My ex-father-in-law used to make yew tree wine.
He tapped the trees in spring and collected the sap, brewed the wine, bottled it in champagne bottles with a teaspoon of sugar.
Then he lifted the carpet on the staircase, lifted a few boards, and stashed the wine in the staircase.
Just before christmas he would extract the bottles and we would drink it.
Well I say we drank it, I remember the first few sips tasted delicious, the rest is a bit of a blur.
I myself use to work at a pub in Sheffield called The Frog and Parrot. We had a parrot in a cage in the corner (it was actually a Macaw) and a fish tank full of frogs (well they were Cane toads , but it was close).
I used to help brew and we were in the Guiness Book of Records for a couple of years for the world's strongest beer.
Roger and Out. 16.9%
We put oxygen pumps in the fermentation vessels to keep the yeast alive. This meant if fobbed up like crazy, so we had to split the brew across 3 FV's at first (we brewed 192 gallons at a time).
I hated brewing it as after a week we had to empty one of the FV's , by hand, in 2 gallon buckets, carry it up to the top of the other FV's and pour it in.
A week later we had to merge the two FV's into one, again by hand a bucket at a time.
Was a lot fitter then
And the brewery was in the cellar of the pub which used to be a morgue, so it was heavily haunted. One ghost used to throw the lids of the malt extract at the back of your head while you were stood on the ladder pouring beer into the top of the FV. He was a bloody good shot as well.
One morning I was in the cellar transferring beer from one FV to another. It was about 02.30, the pub was locked up with the alarm activated, no one else in the building, and a lid flew through the air and caught me on the bridge of the nose. I was furious and yelled and screamed at the ghost for several minutes.
For the next few months nothing happened. No flying lids. Ho strange noises. Nothing.
Then one morning I was down there again, middle of July, and for once it was red hot in Sheffield. I was at the top of the ladder and a snow ball hit me in the back of the neck.
Guess he was saving up for a biggie
https://www.exposedmagazine.co.uk/food-drink/famous-beer-returning-to-the-frog-parrot/
