May 24, 2019 07:00 AM
https://www.sciencealert.com/yeast-from-...cient-beer
EXCERPT: If you think the beer at your local bar tastes a little stale, spare a thought for the researchers who brewed up a beer from yeast estimated to be 5,000 years old. The yeast was plucked from pottery used to produce beer in ancient times, extracted from the nanopores of the clay and converted into an alcoholic drink with the help of microbiologists, archaeologists and winery experts. The end result is ostensibly beer that would've been similar to those drunk at the time of the Pharaohs.
The team believes it's the first time that original ancient yeast has been preserved and developed to brew new beer – in this case a 6 percent brew similar to a wheat beer, and a 14 percent mead. Previously, a genetically modified strain of 10,000 year-old wheat was also used to brew beer.
"The greatest wonder here is that the yeast colonies survived within the vessel for thousands of years – just waiting to be excavated and grown," says one of the team, microbiologist Ronen Hazan from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. "This ancient yeast allowed us to create beer that lets us know what ancient Philistine and Egyptian beer tasted like. By the way, the beer isn't bad." (MORE)
EXCERPT: If you think the beer at your local bar tastes a little stale, spare a thought for the researchers who brewed up a beer from yeast estimated to be 5,000 years old. The yeast was plucked from pottery used to produce beer in ancient times, extracted from the nanopores of the clay and converted into an alcoholic drink with the help of microbiologists, archaeologists and winery experts. The end result is ostensibly beer that would've been similar to those drunk at the time of the Pharaohs.
The team believes it's the first time that original ancient yeast has been preserved and developed to brew new beer – in this case a 6 percent brew similar to a wheat beer, and a 14 percent mead. Previously, a genetically modified strain of 10,000 year-old wheat was also used to brew beer.
"The greatest wonder here is that the yeast colonies survived within the vessel for thousands of years – just waiting to be excavated and grown," says one of the team, microbiologist Ronen Hazan from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. "This ancient yeast allowed us to create beer that lets us know what ancient Philistine and Egyptian beer tasted like. By the way, the beer isn't bad." (MORE)