It sounds insane to us modern folk, but beer without hops was a favorite of some of the 280 breweries in Ghent during the Middle Ages. At least that’s what Annick De Splenter, our guest today, discovered while doing her degree in beer-making at university. (Yes! You can study beer-making at university in Belgium!)
After her father sold the family brewery, Annick was on a mission to figure out how beer was actually made without hops and that it wasn’t all a medieval urban myth. Needless to say, she proved her naysayers wrong with her own brewery, Gruut, founded on four beers made with herbs: Wit, Blonde, Amber, and Brown made with nary a hop in sight.
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