September 28, 2012

Beer





Since Oktoberfest is just right around the corner, here’s something to booze you up...

Beer, surely, is a gift of God, one that brings together yeast and vegetation (in the shape of barley and hops) in a drink that has been enjoyed for 8,000 years, a beverage that has soothed fevered brows, nourished the hungry, and coupled friendly and unfriendly alike—it’s even seen men off into battle. “No soldier can fight unless he is properly fed on beef and beer,” said John Churchill, the first duke of Marlborough (1650–1722), a great British tactician and a forebear of the even more celebrated Winston.

Queen Victoria (1819–1901) was another who recognized the merit of beer: “Give my people plenty of beer, good beer and cheap beer, and you will have no revolution among them.” With these sentiments, the redoubtable monarch echoed the enthusiasm of the Athenian tragedian Euripides (484 – 406 BC):

The man that isn’t jolly after drinking
Is just a driveling idiot, to my thinking.

Cheers!!!


[source: Tap Into the Art and Science of Brewing]




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