Middle Earth brewing

[Desert Loon]

Not alcoholic, but I brewed my first batch of kvass over the past weekend. I like to bake bread, and although I know kvass was traditionally made with rye bread, I haven't learned how to bake rye bread yet, so I thought I'd try the wheat. I saved a few slices of a loaf that was all from hard red flour and dried them out, then toasted them - maybe a bit too dark. I put them to soak with some raisins, a spoonful of yogurt whey, and a pinch of yeast, for a couple of days.


Then I strained out the solids and had a nice clear brown liquid with a very slight fizz and a taste that took some getting used to. Turpentine came to mind at first. But I'm warming to it, and I'll keep on experimenting.

I read that kvass is traditionally brewed with sugar added, but I thought: surely in medieval Russia they would not have had that, so I wanted to try it with no sweetener, not even honey. Again, I'm getting to like the taste.
It has only a very slight fizz (a bit less than kefir), and it won't keep long. But it is refreshing, and leaves a good feeling in the belly.

[Taylor Steiner]

Very cool

[Elleth]

Hunh - that looks like really interesting stuff!

How interesting that they used finished bread for it*. Do you happen to know if the bread was usually stale/old, and if that made a difference?

[Desert Loon]

How interesting that they used finished bread for it*. Do you happen to know if the bread was usually stale/old, and if that made a difference?

Yes indeed: it was a way to use stale bread - though I expect that the demand for the drink led to a lot of bread deliberately left out to get stale.