Preserves Online: Brew Home Beer

Thursday 19 July 2012

Brew Home Beer

Few have done more to inspire brewing at home than Charlie Papazian, a master brewer, author of how-to books on homebrewing and one of the pioneers of the homebrew movement. His immensely popular book "The New Complete Joy of Home Brewing," has sold over a half-million copies. About 20 years ago, Papazian was a nuclear engineering student at the University of Virginia and enjoyed experimenting with beer brewing techniques. (At that time, homebrewing wasn't exactly legal. Laws prohibiting homebrewing survived as one of the last vestiges of prohibition, and it wasn't until 1978 that the federal government made homebrewing legal. ) Papazian became inspired to share his craft with others. He established the American Homebrewers Association out of his house. Today, the AHA is known as the best educational resource for information on the art and science of making homebrewed and microbrewed beer.AHA's membership has grown to over 25-thousand, up from only 3,000 in 1984. And every fall the AHA faithful, together with beer enthusiasts from around the world, flock to Denver for the renowned Great American Beer Festival. Participants can sample homebrew from among the thousands of entrants in the homebrew competition.