This last year was full of discovery in terms of herbal beers. I brewed my first gruit with yarrow in the spring, and instantly fell in love with the herb. I followed that up with adding yarrow to other beers in a random fashion, not caring if it enhanced or detracted from the flavor. Well, I think I have burned out on yarrow because of it.

Yarrow is purportedly a healing herb with it’s use going back past the middle ages. It’s not a beautiful plant like a hop vine, it kinda reminds me of Queen Anne’s Lace in fact. For smell and aroma you can’t beat it. This stuff is amazing…. and strong. It has a sweet, grassy, herbal flavor, with some slight bittering. and the nose is very floral and grassy. This stuff really is a trip in beer because you don’t expect it.

Here I am singing it’s praises though after saying I’m burnt out. The reason I’m burnt out is because of my beer that just finished carbing. Recently I brewed a roggenbier with some modifications. The first mod was I amped the rye malt and barley malt up without increasing the hops. This worked better then I planned, the beer tastes like liquid bread. It’s thick and yummy, but it’s def a beer you only have one of. The second mod I did was I tossed in some left over heather tips and yarrow…. Ya, now I’m not certain what to think of the beer. It’s not bad, but the herbal taste just over runs the beer. I’m hoping my yarrow saison doesn’t have this overpowering quality…. Especially since I used much more yarrow in it then I did the roggenbier.

After this experience though I think I’ll lay off the yarrow for a bit.