Growing your own ingredients

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I became inspired to actually try growing hops in pots by an article written by Chris Colby, editor of Brew Your Own magazine. Well, last week, James Spencer from Basic Brewing travelled out to the home of Chris Colby in Bastrop, TX to do a video interview about that article. In addition to seeing that Chris has various hops growing in about 30 large pots on his driveway, it was interesting to learn that he also has a crop of barley growing next to his house. He still has to figure out a way to harvest and then malt the grain, but he hopes to get enough in order to brew a beer from all home-grown ingredients. Sounds pretty cool. I think we have the room, but I doubt I'll be able to plant a crop of barley in the backyard. The video interview is available here.