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Drink

Spruce Beer

A fermented beverage made with hops, ginger, water, molasses or brown sugar, spruce essence, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Spruce Beer

Why it works: Ginger and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,116 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Spruce Beer

Ingredients

Directions

Make the wort

  1. Boil hops and ginger in water for a few minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture.

  3. Add molasses (or brown sugar) and essence of spruce.

  4. Let the mixture cool.

Ferment and bottle

  1. Add yeast.

  2. Transfer to a clean, tight cask.

  3. Let it ferment for 1-2 days.

  4. Bottle the beer for use.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Ginger + molassestop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Hops + gingertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Hops + molassestop 41% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5 recipes

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Hops
Add bitterness and aroma that balance the sweetness of the molasses.
Molasses or brown sugar
Provides fermentable sugar for the yeast and a rich, dark sweetness.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide, carbonating the beer.
Essence of spruce
Contributes the characteristic resinous, piney aroma and flavour.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before adding yeast. Yeast is killed or weakened by hot liquid. Cooling the wort to lukewarm before pitching protects the yeast so fermentation starts reliably and evenly.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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