Bitesize Guide to Beer Vol 2: How It's Made

Welcome back to the She Drinks Beer introduction to all things beer with Kat, your friendly travelling Beer Sommelier! You might have noticed the recent boom in craft and micro- brewed beers and been wondering what the heck it's all about. For the guy or gal who has been knocking back light beer for the best part of their pub years all these craft brew bars, with their hundreds of beers and their resident beer snobs, it can all be a little intimidating. I believe that beer is for everyone, and good beer can be appreciated by anyone, so this is why I'm putting together this crash course in beer, giving you a small titbit of knowledge to bring you up to speed so you can hold your head up high while ordering your Hefeweizen!

Last time, I touched on the basics of beer, some history and the main ingredients, so this edition I'll dive into the magical process that brings together water, grain, yeast and hops to produce one of the world's favourite drinks. 

Let's begin with the grains.  

Most beers use malted barley as the main ingredient. Malted just means that the grain seed has started growing. Barley will be "malted" by expert "maltsters", who take the grain, soak it in warm water until it begins to sprout, then dry and gently kiln the barley to stop the growing process. The malting process makes the starch in the grain more accessible, as starch= sugar that the yeast will later eat. Similar to coffee beans the barley can be roasted to different states to bring toasty, caramelised and chocolatey flavours to the beers.

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The brewer will normally purchase the already malted barley, and put it through a mill to crush the grains and open them up, separating the centre of the barley, the important part with all the starchy goodness, from the husk. The milled product is known as "grist". 

Now the brewer will "mash in", adding the grist to water in a large tank known as a "mash tun". The resulting mash will resemble a warm, watery porridge at this stage, which admittedly isn't so appetizing, but this allows the starch in the barley to be converted into sugar that the yeast will later feast upon. 


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At this stage, the sweet liquid in the mash tun is known as "wort" (there is nothing brewers love more than constantly changing the names of things as they pass through the brewery!). This will be separated and transferred to a kettle where hops will be added. The finished, or spent grain is taken away and often goes to feed local farm animals!

Hops will be added to boil in the kettle, which imparts a pleasant bitterness to the beer, before the liquid is cooled to an ambient temperature and the yeast added. Different strains of yeast thrive in different temperatures, so the brewer has to be careful of the temperature so as not to kill off the yeast before it has done its job of consuming the sugar and converting it into alcohol and CO2 (fizz!). This part of the process is known as "fermentation", and can take anything from a few days to a few weeks. 

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Once the fermentation has finished, hey- presto! You have beer! However, for many brewers this isn't quite time to clock off and open a cold one. Often the beer will need time to age a little to bring out the varied and complex flavours, and conditioning does just this, normally in a separate tank, in a cask or even in the bottle. 

You might even hear the phrase "dry-hopped" which means that more hops have been added to the cooled wort or beer. Because the hops have not been boiled they won't release much bitter flavour (think steeping a teabag for too long), but they will impart some other fresh and juicy aromatic flavours, such as citrus, floral or fruity, depending on the hops used. 

Depending on the style of beer and the brewery, the beer may be filtered or pasteurised. Filtering clarifies the beer, taking away any residual haze to leave a crisp, pure looking beer which many consumers find attractive, however a clear beer is by no means always best as sometimes that haze provides more complex flavour and a beautiful, soft mouthfeel. Pasteurising beer will simply kill off any organisms that could spoil the beer, this is often done to increase shelf life, and may large supermarket chains will insist upon pasteurised product. 

There are lots of other brewing techniques and apparatus that can be used by brewers to create different styles of beer but what we have described above is the basics of almost every style of beer you will find down your local. Next time we will delve into some of the more common beer styles and how they are created!

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If you enjoyed learning about making beer, why not give it a go for yourself? Follow us on Facebook or Instagram and get in touch for more information on recommended courses in your
area!

Slainte!