OnTap Magazine

It’s important to Zahra to give back: “For every case or keg order that people make, I donate a meal to a kitchen that’s in the East Village. To date, we have donated thousands of meals to this kitchen.” WITCHES AND BREWSTERS I remember hearing for the first time that the image of a witch we often see in popular culture–pointy hat, broomstick, cauldron, cats running about–was derived from European brewsters, or female brewers. I almost fell out of the chair I was sitting in, I was so intrigued by this connection. Turns out, this theory may not be historically accurate, however, what the imagery hints at is very real: Women were once the primary conduits between fermentation and spiritual practice, and many of the ancient beers brewed were done so with medicinal herbs as a form of healing.Women later became thebrewers in their families and communities, and many a nunnery provided an opportunity to become brewers and botanists. One nun in particular, Hildegard von Bingen of 12th Century Germany, became well known for her abilities as an herbalist, a composer, a healer, and as the first person to record the benefits of using hops in beer. This written reference to hops came hundreds of years before Germany’s 16th Century Reinheitsgebot purity law, a law which further encouraged the commercialization of beer brewing and subsequently, the removal of women from it. Interestingly enough, there is an overlap in the time period between this historical shift in beer production and the persecution of tens of thousands of individuals as witches. Related or not, both are instances of an erasure. Hildegard von Bingen: the first person to record the benefits of using hops in beer REVIVING FAMILY HERITAGE I ask Zahra where her grandfather got his recipes. “I don’t think he used recipes,” she tells me with a laugh. “I imagine it was very much like the way my grandmother is when cooking, where she just throws a bunch of stuff together for dinner and it tastes absolutely delicious.” Her grandmother would wax poetic about her husband using such ingredients as sumac and sour cherries, all from their garden, and Zahra herself recalled how frequently she would see the men in her family add a pinch of salt to their lagers and pilsners. Determined to revive this family heritage, Zahra spent several years homebrewing and experimenting on her stovetop in her Brooklyn apartment, using her family as taste testers. When she finally achieved their approval, and with encouragement from the local brewing community, she found herself a place to contract brew. In the fall of 2021, Zahra released cans of her first two beers in New York City. Those two beers, a Sumac Gose and a Persian Blue Lager, came in cans adorned with lines of poetry in Arabic script from Persian philosopher- poet Omar Khayyam. Both beers quite literally disappeared from the shelves. Zahra had to immediately brew a second batch. A complicating, but important part of her process is the ingredients she uses, which she sources as much as possible from the Middle East. The blue salt in her lager comes from Iran, while the sumac she obtains from Turkey. The sanctions currently in place on Iran make acquiring what she needs difficult, but she feels authenticity is crucial. Since that first release in late 2021, Back Home Beer has only grown. Her cans can now be found in over 200 locations across New York and in Washington, DC. The Washington Post described her as a “one-woman brewery bring[ing] Middle Eastern flavour back to craft beer.” Early Northern Europeans worshipped their beer goddesses as ancient Middle Easterners did, and before the second millennium CE, most European women drank and brewed beer. From migratory Germanic women who brewed in forest clearings to avoid Holy Roman invaders to the English alewives who maintained their traditions until the Industrial Revolution, European women fed their husbands and children low-alcohol, nutrient-rich homebrew that proved more sanitary than water.” Tara Nurin, How Women Brewsters Saved the World. WORLD OF BEER 28 | Winter 2023 | ontapmag.co.za