# Brewer's food map



## TimT (23/12/13)

This is a partial list of herbs, plants, etc, growing in my area - Melbourne - that can be used in brewing. I want to keep updating it as I get more information. It's for the benefit of any brewers who are interested in using wild plants to spice up their brews.  Please feel free to supplement this list, or add lists of brew plants growing in your own area.

_Hops _- starting with the obvious. I know of a few gardens around in Reservoir and Bundoora with hops in them - greetings, fellow brewers! - aside from our own. CERES environmental park in Brunswick has a wild hops vine towards the back of the property, growing along the fence that runs along the path which goes down to Merri Creek. I'm not sure if anyone is responsible for these hops - it's possible the CERES staff would be quite happy for others to harvest them.

_Wormwood_ - this used to be used as a bittering substitute for hops. (Since my wife first pointed the plant out to me I've noticed it in gardens everywhere - though apparently it tends to poison the soil it grows in, making it inhospitable for other plants. There's plenty of wormwood growing outside the disused village market just next to the entrance to Epping Plaza on High Street in Epping.

_Pink peppercorn_ - I wouldn't have guessed it but according to the book _The Drunken Botanist_ the peppercorns from this tree were an old flavouring in beer. There's a poisonous version, but it is easily distinguishable from the non-poisonous version - the leaves are much larger, and it is pretty uncommon in Aus. There are peppercorns trees near plenty of train stations, including Reservoir Station, and Lalor Station. Some are growing along High Street in Northcote, on the hillside (there are some of the poisonous variety in amongst these ones, so be careful), and along Alexandra Parade in the park just next to the Dan O'Connell Hotel on Canning Street in Carlton. Never really a problem with availability - they seem to be there all year. (They've also started selling ridiculously small amounts of these ridiculously prolific peppercorns for ridiculously marked up prices in some shops - avoid!)

_Crab apple_ - Another classic - crab apples are used to add flavour, especially tannins, to scrumpy and other types of cider. They are also high in pectin, good for jam setting (and, I think, clarifying wine?) Plenty of crab apples growing in gardens around Lalor, and two outside the Lalor Shops on HIgh Street, Lalor. (We used these this year in our cider, as well as some from a friendly neighbour).

_Rose_ - Traditionally wild rose (brier) was used in wines and foods but any reasonably aromatic rose should work too. (You can also use the leaves and branches to add tannins to a wine and the rose hips in wines and jams). Ubiquituous in just about any garden you can think of right across the city, including our own (is there anyone who DOESN'T know what a rose looks like?) there are also wild roses here and there: a scraggly, disreputable-looking bush growing out of a wire fence round some kind of a store on HIgh Street in Epping (just next door to the Macedonian church), and on the dirt part of Child's Road that begins after the McDonald's, again growing out of a wire fence.

_Yarrow _- Another one that I previously didn't know about but now see everywhere. It's pretty common in gardens, has a ferny-brackeny sort of appearance, and blooms with orange, purple, and yellow flowers in late spring and summer. (I think you can use the flowers and branches in brews, and was quite commonly used in medieval brews. Apparently when you put yarrow in beer it tends to have a psychoactive effect - it wakes you up, unlike hops, which are a sedative and send you to sleep.) I can't think of any wild yarrow but there must be plenty - it grows prolifically. There's some in our garden and I know at least one friend in Reservoir who has it in theirs too.

_Wild lettuce _- I learned about this one from Stephen Harrod Buhner's book _Sacred Healing and Herbal Beers_, and re-read about it in _The Weed Forager's Handbook_. It's a weed that grows abso-bloody-lutely everywhere, out of footpaths, you name it. Not sure how to describe it, but it grows long, scraggly stalks ending in yellow flowers, and when you break the stalks open you get a milky-white sap called 'lactucarium' that will come out and quickly dry in the air. You scrape this sap off and collect it for use for flavouring in beers! (Doctors used to use it too, apparently) It's growing in our front garden, our back garden, on the back oval, in the park opposite the McDonald's on Child's Road in Epping, and everywhere else.

Will edit this post later - we're leaving on Christmas break soon. Meantime, feel free to add to the list!


----------



## idzy (24/12/13)

Great work TimT, not something that I have considered before, but I am sure this will become a great resource for us Melbournians.


----------



## TimT (24/12/13)

As you can see it's very localised at the moment! When we're back in Melbourne I might take a few walks around the creeks, take a few notes.


----------



## TimT (24/12/13)

I had hoped to be able to directly edit this post today but unfortunately it looks like the 'edit' function is only available for a limited amount of time after you post. (Maybe it's because I'm not a 'professional' member of this site?) No matter. This is a work in progress, so I'll just continue here. I'll compile everything later.

_Nettle - _prolific weed, grows unassisted anywhere it can - ovals, fields, gardens, etc. Best in early spring, before the nettle has put all its energy into flowering and going to seed - you're supposed to pick the fresh tips. I've seen a few wine recipes with nettle in them, including one nettle mead that is green(!) Nettles can also be made into a kind of soup that curdles milk, just like rennet - (again, young, fresh nettle before flowering should be used. After flowering they just don't work anymore). We had a nettle in our garden last year, and noticed plenty along the dirt path that Child's Road becomes after the Epping McDonald's on the corner of High Street. Cardoon (a different type of nettle) also grows prolifically in the empty fields along that dirt path; cardoons also grow in an empty lot further up HIgh Street in Epping central, past Coopers Road. 

_Blackberry_ - this one's great. Once you see one blackberry you'll notice them everywhere. Unfortunately they're considered one of our worst weeds, so many people see it as their duty to try to poison blackberries (hardly ever succeeding), so it's best to be wary of blackberries growing in publicly-frequented areas. There are blackberries along Merri Creek in Epping North, and in empty fields on the border of Epping and MIll Park, both probably having been subject to frequent poisoning attempts by council. (The other thing about blackberries is they love growing in inaccessible areas, annoyingly). There is a blackberry growing along the bank next to Bell Station. From healthy blackberries you can pick not only the berries but the leaves to make a kind of tea that can supplement brews. (Ditto raspberry leafs). We have a tame version of the blackberry, the silvanberry, growing in our garden.

_Pine_ - Fresh pine needles, growing in spring, are used in beers - Buhner mentions pine needle beers in his book _Sacred Healing and Herbal Beers_, though he mentions pine resin and sap as well, so maybe you can just throw pine cones in. There are plenty of pines around Lalor and Epping - a very recognisable and hardy tree - so there must be lots around other parts of Melbourne too. Pines in the Thomastown reserve, around the cemetery there, with needles that still look very green and taste quite fresh (I had a bit of a chew last week!) More pines in Epping central, outside a park next to the school, along a street that runs into High Street (sorry, I can't remember the name off the top of my head - but we harvested dry pine needles from them for use in bee hive smokers).

_Oak_ - Very common tree, the bark often sold in brew shops, but why would you bother buying if you just have one in your garden? There's one growing in the front yard of a house on Station Street near the Lalor Shops. Plenty, too, in the Carlton Gardens outside the Royal Exhibition Centre near Melbourne central. I'm sure there are plenty of types of oaks, though I don't know if all oak bark is the same for brew purposes. (Probably, but best to check about that one).

_Spruce _- yet to find a wild one in Melbourne. (Though there must be a few). You use the fresh tips that sprout in spring, throwing them in the wort at the start of the boil. There's a spruce in St Kilda botanical gardens though not the sort of spruce used in brewing.

_Juniper _- The berries, twigs, branches, and leaves (but especially the berries) can be used in brewing - the berries add the distinctive flavour to gin. One is growing in our garden - again, there must be a few in the wild in and around Melbourne but I've yet to see any.

_Tagetes_ - a kind of culinary, sweetly aromatic South American marigold - give off a strong cordial/pineapply odour. There's some growing out of the fence along the Macedonian Church and the field on High Street in Epping; also growing in a friend's garden in Reservoir. Not all tagetes are the same and some may not be suitable for culinary use, but I chucked some in a beer this year and it tastes ace. To my palate, the effect is quite similar to that of the Citra hop. 

_Common garden herbs that may sometimes go wild _- sage, thyme, mint of all sorts and lemon balm, lemon verbena, rosemary. I get best effects from these in brewing if I chuck them in straight after the boil - they add delicious fragrances to the final product.

_Common fruits _- apples, pears, citruses, plums, fejoias - these last are very prolific in late summer/early autumn, again they're the sort of plant that you see everywere once you know of them. Crush them and steep them in water to make a kind of cordial to add to wine must for delicious fejoiay essence.

As I said - Work In Progress!


----------



## Truman42 (25/12/13)

You might be interested in one of the episodes of Brew dogs where they go to Oregon. They meet up with a lady who is Into natural foods etc and she takes them on a walk showing them all the different kinds of plants growing in the area that could be added to beer.

It was quite interesting. They ended up using this plant called witches broom for bittering, instead of hops.


----------



## OzPaleAle (25/12/13)

Wormwood h34r:


----------



## TimT (25/12/13)

Thanks Truman, I'll definitely look that one up. 'Witches broom' is probably just another version of 'broom', which may be lurking in some Melbourne gardens. We are holidaying in Bright at the moment and I'll update soon with some lists from that area. (Erratum: I should have mentioned the sticky hop bush, Dodonae Viscosae, which a friend tells me is native to the Melbourne area. Also, cardoons are not nettles - they're thistles.) Merry Christmas folks!


----------



## TimT (5/1/14)

Okely dokely! Back from Bright, boy do I have some lists for you:

*Walk up hill along the dirt path from the top of Hargreaves Road:*
Pine
Blackberry
Bracken
Thistle
Sheep sorrel
Broad-leaf plantain
Hawthorn
_Here we took a hike across a paddock down to Baker's Gully Road, past..._
Briar
Apple (on a dirt path shorty before it joined Baker's Gully Road)
_Then we_ _took a trip down to Baker's Gully Reservoir and saw plenty more_
Pine
Oak
Hazelnut
Chestnut
More oak, blackberry
_And, hiking home along Baker's Gully Road, _
Plums, and plenty of them. All ripe, all juicy, all delicious.

*Rail trail from Bright to Porepunkah*
Oak
Wild lettuce
Pine, other conifers
Apple
Loquat
Thistle
Fennel
Bracken
plenty of blackberry
Bunyah nut
_In Porepunkah_...
Spruce
Grapes
Apple
_Along Solly Lane_
Plums, Queen Anne's Lace, grapes, pine
_Back home, opposite side of the road to the rail trail (the actual rail line)_
Plenty of blackberries, and pine

*Walk from Bright to Wandiligong, at first past the school and the churches*
Evening primrose (pretty much in Morse's Creek)
Blackberry
Hawthorn hedge
Apples (including an early ripening one outside the school)
Pines and other conifers
Rose and rosehips
Plum
_Over the bridge and onto the bush trail_
Blackberry every-bloody-where - they'd go delicious in saisons and wines when they're ripe in February
Pine
Thistle
Bracken
Queen Anne's Lace
_Opposite the hedge maze_
Plums and crab apples
Hazelnut
Oak
_Now we set out back to Bright, along the bike path_
Mint (by the creek)
Dock
Apple
Vietnamese mint
Plum

*And in to Bright town centre and over the Ovens*
Birch (though apparently it's no use harvesting their sap here in Aus because our winters aren't cold enough, dammit!)
_(Over the bridge)_
Fir
Hawthorn
Pine
Grapes
Blackberry

And on the roads to Harrietville we noticed plenty of birch and spruce (mmm, spruce beer), plus while driving from Beechworth to Yackandanda (or Yackandanda to Beechworth? I forget now) heaps and heaps of wild plums.


----------



## idzy (13/1/14)

Holy crap, that's a big list. Was just in Myrtleford on the weekend. I did notice the pine, thistle and bracken.


----------



## TimT (13/1/14)

Idzy - this from mostly in the bush walks around Bright. Love Myrtleford but we didn't do much there these holidays.


----------

