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| A Mighty Finn Beer |
Dec, 2001 |
| by Horst Dornbusch |
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| From the land of the midnight sun and endless taiga: Celebrate the festive season with sahti, an ancient Finnish ale spiced with juniper. With recipes for mighty shati, nosedrops and more. |
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"She, the maid who beer concocted,
Gathered six of grains of barley,
Seven hop tassels next she gathered,
And eight ladles of water,
Then upon the fire she placed it,
And allowed it there to simmer,
And she boiled the ale of barley,
Through the fleeting days of summer,
Poured it then in wooden barrels,
And in tubs of birch wood stored it."
From Kalevala, the ancient Finnish national epic.
Finland, a land of the midnight sun, covered with vast taiga forests and dotted with placid lakes ,is home to one of the oldest, continuously-brewed beers in the world, sahti. The name literally means juice (from grain) and probably derives from the German word for juice: Saft. The beginnings of sahti are shrouded in mystery, but it is likely that the Finns started making sahti no later than a few centuries after their arrival in their northern homeland. The Finns÷like modern Laplanders, Estonians, Hungarians and western Siberians÷are descendants of the Ugrians, an ancient Asiatic people from east of the Ural Mountains. Some of the Ugrian bands started to migrate west about 2000 BC. By the first century AD, they had reached southwestern Finland. What we now refer to as the Finno-Ugric family of languages is very different from the so-called Indo-Germanic languages used in the rest of Europe. Finno-Ugric speech is characterized by relatively long words that are rich in vowels and poor in consonants. It is therefore peculiar that the Finns' word for their traditional beer appears to derive from German. The regular Finnish word for beer, incidentally, is olut.
Sahti is a hazy, unfiltered, coppery ale, usually between 6ö9% alcohol, with a buttery to tangy aroma and a winey to spicy palate. It is a beer with genuine pagan roots. So, if you are thinking of a spiced holiday brew for this year's festive season, consider making it a sahti. Ever since the Bronze Age, most brews in Europe prob-ably tasted much like sahti, because the early beers were often flavored with such plants as bog myrtle, jarrow, and juniper. Per-haps only in a country like Finland, tucked away in the northern-most corner of the continent and pro-tected from outside influ-ences by its for-bid-ding climate, somber remote-ness, and in-ac-cessible language, could the brewing of such an ancient beer style survive largely unchanged to this day.
A Partigyle Juice Made by Brewsters
Similar to the partigyle brewing technique in use in some modern breweries, two different runnings of this Finnish "juice" were traditionally fermented separately. The beer from the first runnings, though generally made by women (brewsters), was not consumed by them. The Finns considered this beer menās sahti. Once the grain bed had run dry, the mash was washed again with fresh hot water. The weak wort from this second running yielded a thin sahti, the only beer the brewsters were allowed to keep for them-selves. The Finns called this weak beer jlkijuoma, which, literally, means "nosedrops." When you brew a batch each of mighty sahti and nosedrops from one mash, however, there is no harm in sparging continuously, without letting the grain bed run dry.
Sahti was generally brewed under the direction of the oldest woman in the house-hold or village, since she had years of experience and knew all the tricks involved in preparing different sahtis for different occasions. Being a brewster in ancient Finland must have been a thankless job÷all work and no fun. Some-times, when male demands for strong libation exceeded supplies, the women even missed out on their thin sahti. Then they had to add sugar or honey to the fermenting nose-drops to turn them into a rough-tasting, high-alcohol brew, also destined for the masters of the tribe.
Unlike wort for modern beer, sahti wort was usually not boiled, but fermented straight from the mash tun. When the Finns did boil their wort, it was not to coagulate proteins into trub or to isomerize and extract the hopsā alpha-acids, as we do today, but to increase the brewās gravity. The beer that resulted from a boiled wort was called tupulisahti, which means "strong sahti." Just think of tupulisahti as the Finnish equivalent of a British barley wine or a Bavarian doppelbock.
An Ale Born of Myth and Lore
Earliest records of Finnish sahti brewing are contained in the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic. Kalevala is the name the Finns gave their land after their migration from north-central Asia. Finnish did not emerge as a written language until the middle of the sixteenth century, so the saga was transmitted only as oral folklore. It first appeared in book form in 1835, when it was arranged and edited by a physician named Elias Lnnrot. It is a measure of the importance of beer in the daily lives of ancient Finns that the Kalevala contains some 400 stanzas about brewing, but only about 200 about the creation of the world! Sahti was certainly a regular affair in Finnish society by the Middle Ages, as we know from a rare report of a raucous funeral ceremony for a bishop named Hemminki, who died in 1366. By then, sahti was brewed in almost every home in the countryside.
Sahtis are made primarily with malted barley, probably kilned to a color rating somewhere between 10 and 20 ”L. Sometimes sahti also contained an addition of malted rye, a grain that was apparently first cultivated in Finland in the twelfth century. Rye-based worts tend to yield a milder, lower-alcohol beer than do barley-based worts and give it a creamier, almost oily texture. The amount of rye varied greatly in traditional sahtis. Some sahtis were even brewed from rye alone, and, in some areas, malted oats were also part of the sahti grain bill. Sahtis brewed from rye, however, usually did not contain junipers or hops at all.
Before commercial malts were readily available, sahti makers steeped sacks of grain in lakes or streams until the kernels began to sprout. After the brewing grain had germinated, the Finns used their saunas to dry, kiln, or even roast it (and probably drank the beer there as well). They opened the bags of moist, sprouted grain and spread the kernels over benches in a thin layer, while the fire was heating the room to the proper kilning temperature, anywhere between 110ö220 ”F (45ö105 ”C). Kilning took about two to four days, during which the malt was stirred frequently so that it dried evenly and did not turn sour. Some-times the Finns used a "smoke sauna" for kilning, where they burned raw, smoky juniper and alder wood to give the malt extra flavor.
The effect of sauna kilning on the grain is very similar to that of the kilning methods now used in the production of modern crystal malt. Such malt is first wetted and then held in a closed, heated container so that the moisture cannot escape. This results in a virtual premashing of the grain, during which proteins and starches are already being converted (modified) by the grainās enzymes. The maltster then dries the crystal malt with the vents open until the kernels become hard and crystalline and the endosperms take on a glassy appearance. The hardened sugars dissolve readily in the hot mash liquor and thus add non-fermentable (residual) sugars to the beer. These provide body and impart a pleasant nutty flavor and a slight sweetness. For a modern sahti, therefore, an addition of about 10ö20% crystal or Munich malt to the grain bill can only improve the authenticity of the brew.
Traditional mashing in Finland involved the gradual heating of the mash with the addition of hot water, usually in a wooden mash tun. The effect would have been similar to that of a modern step-infusion mash, which guarantees the conversion of both proteins and starches. To enhance the beerās aroma, juniper twigs (with or without) berries were often boiled briefly in the brewing liquor that was used to infuse the grain in the mash tun. Mashing by this method took several hours. At the end, the sahti brewster or brewer dropped red-hot stones into the mash to bring it a boil. The stones were heated÷where else!÷over the sauna fire, of course. Such a mash boil we would now call a decoction.
During lautering, the Finns placed juniper twigs under the mashed grain to impart bitter flavors to the wort. Juniper (Juniperus communis) grows as a coniferous shrub or columnar tree that is perhaps the most widely distributed tree in the world. It does well throughout most of the Northern Hemisphere, including North America. It can be found beyond the tree limit, from Alaska to Newfoundland, Greenland, and Iceland. It ranges south through New England to the Carolinas and west through northeastern Illinois, Indiana, northern Ohio, Minnesota, and Nebraska to the western mountains of Washington, California, Arizona, and New Mexico. If juniper boughs are not available where you live, you can substitute them with fir or cedar twigs, but donāt overdo it or else the sahti will taste more like Greek retsina wine than beer! If the juniper twigs are laden with berries, the bittering effect is also considerable stronger.
Sahti makers usually place whole hops on top of the juniper twigs in the lautering tun. Sometimes they add whole-hops tea (hops boiled or steeped in water) to the fermenter. The old Finns measured their hops by the handfuls. Depending on the size of the brewerās or brewsterās hand, therefore, the hops content of a brew could differ considerably and every sahti maker had to experiment with hop loadings before the beer tasted just right. Some sahtis were even made without hops.
The first hops were probably grown in Finland around the twelfth century. To ensure an ample supply of hops for sahti throughout the land, there were even times when the law forced farmers to cultivate the vine. Even now, hops still grow wild in much of southern Finland, and it is generally accepted that these are "runaways" from the farmersā gardens of old.
Traditional Finnish hop types were rather harsh and rough-tasting by modern standards. The were almost too potent to be used fresh in brewing. The Finns, therefore, developed the practice of drying and storing their hops until the color turned from green to grayish brown. Old hops is, of course, anathema to modern brewers, because the hopsā alpha-acids oxidize during storage and cease to be wort soluble. In sahti making, however, it is not the bittering of the alpha-acids÷which could clash with the juniper flavor÷that is desired, but the preserving qualities of the beta-acids, which add very little flavor, but become wort soluble only after oxidation. Old leaf hops, therefore, is great for this brew. Since sahti wort is not boiled, only the hopsā grassy flavor and aroma components reach the brew. Bittering values (in IBU) are therefore lacking from any sahti specification.
Most of us are probably familiar with juniper from the flavor it imparts to gin, but juniper÷like hops÷serves also as a disinfectant. Some brewers even washed their brewing vessels with hot juniper water called katajavari. Sahti brewed in washed vessels, it turned out, was usually of high quality. Unbeknown to the early Finns, of course, the boiling water helped to kill any bacteria that might reside in the vats. Thus, it was probably improved sanitation rather than the flavor contribution of the juniper water that was responsible for the improvement in sahti quality.
Some sahti makers simply let their mashes rest after the boil, and, instead of lautering the grain, ladled the wort from the top of the mash straight into the fermenter. Sometimes they even let the mash itself ferment. The finished beer was then drawn off the grain or ladled from above the grain into a mug for drinking.
The ancient Finns lautered their mash by ladling it into a long wooden trough-like vat, about six feet long and about one-and-a-half feet deep, with a bung hole at one end. The vat was usually carved from a single tree trunk (mostly aspen). In some areas, the Finns also lautered their sahti in an upright, three-legged tub instead of a horizontal trough. They arranged small pieces of wood as trub dams along the bottom of the vat and covered these with a layer of straw as a false bottom, on top of which they placed a layer of juniper twigs for flavor.
For lautering, the traditional sahti maker simply removed the bung from the vat, but only after the entire mash was transferred, and let the grain bed run dry. The first runnings of the extract were often poured back into the vat for additional filtering. This is similar to our modern practice of recirculating the wort. Unlike in modern brewing, though, the wort thus collected was usually not boiled. Instead it was fermented as is.
Traditionally, the Finns used open vats for sahti fermentation. Since maltiness was the main flavor objective and hop bitterness was less important, a sahti had to be well attenuated during fermentation to reduce any syrupy sweetness. Sweetness was allowed only in nosedrops. The dry aftertaste of a properly made sahti, therefore, resulted from a combination of juniper and good attenuation. In reverence to tradition, many sahti breweries in Finland still use bread yeast to this very day, but for more predictable results you can use a modern ale yeast.
At the end of primary fermentation, the ancient Finns transferred sahti off the sediment into wooden barrels. In summer, these were stored in cool root cellars for secondary fermentation. In winter, they were stored in heated rooms to keep them from freezing. Once fully attenuated, sahti was usually consumed quickly and straight out of the barrel. There is no tradition of bottling sahti in Finland, though it is now available in jugs or bottles from modern sahti breweries. Commercial sahtis, nowadays, also tend to be weaker than the traditional originals, brewed to a strength of about 5ö6% alcohol by volume, half way between a sahti of old and nosedrops. After fermentation, traditional sahti was stored in a cool place of about 40 ”F (4ö5 ”C) to age.
Nowadays, the most popular beers in Finland, as in virtually every country in the world, are mass-produced German-style lagers. By the twentieth century, sahti brewing had virtually disappeared in Finland, because large breweries did not bother with the style for economic reasons, and private sahti brewing and selling had simply been outlawed by the government. It was only in 1985, that the government responded to the lobbying efforts of a few intrepid sahti enthusiasts and started to grant licenses to small commercial sahti breweries. The first to gain such a license was Pekka Kriinen, who founded Lammin Sahti Oy, in Lammi, in Central Finland, some 200 miles north of Helsinki. Now there are about half a dozen microbreweries across Finland supplying a niche market for the traditional ale of their forefathers (or "foremothers," since the ale was usually brewed by women!). Their brews are distributed by the state-run alcoholic beverage system, and sahti is now a regular entry at the annual Finnish Beer Festival.
Making Sahti with Modern Ingredients
Sahti requires a relatively large grain bill, if you are making both mighty sahti and nosedrops from the same mash. Expect to use about 18 pounds of grain or at least 14 lbs. of extract for one five-gallon batch of each. Modern brewers can use two-row barley as a foundation grist (or English pale ale malt extract) with the addition of some Munich malt for color. Though not listed in all recipes here, you can always add an optional 1 lb. of malted rye for creaminess.
The recipes here take into account some of the variations in traditional Finnish brewing processes. You can add the hops to the mash or to the wort. You can boil the mash similar to a decoction process, or you can make the beer without boiling either the mash or the wort. Extract brewers should steep all flavor ingredients (twigs, juniper berries, hops, and cracked malt) in hot brewing liquor before adding the canned malt. But never boil the twigs, because, under prolonged exposure to high heat, they tend to impart a retsina- or turpentine-like flavor to the wort that can make the brew almost unpalatable. Purchase Juniper berries in the spice section of your grocery store or supermarket. Specifically, do not experiment with any juniper preparations. These are usually designed for medicinal purposes only, and some may even be harmful if ingested!
At the start of the sparge, you can collect the initial runnings and pour them back over the mash for recirculation. Continue to recirculate the runnings until the extract runs clear. If the original gravity of the "menās" wort ends up to be higher than specified in the recipes (see gravities there) ladle small amounts of the nosedrop wort into it until you reach the target gravity. If the "menās" wort is too weak, you have no choice, but to ferment it as is or to boil off excess liquid in the fashion of a tupulisahti. If the nosedrop wort is too strong, simply add another dose of hot water to the mash and draw off some additional, now very weak wort to thin out the nosedrops. If the nosedrop wort is too weak, you may wish to "sacrifice" some "menās" wort to enrich the "womenās" wort. Alternatively, you can free-style blend the two worts for any combination of gravities÷and thus alcoholic strengths÷that you desire.
Once fermented (for fermentation times, see recipes) sahti is ready for consumption. But, you get a mellower product, if you let sahti mature and sediment for one to two months, or longer. Nosedrops are at their peak after three months, while sahti, because of its higher alcohol content, mellows out after five months. Sahti and nosedrops are a bit turbid by nature, so there is no need to fine these brews, nor should they be filtered. Like all unfiltered, unpasteurized brews, sahti will ultimately go past its prime, but if stored cold, it should last up to a year.
Sahti and nosedrops are only gently carbonated beverages. Priming is optional in sahti brewing. If you decide to bottle-condition your sahti, use at most half the usual amount of priming sugar or dried malt extract. Using a quarter teaspoon added into each 12-ounce bottle works well. If you serve your sahti or nosedrops out of Cornelius kegs, maintain a pressure of no more than 5ö8 psi.
When you toast with sahti, say: "Kippis." This is Finnish for "cheers."
RECIPES FOR MIGHTY SAHTI AND GENTLE NOSEDROPS
Six step-by-step recipes for making ale the Finnish way
By Mark Naski
All-Grain Sahti and Jlkijuoma
(Mighty Sahti and Nosedrops)
OG (Mighty Sahti) 1.095
OG (Nosedrops) 1.045
FG 1.025 (for both Mighty Sahti and Nosedrops)
alc. % vol. 9.1% (Mighty Sahti) and 3.8% (Nosedrops)
Ingredients for 5 US gallons or 19 Liters Each:
18.5 lb (8.5 kg) English pale ale malt of 3 ”L
2.2 lb (1 kg) Munich malt of approximately 10 ”L
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
2.25 oz (65 g) Any noble hops with about 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or cedar or fir
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character).
Process:
Mash in at 120 ”F (approximately 50 ”C). Add juniper berries and the hops to the mash. Raise the mash temperature slowly over 90 minutes to the boiling point. Boil the mash for 10 minutes. Place a few juniper twigs on top of the false bottom of the lauter tun to cover it with a single layer. Ladle the mash into the lauter tun. Start sparging. Sparge the first 5 gallons into one container for Mighty Sahti. Sparge the second 5 gallons into a separate container for nosedrops.
At the end of the sparge, raise the temperature of both worts to 180 ”F (approximately 80 ”C) and hold it there for about 20 minutes to sterilize them. But do not boil them! Let cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. After 3 days of fermentation, siphon the Nosedrops into jugs or bottles and store in a cool place at 35 ”F (approximately 2 ”C) to cause the fermentation to stop and to ensure that the Nosedrops taste slightly sweet. Ferment the Menās Sahti for a total of about 7 days. Siphon Menās Sahti into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C). Serve either sahti cold. Pour gently to avoid rousing the yeast sediment.
Extract Sahti and Jlkijuoma
(Mighty Sahti and Nosedrops)
OG (Mighty Sahti) 1.095
OG (Nosedrops) 1.045
FG 1.025 (for both Mighty Sahti and Nosedrops)
alc.% vol. 9.1% (Mighty Sahti) and 3.8% (Nosedrops)
Ingredients for 5 US gallons or 19 Liters Each:
14.25 lb (6.5 kg) English pale ale malt extract
2.2 lb (1 kg) Munich malt of approximately 10 ”L
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
2.25 oz (65 g) Any noble hops with about 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or cedar or fir)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character).
Process:
Crack the Munich malt and place in steeping bag. Bring 2ö3 gallons of water to a boil. Turn off the heat and immerse the juniper twigs, the juniper berries, the hops, and the bag with cracked Munich malt into the liquid. Let stand for about 30 minute. Strain the hot liquor and separate into two equal portions. Add 9.5 lbs of extract into the first container and 4.75 lbs into the second. Top off both containers with cold water and stir. Let both cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. After 3 days of fermentation, siphon the Nosedrops into jugs or bottles and store in a cool place at 35 ”F (approximately 2 ”C) to cause the fermentation to stop and to ensure that the Nosedrops taste slightly sweet. Ferment the Menās Sahti for a total of about 7 days. Siphon Menās Sahti into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C). Serve either sahti cold. Pour gently to avoid rousing the yeast sediment.
All-Grain Tupulisahti
(Strong Sahti)
OG 1.070
FG 1.016
alc. % vol. 7.02%
Ingredients for 5 US gallons or 19 Liters:
11.1 lb (5 kg) English pale ale malt of 3 ”L
1.5 lb (0.7 kg) Munich malt of approximately 10 ”L
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
1.1 oz (35 g) Any noble hops with about 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or ceddar or fir)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character)
Process:
Mash in at 120 ”F (approximately 50 ”C). Add juniper berries to the mash. Raise the mash temperature slowly over 90 minutes to about 160 ”F (approximately 70 ”C). Rest the mash for 60 minutes. Keep the mash covered to retain heat. Place a few juniper twigs on top of the false bottom of the lauter tun to cover it with a single layer. Ladle the mash into the lauter tun. Start sparging. Add hops to the wort at the start of the run-off. At the end of the sparge, raise the wort temperature to 180 ”F (approximately 80 ”C) and hold it there for about 20 minutes to sterilize it. But do not boil! Let cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. Ferment until the brew reaches final gravity. Siphon into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C).
Extract Tupulisahti
(Strong Sahti)
OG 1.070
FG 1.016
alc. % vol. 7.02%
Ingredients for 5 US gallons or 19 Liters:
8.5 lb (3.9 kg) English pale ale malt extract
1.5 lb (0.7 kg) Munich malt of approximately 10 ”L
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
1.1 oz (35 g) Any noble hops with about 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or cedar or fir)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character)
Process:
Crack the Munich malt and place in steeping bag. Bring 2ö3 gallons of water to a boil. Turn off the heat and immerse the juniper twigs, the juniper berries, the hops, and the bag with cracked Munich malt into the liquid. Let stand for about 30 minutes. Strain the hot liquor. Add the extract. Top off with cold water and stir. Let cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. Ferment until the brew reaches final gravity. Siphon into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C).
All-Grain Lammilainen
(Lammin Sahti)
OG 1.065
FG 1.016
alc. % vol. 6.37%
Ingredients for 13.5 US gallons or 51 Liters:
10.4 lb (4.75 kg) English pale ale malt of 3 ”L
1.1 lb (0.5 kg) Rye malt
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
1.1 oz (35 g) Any noble hops of approximately 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or cedar or fir)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character)
Process:
Mash in at 120 ”F (approximately 50 ”C). Add juniper berries to the mash. Raise the mash temperature slowly over 90 minutes to about 160 ”F (approximately 70 ”C). Rest the mash for 60 minutes. Keep the mash covered to retain heat. Place a few juniper twigs on top of the false bottom of the lauter tun to cover it with a single layer. Ladle the mash into the lauter tun. Start sparging. Add hops to the wort at the start of the run-off. At the end of the sparge, raise the wort temperature to 180 ”F (approximately 80 ”C) and hold it there for about 20 minutes to sterilize it. But do not boil! Let cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. Ferment until the brew reaches final gravity. Siphon into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C).
Extract Lammilainen
(Lammin Sahti)
OG 1.065
FG 1.016
alc. % vol. 6.37%
Ingredients for 13.5 US gallons or 51 Liters:
8 lb (3.6 kg) English pale ale malt extract
1.1 lb (0.5 kg) Rye malt
approx. 3 oz (80 g) Juniper berries
1.1 oz (35 g) Any noble hops of approximately 4% AA
Juniper twigs (or cedar or fir)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast (or a similar yeast with a fruity and smooth character)
Process:
Crack the rye malt and place in steeping bag. Bring 2ö3 gallons of water to a boil. Turn off the heat and immerse the juniper twigs, the juniper berries, the hops, and the bag with cracked Munich malt into the liquid. Let stand for about 30 minutes. Strain the hot liquor. Add the extract. Top off with cold water and stir. Let cool to about 70 ”F (approximately 20 ”C) and add yeast. Ferment until the brew reaches final gravity. Siphon into jugs or bottles and store in cool place (best at around 40 ”F, approximately 5 ”C).
Horst Dornbusch was born and raised in Dsseldorf, Germany. He has been a resident of North America (both Canada and the United States) since 1969. Horst has been a homebrewer since 1972. He is an active contributor to Brew Your Own and has three beery books to his credit: PROST! The Story of German Beer (Brewers Publications, 1997) and two volumes of the Classic Beer Style Series: Altbier (Nr. 12, 1998) and Bavarian Helles (Nr. 17, 2000).
Mark Naski (his real name is Markku) was born and raised in the small village of Hamina on the south-east coast of Finland, about 20 miles from the Russian border. The commercial brewing and selling of sahti was illegal then (and it is still highly regulated today). So Mark and his village friends used to fish for salmon, which they traded for carboy-size milk containers filled with bootlegged sahti from a farmer some 100 miles away. In 1972, Mark moved to Helsinki, where he became a computer scientist and a homebrewer. In 1978, he moved to Canada and, in 1991, to St. Louis, Missouri, where he has since brewed many a batch of both sahti and nosedrops.
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