It can be difficult as parents to teach your children about alcohol. Media, American puritanical history, and many other influences give our kids contrary information about whether or not booze is a good thing and how it is to be properly enjoyed. If you currently brew beer or wine or have thought about giving it a try you might find that having your children share in the creation of wine and beer will take away the mystique surrounding alcohol that often attracts teenagers into irresponsible drinking.


How to brew beer It's Friday afternoon/evening here in the US and for many of you it's time for a cold one. Here's a Read more

Art and culture blog Joffre the Giant comments:

Many parents have an instinctive American Protestant complex of guilt and fear revolving around alcohol, so that they treat the subject with a gravity, severity, and degree of fear at a level similar to that involving guns (lock it away in a cabinet, hide the key, and hope that we've taught them well enough that they won't try to break in when we're away). In my opinion, the level of alarm that needs to be applied to alcohol and children is more like that in cooking: please don't touch the hot stove, never use a knife carelessly, and you're probably not old enough to use the stove yet. I can't imagine a better way to be introduced to alcohol than through homebrewing. It's like learning to cook! Beer is not some fearsome magical thing that comes from elsewhere and does harm...it's a fun food that my uncle makes for all his friends.


Geek icon Wil Wheaton also recently posted an entry on his blog on how homebrewing with his college-aged son has strengthened their relationship.

As you're teaching your kids about everything else in life, don't leave out the proper place of alcohol. If you brew, why not invite your child to help when they're old enough to actually enjoy the process of brewing and bottling. You may even choose to give them a taste of their labor. Photo by Jeffrey.

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Alcohol & Kids Part 1: A Ramble | Joffre the Giant