Pssst. Sam. Hey, Sam Calagione. Here’s something you might want to jump on: a recipe for a 5,000-year-old Chinese beer, made from tubers, millet, barley, and a gluten-free something called Job’s tears.
Jiajing Wang at the Stanford Archaeology Center and others reconstructed this formula after analyzing pottery in ancient pits in Shaanxi, North China. According to a new study in PNAS, the funnels, amphorae, and stoves found on site point toward a sophisticated pursuit of humanity’s favorite vice—getting loaded. “To our knowledge,” the researchers write, “our data provide the earliest direct evidence of in situ beer production in China, showing that an advanced beerbrewing technique was established around 5,000 [years] ago.”
