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re you aware that one o your avouritethings to drink is a waste product rom asexual orgy o ungi? I thought not. Yes,ethanol, sweet ethanol, is to yeast as you are toyour morning constitutional, with, obviously, armore pleasing results. We humans cannot seemto unction without yeast’s precious excrement,and we consume it in myriad orms, rom pure(vodka), to dilutions in carriers such as the sideingredients which make a Sex on the Beach,Vesper Martini, Fuzzy Navel, and the imposingKookie rom Black Dog. Your
GOM 
melier has
A
Glory Be To Beer
By Keith B. Hofman
Bod ows, fung sx, dty whpoos and ant coony agoths.
already tackled some o our other ingeniousdelivery systems to enjoy ethanol—scotch, wine,rum, grappa, etc. oday, we investigate one o the most worldly and ancient o all alcoholicdrinks—beer.Eight-thousand years ago, a armer le somebarley outside in a shallow container. It rainedthat night. Te next morning the armer thoughthis harvest was ruined as it was steeped inrainwater. Over the next days o neglect the barley germinated and wild yeasts in the air waed ontothe sugary liquid leeching rom the sprouted
È
Where it all happens. In such unremarkable surrounds a process takes place to create mankind’s favourite tipple: beer. Where would we be without it?
grain. Te yeasts had a ne time o exhaustingthemselves in reproductive bliss. Te lucky armerenjoyed the resultant, low-alcohol and barely favoured beverage on the next sunny day. Hesuddenly ound his wie more attractive andeven hilarious. Beer was born.Tat liquid bread changed human society orever. Some historians claim it was the mostimportant driving orce behind ending ournatural nomadic tendencies. In other words,some believe that we need to thank beer orcivilization itsel.
 
Water sanitation is something we takeor granted now in many parts o the world.Tousands, to just dozens, o years ago thiswas ar rom the case. Water-borne diseaseswere a pestilent reality or all o our ancestors.Beer and distilled spirits, by virtue o containingalcohol, were liquids that drastically quelledbacterial contamination. In the case o beer,since it had lower alcohol content than wineand distilled liquors, even more preservationand decontamination eorts were needed.Until roughly the 12th century, beer wasexclusively avoured and ‘bittered’ with gruit—
for further reading...
Should you be drinking wine or beer or betterhealth? For you beer acionados, the news isgood. It turns out the scientic consensus isnow leaning toward either one. In other words,the magical “French Paradox”, that leads many to believe that wine is the most healthul way to imbibe, may not be totally accurate,as alcohol itsel is now thought to be thecardiovascular protectant.Just to assure you that more seriousscience is going on, everyday, toward theurther development o all that is beer, I pointyour attention to the ollowing two articles:“Enantioseparation o isoxanthohumolin beer by hydroxypropyl-gamma-cyclodextrin-modied micellar electrokineticchromatography”, and, “Preparation o novelsolid-phase microextraction bres by sol-gel technology or headspace solid-phasemicroextraction-gas chromatographic analysiso aroma compounds in beer.” Now then, resteasy, as you can see, the nerds are on it! Usually,this produces a good outcome.Also, rom the obviously underappreciated
 Journal of Colloid Interface Science
comes anarticle “Gushing in canned beer: the eect o ultrasonic vibration”. Tis beauty o a study startswith the memorable line—especially or a peer-reviewed scientic publication—o “Everybody has had the experience o a canned carbonateddrink overowing and soiling their clothes.”“We observed the beer drinking behaviouro 308 university students in several bar andparty settings. Te ollowing relationships wereound: males drinking beer in bars consumedmore than emales, and stayed in a bar or alonger time period; patrons drank signicantly more beer when drinking in groups and whenpurchasing beer in pitchers versus cups orbottles; and intervals between party arrivaland rst drink and between party departureand last drink varied inversely with bloodalcohol concentration.” Tank your lucky stars that these researchers made sucha set o startling discoveries!a mixture generally made o herbs such as gale,yarrow, heather, rosemary and occasionally,either by mistake or malice, items such as toxicnightshade. Te gruit herbs unctioned asstimulants, versus the now, totally dominant hops(more on them in a second), which are actually depressant in nature. As more was appreciatedabout beer spoilage, contamination, etc., gruitwas phased out rom around 1100 to 1516 whenBavarian brewers dumped it and implementedthe Reinheitsgebot in 1516: the rst ocial
È
A 15th century bishop takes a delivery of beer.
Í
The ofcial rules for brewingbeer date back to the 16th century.
Ofenwith excellententertainment value, most eldso scientic inquiry employ someoneready to ask a ar toodetailed questionabout a givensubject. Tis ofenmaniests as theorcible ramming o a resh technologicaladvance down thethroat o an oldquestion. Whilethe science and arto brewing are indeed ascinating and complex,perhaps these guys went a bit ar in theirexplorations o ermentation methods: “Antcolony system algorithm or the optimization o beer ermentation control.” However, and muchto their credit, they displayed a rare moment o printed scientic humbleness, by concluding that“the satisactory results obtained did not requiremuch computation eort”. When ants nally take over the world, and learn to read, they willprobably get a big kick out o that publication.Finally, rom the overstued les o the“Why was this study done, and who the hellpaid or this?” comes some shocking ‘ndings’:
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