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From Barley to Beer
Whether a microbrewer's copper kettles or a macrobrewer's stainless-steel tanks (some hold 6,000 barrels), beer is brewed in the same basic way. A chief ingredient is malted, roasted barley, which makes breweries smell something like Grapes-Nuts cereal. Added bitterness and flavor come from the cone-shaped flowers of the hop vine. Still slight differences in ingredients, brewing procedures, and distribution can make a big difference in flavor. Here's how beer gets from the field to your house, along with steps that affect its taste along the way.
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Malting
Barley is wetted and spread out damp. It starts to sprout, which activates enzymes that break starches into sugars. The barley, now called malt, is then roasted, which stops germination. Lightly roasted malt makes pale beer. Darker roasts add color and toff, chocolate, or smoky flavors.
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Mashing
Roasted, malted barley is crushed, then steeped in warm or hot water; enzymes cleave starch into simpler carbohydrates and sugars. To make light beers, brewers add extra enzymes that can turn even more carbohydrates into sugars, which yeast can later "digest". The result: fewer calories. Other grains -- rice or corn, sometimes cornstarch or corn syrup -- may be added. They remove some of the malted-barley flavor, leaving a lighter taste, and cut costs, because those grains are cheaper than malted barley. Mashing results in a sweet liquid called wort.
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Brewing
Wort is sterilized and concentrated by boiling. Hops are added early for bitterness, later for aroma. The amount, variety, and timing of each addition is key to the flavor. Hops' aromatic oils and bitter resins balance malt's sweetness and act as a natural preservative. Brewers use whole hop flowers, pressed pellets, or liquid extracts, which lack the full range of flavors found in whole hops or pellets.
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Fermentation
The hopped wort is cooled. Yeast is added to turn sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide. The type of yeast, how long it's left in the mix, and lagering (cold storage) all affect taste. Some beers are "krausened," or given a second fermentation, with added wort and yeast. That builds flavor and carbonation. Budweiser uses beechwood strips in krausening to provide a surface on which yeast spreads out. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale does its krausening in the bottle. At times that brew looks a bit cloudy, because yeast remains.
Vessels, plumbing and air must be kept scrupulously clean, lest stray yeast and bacteria invade, creating medicinal or sour notes.
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Hops Add Bitterness
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Pasteurization
Most beer is heated to kill bacteria. In its Genuine Draft, Miller uses sterile filtering, a cold process that traps microscopic particles with ceramic strainers. Critics of pasteurization say heat changes flavor; critics of filtering say it removes flavor. We say there are so many taste factors that it's impossible to tell. Most beer destined for the tap is not pasteurized or sterile filtered, so refrigeration is essential.
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Bottling
Oxygen is flushed from cans and bottles to keep beer from turning stale before its time. A bottle's color can affect taste: Clear or green glass admits light wavelengths that promote chemical reactions responsible for skunky off-flavors; brown glass admits less light.
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Shipping, storage
Beer should be kept cold and out of the sun from the time it's brewed until you drink it. Even fluorescent lights can affect flavor. Refrigerated (or a least insulated) trucks help preserve freshness on the way to market. Ships that carry imported beer to the U.S. are typically not refrigerated, and flavor can deteriorate. Grolsch Premium Lager, which had off-flavors in every sample we tried, spends four weeks in an unrefrigerated ship traveling from Holland to the East Coast, its importer said.
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Brewer's Secrets |
Coloring
Dark beers have no more alcohol than paler varieties; they're made with different malt, more heavily roasted malt, or extra color that brewers add (from natural malt extracts).
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Contract brewing
Many beers aren't actually made at facilities owned by the company named on the label. Some Samuel Adams beers come from a Miller facility in Washington state. Many Pabst beers are brewed by Miller. The brewer behind a brand often watches closely and may send its own brewmaster to the brewery.
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Undercover Imports
Anheuser-Busch ads may mock imports, but, says Advertising Age, it plans to test-market an upscale beer called Red Label, designed in part to lure Bass and Heineken loyalists. (The brewer wouldn't comment.) Anheuser-Busch owns half the corporate parent of the Mexican import Corona, and it brews -- at its plant in Los Angeles -- all the Kirin Japanese beer Americans drink (under Kirin's supervision).
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Stealth brewers
Big companies sometimes hide behind brewery names that sound small. Coors produces George Killian's, but you won't find the Coors name on the Killian's label, which says "Unibev Ltd." (Unibev is a Coors company, also located in Golden, Colo.) Miller makes Red Dog, whose label reads "Plank Road Brewery."
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Mark Scott, All Rights Reserved.