Home Brew In Los

[Kilgore Trout]

I was wondering if anyone has any experience with home brew beer/ale in Thailand. Were your experiences good/bad?

Does the climate make it difficult?

Are there any Thai laws/regulations that apply?

Is it easy to get necessary ingredients?

Thanks for your responses.

DIY!

[BigWheelMan]

Home brewing is illegal in Thailand.

[Kilgore Trout]

Home brewing is illegal in Thailand.

Really? Even for your own consumption, not to sell? Is there any way around this?

[johnh101]

Quite a few people do it............. discreetly

[IMA_FARANG]

Just some varied comments.

First of all...making good beer (I never tried making ale) is more tricky and frustrating than you may think. If you make a mistake, you end up with a batch of sour vinegar.

Bigwheelman:

Are you sure. I don't plan to make any in Thailand anyhow. But is there a Thai law against making something for your own use...and of course never selling it?

And finally:

Kilgore Trout:

I love your forum name. I'm a big Vonnegut fan.

There's a story about hin being interviewd by a female reporter once.

She said to him, "Mr. Vonegut, how do you ever organise your books? Your desk is so cluttered and untidy!"

"That's okay, ma'm", he said to her.

Then tapping his head he said,"Because if you think that desk is untidy, lady, then you really ought to see what the mess is like up here."

[richardjm65]

I tried many years ago using ingredients from the UK. It was not a great success and I decided that the bottled stuff was better, especially since it is not that expensive. I had much more success with making wine from local fruit, the best being, without doubt, mango wine which was good enough to earn praise from a couple of visiting wine buffs. It is, of course, illegal unless you get the right paperwork and I'm quite sure all the satoh (rice wine) makers in the villages have applied for their licences! Wouldn't want to upset the excise boys and the BIB would they?

[Maccheroncini]

Home brew is illegal. But local peasants do it all the time. Gambling is also illegal but it's big business in Thailand (e.g. boxing soccer). Prostitution is also illegal but that's what Thailand is famous for.

[eefoo]

As far as I know, home brewing is illegal, but there again a lot of things are and that doesn't stop people doing them. The biggest problem would be ingredients for the beer, which are unavailable in LOS as there is no demand for them from the public. Obviously some must be available somewhere as the big brewers use them, but they wouldn't be of much use for a dark beer. Hops shouldn't be a problem as they are light and they could be carried in from UK say; even hop extract is available which is a concentrated liquid. The problem would be the malted barley or the malt extract which is partially processed. That's heavy and you need quite a lot to make beer.

I have imported ingredients in the past and brewed my own, but to be honest it just isn't viable to do regularly.

[sceadugenga]

As eefoo says, the malt is the problem.

We discussed this elsewhere and there was some talk of trying to malt rice.

[Kilgore Trout]

Just some varied comments.

First of all...making good beer (I never tried making ale) is more tricky and frustrating than you may think. If you make a mistake, you end up with a batch of sour vinegar.

Bigwheelman:

Are you sure. I don't plan to make any in Thailand anyhow. But is there a Thai law against making something for your own use...and of course never selling it?

And finally:

Kilgore Trout:

I love your forum name. I'm a big Vonnegut fan.

There's a story about hin being interviewd by a female reporter once.

She said to him, "Mr. Vonegut, how do you ever organise your books? Your desk is so cluttered and untidy!"

"That's okay, ma'm", he said to her.

Then tapping his head he said,"Because if you think that desk is untidy, lady, then you really ought to see what the mess is like up here."

Thanks for the info. My favorite quote by him goes something like; "some of the most interesting people I know are in their 40's and still don't know what to do with their life"

That thought always cheers me up!

[Kilgore Trout]

As eefoo says, the malt is the problem.

We discussed this elsewhere and there was some talk of trying to malt rice.

Yes, I believe malted rice is what they usually use in Asian beer.

My biggest interest in brewing is in that Thailand seems to have a lack of brown beer or ale; that excellent flavor I can't really describe, like Newcastle brown, Porter etc. I'm no connoisseur but Thai beer just doesn't do it for me.

My wife says I should teach her mom in the village up north for the benefit of the family and locals.

We currently live in the US and I'm making my first batch this weekend from extract, unfortunately due to laws and lack of ingredients it may be a skill I will have to leave here for now.

[sceadugenga]

There's a dark Beer Lao that should be available here and I've bought ABC stout from Burma.

Dark beer is made by roasting the grain before malting, there's a number of home brewer sites on the internet describing this.

I home brewed in Australia for years. If you keep your kit clean it's virtually foolproof.