Brewing Ancient Sumerian Beer

[The_Professor]

This Sunday I brewed what I will call an ancient Sumerian Beer.
The grain bill:
1.8 lb malted barley (6 row)
1.2 raw barley
1/3 cup Syrian spice mix (allspice, black pepper, coriander, nutmeg, cloves, cardamom)
Yeast - M47 Belgian Abbey (Mangrove Jack's)

The reason for the mix of malted/raw barley is that seems to be what proto cuneiform sources suggest.

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/327385

I milled the malted and raw barley then mixed it with water to make it moist but not soaking in water. It sat for 2 hours before "baking/mashing". The spices were mixed into the milled grain.



The "bake/mash" cycle (in my Romertopf clay baking pot) was close to 8 hours as the grain slowly heated.



The "baked/mashed" grain sat overnight because the "bake/mash" cycle took so long.

The grain was simply put into water (1 3/4 gallon) and squeezed, massaged, and rubbed, then the liquid strained off.
I did a quick 10 minute boil which may not be authentic.

The Brix was 9.0 (1.036)
After a cool down some of the M47 yeast was sprinkled into it. (Other fermentation options to be explored later.)

[Beer-lord]

This is pretty cool. I salute you for your efforts and brewing outside the box.

[bpgreen]

And I thought I was brewing outside the box on those occasions when I brewed gruits or that unhopped beer that used orange extract and/or orange zest.

Please keep us posted on how this turns out.

[Inkleg]

This is awesome and I applaud you for your efforts. Looking forward to the follow up.

[The_Professor]

I'm glad someone is interested in this and I am not just boring everyone.

This "Sumerian beer" seems to have turned out well.
The original Brix was 9.0 (1.036) and the Brix after 5 days is 5.0 (1.010) for an ABV of 3.5
I'm just drinking it straight out of the fermenter, room temp, no carbonation.
The Syrian spice flavor just sort of blends in with the Belgian yeast flavor. I would say it is pleasant and easy to drink.

[Beer-lord]

I love it when a plan comes together!

[Inkleg]

I'm glad someone is interested in this and I am not just boring everyone.

I enjoy learning about the history of beer and love reading about the process through people who do this. So thank you.
That dove breast appetizer would have paired well with that beer.

[BlackDuck]

That's really cool Professor. And your right Inkleg, those would go good with that.

[mashani]

Awesome Professor.

I'm going to make one of the Lithuanian baked mash type beers one of these days. I pointed you at a link to that I believe.

[The_Professor]

.....That dove breast appetizer would have paired well with that beer.

The aftertaste of this Sumerian beer is a little odd due to the Syrian spice mix containing black pepper. Imagine the peppery aftertaste after eating a well peppered (not blackened) steak.

.....I'm going to make one of the Lithuanian baked mash type beers one of these days. I pointed you at a link to that I believe.

Yes you did.
I wonder if it might be somewhat similar to an old porter brewed with brown and snap malt.

[mashani]

.....I'm going to make one of the Lithuanian baked mash type beers one of these days. I pointed you at a link to that I believe.

Yes you did.
I wonder if it might be somewhat similar to an old porter brewed with brown and snap malt.

Hard to say. I have made brown malt porter and like brown malt in bitters too in small amounts. I like brown malt.

But the baked mash is kind of unique in that it actually was mashed. But then the mash is baked. So you are caramelizing the already converted sugars from the mash instead of toasting starches like in Brown Malt.

So it is more like making some sort of candi sugar out of the sugars (sugars can be inverted by just heat, that's how old school candi syrup was made, acid is just a short cut), or at least like converting some of it into "crystal malt" post mash, or some combination of those two things.

I think you may have gotten some of this effect in the Sumerian beer baked mash, as first it would have converted, at least somewhat around the edges, and then the converted sugars there would caramelize as the middle of the "loaf" continued to convert.

[The_Professor]

.....first it would have converted, at least somewhat around the edges, and then the converted sugars there would caramelize as the middle of the "loaf" continued to convert.

That exact thought has crossed my mind. In regards to "Sumerian" brewing it could happen when baking/mashing a loaf. The color of my beer came from somewhere. But my thought is that if any baking/mashing took place in a larger ceramic container that effect could be even more pronounced.

.....But the baked mash is kind of unique in that it actually was mashed. But then the mash is baked. So you are caramelizing the already converted sugars from the mash instead of toasting starches like in Brown Malt.....

Here is a homemade crystal malt tutorial I have used. Green malt mashed and dried.
The thing that makes me raise my eyebrows with the Lithuanian baked mash beer is that I have read that some part of the sugars in crystal malt are non fermentable.
Obviously, if it works it works. Does that mean one could brew a beer entirely from crystal malt?

[mashani]

There are a bunch of people who tested crystal malt for fermentability. From what I recall they generally found that it consists of:

A good amount of highly fermentable sugars.
A good amount of starch that will convert in a mash into more sugars.
Not anywhere near as much unfermentable sugar as people think.

The sugars add flavor because they have gone through the malliard reaction, not because they don't ferment out. Consider those fermentable sugars more or less the same thing as dark candi syrups or candy rocks in that regards.

If you just mash crystal on its own and do an iodine test, it will show starch. If you add some 2-row it will not.

So yes, you could make beer of some sort from it, but it would be very susceptible to starch eating opportunistic organisms.

The best bet if for some crazy reason you want to try it all on its own and try to outcompete opportunistic critters would be to use a starch eating Saccharomyces cerevisiae var. diastaticus strain of yeast, something like Bella Saison or Wyeast 3711, or a Brett strain that will break down the starches over time (but Brett will take a lot longer).

I think in the case of the Lithuanian baked beer, the entire mash is actually converted (or at least mostly) before it goes into the oven. It is a thick mash that they start it at 65C and let rest for an hour before they put it into the pans and into the oven. So everything that is having a malliard reaction done to it is already likely in a fermentable or unfermentable sugar state, as in no starches remain like in crystal malt. So I think the results are probably unique in that regards.

Did that make sense?

[The_Professor]

There are a bunch of people who tested crystal malt for fermentability. From what I recall they generally found that it consists of:

A good amount of highly fermentable sugars.
A good amount of starch that will convert in a mash into more sugars.
Not anywhere near as much unfermentable sugar as people think.

The sugars add flavor because they have gone through the malliard reaction, not because they don't ferment out. Consider those fermentable sugars more or less the same thing as dark candi syrups or candy rocks in that regards.

If you just mash crystal on its own and do an iodine test, it will show starch. If you add some 2-row it will not.....

.....I think in the case of the Lithuanian baked beer, the entire mash is actually converted (or at least mostly) before it goes into the oven. It is a thick mash that they start it at 65C and let rest for an hour before they put it into the pans and into the oven. So everything that is having a malliard reaction done to it is already likely in a fermentable or unfermentable sugar state, as in no starches remain like in crystal malt. So I think the results are probably unique in that regards.

Did that make sense?

The Lithuanian "thick mash" was mashed for 60 minutes at 149 Fahrenheit then put in to bake at possibly 662-752 Fahrenheit (at the beginning, but the fire was removed) possibly invoking, as you suggested in an earlier post in this thread a toastier outside. So yes, some two row added to a large amount of crystal.
A brew with two row, Munich, light, and dark crystal would be interesting to try.

[mashani]

Whenever I do the Lithuanian baked beer, it will start at 575, because that's as hot as I can get my oven. I might just leave it on for 5-10 minutes before turning it off, that should get me in a similar overall "ballpark".