I spent Friday in a brewery making ale. Unfortunately, this is not the start of a new career path. It was all part of a crowdfunder in March that saw me spend more than £1,000 on various rewards to help Stroud Brewery survive the pandemic, with all of these rewards being beer-related. And the most expensive reward I paid for was to brew an ale with a group of friends, and us each getting to keep about 30 pints each of the finished brew.
It was an early start, with us needing to be down there for 8.30am. We began by emptying sacks of wheat and malt into the tun for what is known as the mash in. This would form the base of our ale. We got to taste the very early brew that can be best described as tasting like Ovaltine.
Then we started weighing the hops and other ingredients for a process known as sparging the wort. That is not a euphemism. All the liquid from the first tank would then be filtered into a second tank, where it would then be heated to high temperatures. Once the liquid had all transferred, it was time to get a shovel and clear the first tank of the leftover malt in what is known as the mash out. I learned a lot of new terms.
I also learned that brewing is much more scientific than I thought, with measurements and temperatures having to be accurate, otherwise everything becomes messed up. I don’t know quite what I was expecting. In fairness, I hadn’t given it a huge amount of thought, preferring to focus on what goes in a pint glass instead of how it got there.
Anyway, it was a really fun day. Also, it was certainly the most talking and socialising I had done in about 18 months. And the ale that we brewed should actually be drinkable and go on sale within the next month or so.
We finished the day having several pints and talking nonsense, thus proving once and for all that I can organise a piss-up in a brewery.