Chinese Made ‘Sweet and Sour’ Beer 5,000 Years Ago

Ancient Chinese brewed beer 5,000 years ago using similar technology that we use today.

Left: 5,000-year-old funnel for beer-making. (Courtesy of Jiajing Wang/PNAS); Right: Residues from the interior surface of one of the 5,000-year-old funnels for beer-making. PNAS

Ancient Chinese brewed beer 5,000 years ago using similar technology that we use today.

The beer was made of broomcorn millet, barley, Job’s tears, and tubers fermented together and would have tasted “a bit sour and a bit sweet,” said Jiajing Wang, archaeologist and Ph.D student at Stanford University, according to NPR.

Wang participated in the excavations at Mijiaya site in Xi'an, the ancient Chinese capital about 500 miles southwest of Beijing, where researchers discovered an underground brewery with sophisticated tools. The room was built between 3400 and 2900 B.C., according to estimates.

They found pottery with barley grain remains that showed signs of malting and mashing, crucial steps of beer brewing. The residue inside the pots and funnels were tested with ion chromatography to discover the ancient recipe.

Analyzed Mijiaya artifacts with red
circles indicating location where a sample was taken. PNAS