🇧🇮 Burundian Cuisine

Inzoga

Sorghum Beer

Prep Time 7 days
Servings 10
Difficulty Hard

A traditional opaque beer brewed from fermented sorghum grain with a thick, slightly sour character, deeply embedded in Burundian social and ceremonial life.

Ingredients

  • 5 kg sorghum grain
  • Water for soaking and brewing
  • Malted sorghum for starter

Instructions

  1. 1 Soak sorghum grain in water for two days, then spread on mats to germinate for three days, creating malt.
  2. 2 Dry the sprouted grain in the sun, then grind coarsely using a grinding stone or mill.
  3. 3 Boil the ground malt in a large pot with water for two hours, creating a thick brown wort.
  4. 4 Strain the wort through a basket filter to remove the grain solids, collecting the liquid in a fermentation pot.
  5. 5 Add a small amount of previously brewed beer as a starter culture and leave covered at room temperature for two days.
  6. 6 The beer is ready when it has a pleasant sourness and mild effervescence. Serve from a communal pot with shared straws.

Did You Know?

The communal drinking of sorghum beer is so important in Burundian culture that the country's coat of arms features a sorghum plant.

From The Culinary Codex — http://theculinarycodex.com/dish/burundian/inzoga/