America's Own Reinheitsgebot Of 1667

[jakub76]

It seems that America had it's own Reinheitsgebot. In an old publication called 'A History of American Manufactures from 1608 to 1860' it states that the New England General Court ordered that beer be made with at least 4 bushells of good barley malt (61.6kg) to each hogshead (238.5 litres) without "any mixture of molasses, course sugar or other materials instead of mault on penalty of five pounds per offence".

I thought this was interesting...it seems the germans weren't the only ones protective of their beer quality. The same publication also mentions the wide use of corn/maize and even maize bread in beer making as well as the various other corn based imbibements that the native american indians used to make.

You can find the book by searching on google books for 'beer brewing history' or by following this... http://tinyurl.com/2uoczjo

Good to see they had their priorities straight too...it seems that in 1633 the West India Company ordered the building of a mill and brewery on "Farm No.1" extending from present Wall St west to Hudson St. I have also read elsewhere that the first paved street in New York was for the purposes of transporting beer by wagon - the horses and carts would get bogged in the soil. Ah beer, how fuckin good is it?

 

[raven19]

Gotta love a bit of beer history!

 

[Banshee]

You will probably fine that the ones who introduced the law were originaly from Germany.

 

[Bribie G]

At that time popular recipes for beer included oat bran and molasses etc. Poor buggers still had to wait 300 years for Bud Lite