Pure hemp beer?

[3chomes]

I've got a load of hemp seed cake, the stuff that is left after I press out the oil. Recently I've become interested in making beer. Problem is that hops are hard to come by where I live.
So I'm wondering if I can make a pure hemp beer. Hemp/water/yeast, that's it. Any suggestions welcome.
Cheers.

 

[Mister Green]

To get the sugar from the hempseed, you'd have to sprout it and malt it, then you could add flowers or leaves for flavour. Or maybe the seedcake would flavour it, possible protein haze problems with this though.

 

[Dankdude]

This may be of interest for those who live in places that hops are hard to find...

http://www.bioline.org.br/request?ft04002

Hops the female flowers of the hop plant (Humulus lupulus) are grown in the temperate regions of the word, solely to meet the demands of the brewing Industry (Hough et al., 1982, Grant, 1977). Hops contribute to foam stability and also provide hop flavour, hop character and preservative properties to the beer (Laws, 1983). In most tropical countries, the hops are imported. With the expansion of the brewing industry in Africa, huge amounts of money are therefore being spend by developing countries for the importation of hops.

A lot of effort has been made in the brewing industry for the substitution of barley with some local cereals. The substitution of hops with local raw materials has not however received the same attention. Some pioneer work by Okafor and Anichie (1983), showed that leaves of the tropical vegetable, Grongonema latifolium (utazi), show great potential as substitute for hops.

They found out that this plant possessed some antiseptic properties against beer spoilage micro-organisms. The chemical properties of beer brewed using this plant did not differ much from that brewed with hops though their organoleptic differences were pronounced (Okafor and Anichie, 1983). Okafor and Anichie (1983) however did not characterise the vegetable as they only used it for brewing and sensory analysis.

This piece of work intends to characterise in addition to Grongonema latifolium, three other bitter vegetables used for food in the tropics. These are Vernoniq amygdalina (Bitter leaf), Azadirachta indica (Neem) and Garcinia cola (Bitter kola). Azadirachta indica is used in some parts of Africa for the treatment for malaria, while Garcinia cola is used in some areas for the treatment of stomach ache and gastritis. All four vegetables have one thing in common. They are bitter vegetables.

The principal objective of this study is therefore to compare these vegetables to commercial hops by:

• Carrying out proximate analysis for both the vegetables and hops
• Extracting the resinous components and essentials oils
• Investigating the effect of the type of solvent used for extraction, the temperature and duration of storage on the bitterness levels of these vegetables

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Procurement of raw Materials
Freshly picked Neem and Bitter leaf were collected from the Forestry Research Institute, Ibadan (F.R.I.I.), while Utazi and Bitter Kola were purchased from a local market in Ibadan. Hop pellets were supplied by Africana Breweries Ltd. Ibadan. Chemicals used in routine analysis adopted were as detailed by;

(a) The Association of Official Analytical Chemists (A.O.A.C.)
(b) American Society of Brewing Chemists (A.S.B.C.)
(c) Institute of Brewing (I.O.B.)

Processing of vegetables to powders
Fresh vegetables were destalked, sorted and then washed in tap water. They were then air-dried for about 10 mins, after which they were transferred into an air drought oven, at a temperature of 50°C for 24 hours. The vegetables were then allowed to cool to room temperature in a dessicator and then subsequently milled to powder using a laboratory hammer mill (Gibbons, Model 8).

The resulting powders were then put into high density polythene bags of thickness 0.06 mm, heat sealed and then stored in air tight metal containers. The flow chart below represents the process.

Proximate Analysis
The moisture content, protein content, fat content, ash content, crude fibre content and the amount of total resins and essential oils were determined as described by the Association of Official Analytical Chemists and the Institute of Brewing.

Preparation of Vegetable Extracts
A 0.15% (w/v) solution of vegetable sample and solvent was boiled for 90 minutes, after which it was allowed to cool, and then transferred into an air tight transparent glass bottle and then subsequently stored at three different temperatures.

• Ambient temperature (27±1)°C
• Refrigeration temperature (7±1)°C
• Freezing temperature (0±1)°C

Bitterness level determination
Bitterness level values for the extracts were determined by the method described by Hough et al. (1982).

Determination of the storage stability of vegetables and hops extracts
Bitterness level values for extracts stored at three different temperatures and for different lengths of time were then measured.

 

[weener]

Ya, like Mr. Green said you have to have some type of malted seed to begin the brewing process. I am in the process of doing a malted "cannabeer" thats also hopped w/ herb. Its only a test batch in a 5 gallon carboi but Im excited to see the end result.

 

[mapleboy]

Nice... it'd be "WAY SWEEEEET" to have a homebrew that one could get a buzz(alky) off of and a head rush to boot... I'd BUY INTO that one!! Keep us posted!!
mb

 

[Hazelnuts]

I got some beer that has been brewed exclusively with cannabis in my basement actually. But I didn't brew it, you can buy that stuff here in some small brewery. Never even tried it

 

[zymos]

The one commercial one I tried ( a few years back- forget what it was called) ,which of course was mostly made from barley, bragged how the hemp seeds helped with head retention. Which makes no sense to me, as those seeds are quite oily, and oils destroy the head...

 

[3chomes]

To get the sugar from the hempseed, you'd have to sprout it and malt it, then you could add flowers or leaves for flavour. Or maybe the seedcake would flavour it, possible protein haze problems with this though.

Mister Green
Sorry I didn't even know that even anybody replied to this thread, got no notification whatsoever.
Have you tried brewing with hempseeds?
I've got some hops now. I have hemp seedcakes. I make oil out of the seeds and the seedcakes are what I'm left with. I can also make hemp flour from the cake for baking with, which is nice. And yes, the hemp protein(flour) does taste sweet, will that work?
Sorry, I'm a total n00b at brewing beer(read: never done it before)
Thank you kindly for the tips.

 

[3chomes]

Ya, like Mr. Green said you have to have some type of malted seed to begin the brewing process. I am in the process of doing a malted "cannabeer" thats also hopped w/ herb. Its only a test batch in a 5 gallon carboi but Im excited to see the end result.

weener, how did that brew go?
Excuse my ignorance, but is a carboi absolutely necessary for making beer? I cannot get one here.
Let us know how your cannabeer is.

 

[3chomes]

Nice... it'd be "WAY SWEEEEET" to have a homebrew that one could get a buzz(alky) off of and a head rush to boot... I'd BUY INTO that one!! Keep us posted!!
mb

I'm looking forward to that myself, but unless you add some thc to the brew, you won't get that head rush. I'll see what I can do and will keep everybody posted.

 

[zymos]

3chomes-
the hemp cake (or any other starchy material) has no ( or VERY little) fermentable sugars in it. So you would have to mash it with malted barely to covert those starches to sugars. Otherwise, that starch is just sitting aroun your beer, amking it cloudy and inviting bacterial contamination, plus, it's not really adding anything.

You dont NEED a glass carboy, you can use a white plastic food grade bucket if that's all you can come up with. You'll need some sort of lid or cover that can let CO2 escape. But the carboy is the way to go, and if you get into brewing, you'll want one (or several)...

 

[3chomes]

3chomes-
the hemp cake (or any other starchy material) has no ( or VERY little) fermentable sugars in it. So you would have to mash it with malted barely to covert those starches to sugars. Otherwise, that starch is just sitting aroun your beer, amking it cloudy and inviting bacterial contamination, plus, it's not really adding anything.

You dont NEED a glass carboy, you can use a white plastic food grade bucket if that's all you can come up with. You'll need some sort of lid or cover that can let CO2 escape. But the carboy is the way to go, and if you get into brewing, you'll want one (or several)...

zymos, thanks for the tips.
I read somewhere that someone was making hemp beer out of seedcake, because the seeds themselves are pretty oily(about 30% of hempseed is oil, btw).
I'll do a bit more research before wasting all my hard to get hops.

 

[Sammet]

http://www.ethicalsuperstore.com/products/cannabia/cannabia-hemp-beer-330ml/

Cannabia Hemp Organic Beer

 

[sodaman]

I tried some Hemp Beer at a Head shop in Tokyo once- not bad, but not very different.

 

[B. Friendly]

to cool came across this thread looking for this very thing.

 

[CannaExists]

The one commercial one I tried ( a few years back- forget what it was called) ,which of course was mostly made from barley, bragged how the hemp seeds helped with head retention. Which makes no sense to me, as those seeds are quite oily, and oils destroy the head...

I've read that oils on your lips or a dirty glass will destroy a head, like chapstick, food oils, etc... yet I've also read the oils in hops contribute to a wellplayed head. My intuition tells me different oils do different things, by all means.

weener, how did that brew go?
Excuse my ignorance, but is a carboi absolutely necessary for making beer? I cannot get one here.
Let us know how your cannabeer is.

I currently brew in a 1 gallon Carlo Rossi wine jug.

That's tits how you press your own hemp oil, what do you use to press the oil? I was thinking of buying a low heat oil expeller for some raw cold-pressed oil. It sounds logical to me that if you put hempseedcake in a mash with malted barley the results would be superb. That hempseedcake would also make an excellent organic amendment for growing pot... or ya know, demz other veggies that aren't pot.

I just got done reading a whole book on Homebrewing so if you have any questions I may be able to help. I have very little experience, I've just read a book, so don't expect me to be a bible of knowledge. I just read a bible of knowledge.

 

[stonethecrow]

great thread to come across as ive been wanting to do something similar. my idea was to make a batch of wheat beer using the water from making bubble hash. im looking more for flavor than effect really so any of you guys tried this or have opinions on whether it would be worth/waste of time.

id like to say though to anyone thinking about getting into home brewing DO IT its fun and easy to do if you can follow simple directions and its cool to share with your buddies and see the amazement on their faces when you tell em you made the beer theyre drinkin.
theres a ton of books you can read and plenty of websites out there too on the subject

check out brewing tv for starters and you can find more links there