Brew It At Home

Jack Schmidling and Marilyn Schenk (creators of the excellent programs Backyard Safari and Recycle It Yourself.!) have once again produced a winner with this low-budget guide to making your own brewski...and more. The first part of the program is devoted to making genuine root beer and ginger ale-from gathering the ingredients to checking for proper carbonation and, finally, bottling. Then it's on to beer. Using the German pure beer law (beer shalt have only four ingredients: barley malt, hops, yeast, and water), the producers take viewers step-by-step through the long process of making a batch of beer. Claiming that "most American beer tastes more like carbonated saki than beer," Schmidling reels off a list of additives found in American beer-which is basically more chemicals than you'd find at a DuPont factory. Viewers learn what "wort" is (pre-fermentation beer) and how to tend it, using siphons to transfer the beer-in-the-making to new containers, and even how to cap your beer using a hand-held capper. In addition, the filmmakers visit Tim O'Donell, the proprietor of Brewin' Beer, who discusses common mistakes beginning beer brewers make; and they talk to Ken Pavichevich from the Baderbrau brewery, who takes them on a tour of the factory. When Pavichevich draws a glass of Baderbrau, the head is pretty impressive: like about 3-4 inches above the lip of the glass. Viewers will learn how to make their own super brewski in this program, as well as have a good time watching an interesting tape. Highly recommended. (Available from: Aylmer Press, P.O. Box 2735, Madison, WI 53701.)