumuskin]

i don't even drink but here are some ideas

cranberries,blueberries,teaberry,sassafras,pine(an acquired taste)

Al

[nowashburn]

You should look up Russ Juelig. He's a home brewer and also a member of the PPA. He's been interested in doing something along the lines of what you're talking about, as well as starting up a Pine Barrens brew club.

If appropriate, please tell me how to contact Mr.Juelig. Thanks!

[Ben Ruset]

http://www.pinelandsalliance.org/support/about/staff/

He also has an account on the forums, but he's rarely on.

[Spung-Man]

Eric,

For authenticity, search out a copy of Weiss (1963: The Early Breweries of New Jersey, 98 pp.). Harry B. Weiss authored a magnificent series of monographs on a suite of vocational topics for the New Jersey Agricultural Society. Within are a few local brew recipes and related beer miscellany. For inspiration, consider tapping into our Pinelands cultural heritage. The region (Atlantic, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester, & Camden Counties) has been called an ethnic archipelago for its rich cultural diversity. Margaret Mead, who spent her formative years in the Pine Barrens (1902-1910), considered her brief residency here the inspiration for life’s direction. Some thoughts on ethnic-based styles:

1) GERMAN – c.1850-1930, Egg Harbor City, Cologne, Germantown, (a.k.a. Folsom) – bock, check out the EHC Historical Society for early brewery records;

2) ITALIAN – c.1870-1930, Vineland, Hammonton – northern Italians were beer drinkers, especially those who occasionally came under Austrian rule; entirely home brew, some bathtub stuff made its way to market during the Prohibition, also peachy (a peach cider);

3) RUSSIAN – C. 1880-1930, Woodbine, Mizpah, Hebron – freethinkers who had a penchant for wheat beers, bock, and homemade vodka;

4) WELSH – (c.1880-1930) Richland – you’d be amazed how this Methodist town quaffed diesel-fuel high test strong ale, honey was added for a higher alcohol content, although Ole Uncle Jenk preferred a good pint of poison from Quick’s still.

5) PINEY – apple cider, pear cider, laudanum (opium tincture).

6) HISPANIC – (c.1950-today) – I’ve had pulque at a migrant camp, which is supposed to be made from fermented agave sap but who knows what the hooch was actually made of. It was a perfect match for the steel drum-cooked goat stewed with fiery-hot chili peppers!

Spung-Man

[ecampbell]

How about making it with water from one of the rivers. I remember making coffee from the Wading River and it was quite interesting.

[DeepXplor]

No Light beer, no near beer, just beer with a high alcohol content.

[PINEY MIKE]

Sierra Nevada depicts their beer as having a "pine" flavor. Says it right on the neck label. Id imagine a good pale ale brewed with some authentic Jersey pine, sassafras, maybe even cedar would tatse refreshing. A cider-whiskey drink called Jersey Lightning was popular back in the day. Maybe a good cider along the line of a Woodchucks would be good or just a beer with a hint of Jersey apples (cranberries might be a bit tart to slug). As far as names are considered:
Pine Barren Brew
Pine Ale or Piney Ale
Dirt Road Ale
Piney Grog
Pitch Pine Pale Ale
Jersey Lightning
Bog Booze
Devil Spit
Cedar Sludge
Outhouse Hoppin' Ale


Ill add more as they come. Great idea.. good luck!

[Spung-Man]

Eric,

Early on I understood this minstrel’s message; the protagonist was preparing a mash to make moonshine! Grain cracking for grist is a necessary step to convert starch to fermentable sugars by enzymatic conversion. On occasion farm hands enlisted me into collecting wild black cherries (Prunus serotina) to enhance their chicken-feed based concoction. We called the cherry by its Ukrainian folk vernacular, “katchi-zrubee,” meaning dirty (stained)-teeth. Shell-corn was easily poached from my father’s old mill, Richland Grain Co.

During 1978, President Carter amended the 18th amendment (1919) to the US Constitution making it legal to again homebrew beer. Until this exception, beer kits had a bizarre set of instructions that went something like this: “do not boil the wart for one hour, do not add 2-ozs. Kent Golding hops … or else the resultant product would become Federally-prohibited beer.” I was a freshman at Cook College when laws changed, and promptly petitioned the Dean for permission, as “head of household,” to brew beer in my dorm-room. Drinking age was still 18, and officials (who could hardly keep a straight face) permitted for the first time student practice of zymurgy arts at Rutgers.

There is a long-standing tradition of Pinelands homebrewing. From its inception in 1908, throughout Prohibition, and even to this day, Richland General Store has always been South Jersey’s brew- and winemaking supply center. Gary, the current proprietor, could provide some insight into local concoctions. Archie, former owner, is also has a wealth of local knowledge on the art of beer making. Here are some thoughts on beer adjunctive:

1) Fruits and berries were traditionally added to flavor wheat beers. ‘Black Diamond’ Blackberries, developed from native dewberries (Rubus sect. Eubatus), are an heirloom cultivar well worth seeking out. Margaret Mead’s (1972) autobiography, Blackberry Winter: My Earlier Years, memorialized these blackberries that were cultivated at the family’s “Six-Acre Farm.” Wild black cherries are full of character, and were widely employed around these parts for flavoring wines and spirits.

2) Raw licorice was often added to local brew, which added spiciness and made for better head (suds) development, especially when malt was extended with other grains like corn or rice. Milmay was the site of a large licorice (several Glycyrrhiza spp.) plantation. Waldeck Farms (for owners Walker and Decker, c.1915-1925) was a World War I boondoggle established to provide McAndrews & Forbes (Camden) with raw material for flavoring cigarettes, snuff, and confections when licorice shipment from Europe came to a halt. I’m also under the impression that early fire extinguishers used licorice as a sudsing agent, hence its use towards beer-head enhancement.

3) Sassafras has long been as a flavoring in the Pine Barrens. We enhanced root beer extract with Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) roots when making our batch, as did Cumberland County’s Charles Hires. Whether he developed his brown gold in Millville or Vineland is open to debate (http://www.co.cumberland.nj.us/content/163/241/597.aspx). Yeast-rich raisins were used to start fermentation for carbonation. It wasn’t unusual to hear a bottle-pop or two from the pantry if the carbonation process became too robust. Be warned, you now must use store-bought Sassafras extract that is safrole-free, a constituent that is believed but not known to cause liver cancer.

4) Other flavorings to consider: eastern red-cedar (Juniperus virginiana) berries (esp. German recipes); yarrow (Achillea ssp.); wormwood (Artemisia absinthium), Russian.

Cheers,
Spung-Man

Figure 1 (A) Photograph of ‘Black Diamonds,’ an heirloom cultivar originated by George Liepe, (c.1908: The Black Diamond Blackberry, promotional brochure for Geo. H. Liepe, Cologne, NJ. 4 pp.). (B) Post card of Margaret Mead’s childhood home (now gone), used as a base by her mother to studt local Italian farmers during planting and harvesting seasons in an effort to debunk the eugenics movement (see Meade, E.F., 1907: The Italian on the Land: A Study in Immigration. Bulletin of the Bureau of Labor. 70.[reprinted in 1992, Hammonton Historical Society. pp. 1-78]). Her house was on the east side of Fairview Avenue between Third Road and Packard Street, Hammonton, NJ.

[nowashburn]

Sierra Nevada depicts their beer as having a "pine" flavor. Says it right on the neck label. Id imagine a good pale ale brewed with some authentic Jersey pine, sassafras, maybe even cedar would tatse refreshing. A cider-whiskey drink called Jersey Lightning was popular back in the day. Maybe a good cider along the line of a Woodchucks would be good or just a beer with a hint of Jersey apples (cranberries might be a bit tart to slug). As far as names are considered:
Pine Barren Brew
Pine Ale or Piney Ale
Dirt Road Ale
Piney Grog
Pitch Pine Pale Ale
Jersey Lightning

Ill add more as they come. Great idea.. good luck!

pitch pine ale, i really like that. in fact, i looked up "pitch pine" in wikipedia, and there is a picture from applepie hill:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitch_Pine

[cranbrake]

i am not a fan of fruity beer so i'd consider somehow incorporating white cedar in some capacity if possible or pine like was mentioned.....also like the notion of incorporating use of water from a local stream,as was also mentioned.

No Light beer, no near beer, just beer with a high alcohol content.

i can say good beer WITHOUT alcohol is also always appreciated by lots of us......

[PINEY MIKE]

good beer WITHOUT alcohol

Is there really such thing?!?! lol

[cranbrake]

Is there really such thing?!?! lol

LOL.......but seriously yeah there is,and i'd recomend the following: O'douls amber(brown bottle,not the green!);st. pauli's NA;buckler(made by heineken);clausthaler;bitburger drive(a wheat beer);beck's NA...........off the top of my head.

[ecampbell]

.....also like the notion of incorporating use of water from a local stream,as was also mentioned.

Name the beer after the river, Wading, Atsion or places like Lower Forge, Batsto......