Today I realized I have a bit of a history with home brews… or homestead hooch as it’s been called. I was mixing up a new batch of kombucha and remembered back to high school and college when brewing beer was all the rage.

It started in high school when my friend Matt was brewing beer and wine in his kitchen. We often HAD to skip pre-calculus class to go “check” on the fermenting wonder. Skip ahead a few years and the microbrew beer culture was just beginning to hit Portland when I was at Lewis & Clark College. My friend Joe decided to try his hand at brewing and we would spend afternoons at our friend Mark’s house mixing up concoctions (that’s Joe and I 20 years ago). Of course the irony here is that I’ve never been a huge fan of the malted beverage, but I love the idea of handcrafting something you love.

I got back into home brewing last year when I started brewing kombucha from a SCOBY start I received from my friend Chris. I took a bit of a hiatus over the winter, but now that summer is upon us I’m craving what the Chinese call the drink of the gods. I started a new batch this weekend and I’m looking forward to another summer filled with the elixir.