谈及中国啤酒，多数人脑海中首先浮现的通常是青岛牌，一种自1900年代早期便在山东开始酿造的、有着温和啤酒花香味的比尔森啤酒。但事实上，青岛啤酒是在清朝瓦解时，涌入中国通商口岸的德国和英国的企业家建立的，其历史可谓复杂。除去一场推动本地酿酒厂的尝试在1950年代遭遇夭折，这种饮料在中国的发展从未达到其在西方市场的流行程度。至今，中国的人均啤酒消费仍不及美国的一半。但新的证据表明，中国首次进行啤酒酿造并非在一个世纪以前，而是在五千年以前。近日，人们从考古学家发掘的陶器中发现了用于啤酒发酵的谷物和根茎的痕迹。这是中华文化又一项灿烂的发明。

彩蛋系列摘自美国外交关系协会每周一期的“亚洲事务更新”，该栏目包罗万象，主要展现让外国人惊呆了的那些中国趣事儿。前三期内容包括《贵州一大学以“喝酒定成绩”引热议》、《中国煎饼引领纽约新“食”尚》、《中国“剩女”的烦恼》、《“手抄党章”成中国新婚俗》。（编译罗婧婧）

Bonus: China’s five thousand years of (beer) history. When most think of Chinese beer, the first name that usually comes to mind is Tsingtao, a mildly hoppy pilsner brewed in Shandong since the early 1900s. Its history is complicated, however, by the fact that it was founded by a group of German and English industrialists who had rushed into China’s treaty ports as the Qing dynasty slowly crumbled. Despite an abortive attempt in the 1950s to promote local breweries, the beverage never caught on in China to the same extent as in Western markets, and per capita consumption is still less than half of that in the United States. But new evidence suggests that beer was first brewed in China not a century ago, but five thousand years ago. Pottery unearthed by archaeologists was recently found to contain traces of grains and tubers used in fermenting beer. Another glorious invention of Chinese civilization!