by David Flint
A brewery on Bly Hollow Road in Cherry Plain? Seems unlikely. The unlikely brewer, however, is Dr. Jonathan Post, and he’s not just a brewer but a Beer Diviner. Post has indeed recently opened his Bly Hollow Brewery for business and is now selling his products at local stores, including the Cherry Plain Pantry.
[private]Post was bestowed with the office and title of Beer Diviner by Shamans of the Dagara people of the West African nation of Burkina Faso. He went there some years ago on a cultural and economic development exchange trip led by the distinguished African writer Malidoma Patrice Somé. Because of his expertise in home brewing he was asked to bring some equipment and demonstrate the art of western beer making, with the intent of possibly setting up a profit making brewery. The Dagara have their own ancient tradition of beer making, using sorghum and herbs in place of barley and hops. Along with beer consumption it is a very important and even sacred and ritual part of their culture. But they also like western style commercial beers. On a second trip the village Shamans made Post a Beer Diviner. They weren’t quite sure themselves what that entailed because they had never had that category of Diviner before, and, in fact, beer making among the Dagara has always been strictly a women’s province. In any case, Post was sent forth to fulfill his mission.
Dr. Post recently retired from the English Department of SUNY-Albany when his program for assisting new students was cut – shortsightedly in his estimation. Now he is devoting his efforts full time to his beer making mission. Currently he is producing three types of brew. “Got Your Back” is an Imperial Stout brewed with oatmeal, Sumatra French decaf coffee (from Fred Cashmere’s Liquid Assets Coffee in West Stephentown) and Scottish floor malted barley. Post says this beer was divined “for protection.” His Original Pale Ale uses Northwest coast Williamette hops and California Ale Yeast. The divination for this beer is about our original connection to nature. The Ancestral Red Ale, he said, has a “creamy, fruity finish, not a lot of hops, and yet you wouldn’t know that it’s 7% alcohol…Like most Belgian ales, this beer ages well. It was divined for our connection to our ancestors, for forgiveness, a mutual energetic.”
A fourth brew, Ancient Gruit Ale, does not use hops, but in the ancient Dagara beer making tradition, a mixture of herbs is used instead. In this ale Post includes wormwood, yarrow which he picks in the wild and the peppery Grains of Paradise from West Africa. He is waiting for an OK from the US Food & Drug Administration before he can offer this for sale. He noted that hops produce estrogen and can cause a reduction in the male sex drive. Gruit has the opposite effect. Prior to the 15th century, beer was always made by women, as it is today in much of Africa. Post said that makes sense, “Seems to me, if I were a woman, I’d be putting the herbs in there, not the hops.” This beer was divined for healing.
Post makes his beer in small controlled batches using European malts and what’s called a recirculating infusion mash system (RIMS). The liquid or “wort” extracted from the milled grain in the mash process is recirculated through the mash while maintaining the correct mash temperature depending on the type of beer. The mash remains largely undisturbed through this process, and Post said it makes for a cleaner, smoother beer. After a cleansing process called lautering, the wort is boiled down and hops or herbs are added. The hot wort is pumped through a cold plate device into a fermentation tank which is then stored at 60-65 degrees for two or three weeks. Then it goes into smaller cold conditioning tanks and kept chilled for another two weeks before bottling.
Post said that so far the experience has been great despite the sometimes daunting and expensive process of getting the required federal and state permits. The process is in many ways tilted to favor large breweries and distributors, but Post has an advantage in having low overhead. He constructed the building himself over an old cellar hole on his land, and he does all of the work himself including the brewing, bottling, labels, transporting, selling…everything. He has had comments from people in the area that besides the fact of it being good beer, what makes it attractive is that it’s made locally and that Post makes it all on his own.
At this time he can produce about 300 22-ounce bottles in a week He plans eventually to expand, but right now, only a month since store sales began, he is finding it hard already to keep up with the demand. A brewer in a nano-brewery like this, he said, “Has to like the whole process, the gadgets, the planning, the whole system.” Another thing about brewers, he said, is that they like to talk about their craft.
The beers of the Bly Hollow Brewery are currently available at the Cherry Plain Pantry and at Young’s Pharmacy in Averill Park as well as several beverage centers in Troy, Albany, Clifton Park and Scotia.
Check out Post’s interesting website at Beerdiviner.com. Post is planning a grand opening at the brewery on Saturday, September 1, from noon to 5 pm with beer tastings, barbecue and live music.
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