"What's on your table?" is a series of articles that explore the relationship between food and power systems, and how our dining table shapes global cuisine and family history. You can find a recipe at the bottom of each piece to add to this meal. You can read more of the series here.
As the temperature gets lower and lower, the winter holidays begin, and now is the time to enjoy a warm, spiced holiday beer. When you do this, you can raise a glass to the female winemaker or winemaker who created this drink in the first place. As a modern male-dominated industry, the influence of women on beer brewing technology has been mostly erased, eliminated or forgotten over the centuries. However, initially, the beer we taste today was brewed by women and was only excluded when-you guessed it-money or power was involved.
As we all know, holiday beer originated in Europe. The Vikings are considered the first: Jólöl. That is the Viking of Christmas beer. For thousands of years, beer brewing has been considered a woman’s job, a task completed by the fireplace at home. In more cultures around the world, it is seen as a gift from goddesses rather than a gift from the gods. Therefore, the responsibility of brewing Christmas beer and adjusting the recipe appropriately falls on women-perhaps only women, as the famous beer anthropologist (yes, that's a real job!) Alan Ames (Alan Eames) argued. If women’s jobs are often marginalized, the product itself is not: According to reports, the Viking King Haakon asked the family to contribute gallons of Christmas beer each year, fined or-for serious offenders-confiscate the land.
This style of seasonal beer appears in other corners of Europe and blends with Christmas traditions. Its popularity is not surprising. Ale is an important household item, safer than water, and a source of required calories. Women have always been behind this staple food. In fact, if you prefer hops, you might as well pour a glass for the monk of St. Hildegard, who was the first person to integrate hops into the brewing industry of the monastery, which was earlier than its rise in industry. 500 years.
When women are driven out
As brewing became more profitable, women selling beer were excluded. After the Black Death, a higher quality of life led to a greater demand for beer (because who does not need to drink after the pandemic, amirite?). The supply side also began to change. Hops became the mainstream, which made the shelf life of beer longer and ushered in profit-oriented industrialization. In fact, male-dominated guilds provided financing, licensing and trading opportunities, while independent women were excluded.
With the introduction of stricter gender norms and European witch-phobia in the era of the Reformation, enterprising winemakers faced further marginalization.
With the introduction of stricter gender norms and European witch-phobia in the era of the Reformation, enterprising winemakers faced further marginalization. The propaganda of this era gave us the classic image of the witch as we know it today, wearing a pointed hat and a broom. This photo is surprisingly reminiscent of brewers who dared to get paid for their work: these women wear pointed hats, which are easy to see in a crowded market, carry beer in a cauldron, and keep the cat beside them. To prevent rats from eating grains, and hung a broom on the wall outside the house to indicate when their latest batch can be purchased.
This is not to say that the brewing women were rounded up as witches (they were not). Historians argued about the true origin of witch images, but it is clear that such images demonize ethnic minorities and women who are out of contemporary gender entrust them to their families to raise them. The role of the child. As far as winemakers are concerned, churches and popular culture increasingly imagine that these women have a special place in hell. They trick men into losing their cents and senses.
"New World", but still the old patriarchy
Although these women are excluded from the brewing industry, their innovative beer is still very popular. The malt and spiced holiday beer that Americans enjoy today are reminiscent of British winter heaters and other European traditions, which were originally introduced by colonists to the "New World", where the history of women brewing until profitability will Repeat. Due to the lack of industrial infrastructure for brewing in the colony, the Virginia Company even introduced mail brides as winemakers for male colonists. It recruited women with respectable qualifications in winemaking and housewives to come to the "new world" with the hope of getting married. Colonial women who lack brewing skills are punished for their "lazy" behaviors, which make men only drink this inferior beverage, water, which is not uncommon.
Colonial women made full use of available raw materials to make cider and malt wine with honey, molasses, peaches, apples, etc. Spruce is often used as a substitute for hops because of the smaller number of hops and the higher import costs. In wealthy southern families, enslaved women and men are an integral part of this process, creating the beer that senators and other male elites are pursuing. There is evidence that Native American women at the time also used local ingredients (such as corn) to brew beer, but this history was obscured by early American policies that made alcohol a taboo topic on tribal lands.
Women continue to be the backbone of this work until profits and power reappear. With the acceleration of the industrialization of the colonies, the brewing industry provided a new source of income and a way to confront the elites. Male growers and merchants took over the trade. In the end we don't know what we missed. Large-scale industrialization encourages homogenization, weakening the unique recipes that women brew when they try various available ingredients in the family.
Until the modern craft beer movement tilted the market back to this tradition, it basically remained in this state. In the late 1970s, Congress again legalized home brewing, allowing renewed experimentation and innovation, similar to the process that women have pursued for all centuries, and this movement arose in the late 1970s. Even so, today, in this $600 billion industry, the number of male brewery owners still outnumbers women by three to one. Despite these possibilities, women have made great strides in the brewing world and are vying for the highest honor.
So, when you pick up a pint this winter and settle down by the fire, you can toast the Viking women, nuns, and cunning witches who brought it to the world and improved the formula to make it just right.
If you want to pay tribute by brewing yourself, you can start with this recipe, provided by our own award-winning home brewer Cathy Frye (thanks, mom!). This seasonal winter warm wine is the most popular homemade beer, and later changed to commercial beer under her label Phase 2 Brewing from 2018 to 2020. "Happy" holiday!
Recipe for "Fireside Winter Heater"
The fireside smoke in this slightly spiced winter heater is produced by tea.
14 pounds of light malt (2 rows) us (2.0 SRM)
4 oz black (patent) malt (500.0 SRM)
1 ounce grated, peeled fresh ginger root
0.3 oz bag Lapsang Souchong tea
1 11g package SafAle S-04 British brewer's yeast
Laura Daniels is a foreign policy professional who has written articles on peace and security, European affairs, and food politics. She is also a hopeless foodie.
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