[jmspring]

The idea of fermentation to kill bugs and what not is mentioned in the documentary How Beer Saved the World.

If I remember rightly, they make a brew out of pond water towards the end

https://vimeo.com/23278902

[spoonie]

The only part of that documentary I don't like is that they purposely don't mention that they boil the pond water while brewing with it (like you would normal water when brewing). It would have been way cooler if they had shown that yeast alone was enough to kill off other bad organisms.