If you live in Kent (or are passing through), you no doubt have spotted one of the many oast houses. What are they, and what is their history? Today many are used for luxury holiday homes, but they had a real purpose, back in the day.
Kent and Sussex used to be the main counties where beer was brewed. Dating back to the 16 century, the oast houses were simply used to dry hops. Imported beers means many of them no longer had a use.
Most oast houses had a few drying floors and kilns, which were fired by wood or charcoal. The hops were dried, then made into bales to send to breweries. You can still many oast houses in other counties, but most of them are here.
Hops need to be dried before they are used in beer, so oast houses would reduce moisture from around 80% to less than 10%.
If you fancy living in an oast house, you’ll likely have to be a millionaire. It’s good the old buildings are being bought (to prevent them being knocked down). But sad that nobody can often tour an oasthouse, as a community museum.
