Roasted barley, a specialty malt, has a roasty, coffee-like character.
BREWING INGREDIENTS CAN be purchased in home-brew stores or through Internet retailers. Some may include an ingredient or recipe kit of your choice with your initial purchase of an equipment kit. Ingredients – malted barley or malt extract, hops, and yeast – are also packaged and available individually so you can create your own recipes. A kit is a good first step, as the variety of products available to today’s home brewer can be overwhelming.
There are four basic ingredients in beer. Each in itself has an interesting story, but when they combine to create beer, it is a truly a wondrous thing.
Let’s start with the obvious ingredient: water. Since beer is essentially water, brewing water is a very important component of the finished beer, though more so for commercially brewed beer than for beer brewed at home. In most cases, city water is perfectly adequate to use when brewing at home. Some home brewers, however, may opt to use filtered water in order to remove unwanted chemicals and off-flavors from their water. Substituting bottled water for tap water is both expensive and unnecessary, in my opinion. Depending on whether your drinking water is either very hard or very soft, some home brewers, particularly advanced brewers, will incorporate a water-treatment protocol into their brewing routine, especially if they are trying to replicate a beer style with a notable water profile. For example, the water of the UK’s Burton-on-Trent, famous for its pale ales, is rich in minerals, which gives its beer a characteristic dry crispness. In this case, adding brewing salts, such as gypsum (calcium carbonate), to the water will increase its hardness. Conversely, the water in Pilsen, Bohemia (now the Czech Republic), the birthplace of Pilsner lager beer, is very soft.
Home-brew ingredient kits are a good way to ease into the hobby. They come in a variety of styles, complete with malt, hops, and yeast.
Malted barley makes up the base of a beer, although wheat, rye, and oats are also commonly used in smaller amounts. Adjuncts (primarily corn and rice) are also used in commercial brewing to produce lighter-bodied, American-type lagers.
In order to be suitable for brewing, barley must be modified by undergoing a process called malting. Harvested barley is soaked in water for several days until the seed, or kernel, begins to germinate or sprout. The grain is then dried, or kilned, at a high temperature to halt germination. This process enhances the starches and nutrients in the kernel, and creates the enzymes necessary for converting these starches to sugars, which are then converted to alcohol by the yeast. The process also makes the barley husk friable, as the kernels must be cracked to expose the starches.
Young cereal grasses, such as barley, are bright green.
As barley matures in the field, it becomes tawny in color.
The versatile base malt is pale in color. Kilning at higher temperatures produces a darker malt. Depending on the degree of kilning, these “specialty” malts may be light brownish-red to black in color. Darker, more flavorful and aromatic malts – including crystal, chocolate, and roasted – are the result of Maillard reactions, which are chemical reactions that enhance the flavors of browned foods. Each malt flavor and aroma is unique: reddish crystal malt has a sweet, raisin-like quality; chocolate malt has a bitter chocolate taste; and roasted malt has a burnt, coffee character. I like to use the example of that one piece of popcorn which is a little browner and tastier than the others. Browned meat and caramelized onions are other examples. Unlike the lighter varieties, the highly kilned, darkest specialty malts – roasted and black, for example – contribute no fermentable sugars to the finished beer and are used mainly for color and aroma.
The combine harvester performs three functions in the field: cutting, threshing, and cleaning grain crops.
Baled barley after the harvest.
Barley turners used during the malting process.
Pale malted barley, the base malt for many styles of beer.
Malted barley is sold in bulk, or packaged in 55-pound sacks. Much smaller quantities are available to the home brewer.
Grain color is measured in degrees using the Lovibond scale. For example, pale malt registers at about 2 degrees or less, crystal malt a range from 20 to 120, and black is at the extreme at more than 500. (Learn more about malt color and its contribution to beer in the “Recipe Formulation” chapter.)
The grain, also referred to simply as malt, must be crushed or milled prior to brewing. It is possible to buy grains that have already been milled, or to have them milled wherever you are buying your ingredients. Some all-grain brewers prefer to mill their own grain and will use a small electric or manual mill (similar to a hand-turned coffee grinder).
Malt extract, available in a dry powdered or viscous liquid form, can be used in place of or in combination with grain. It also comes in degrees of color ranging from the very light to the very dark. Malt extract is convenient and easy to work with, though more expensive than using grain.
Hops are the cone flower of the female hop plant, Humulus lupulus. They grow on a vine, and can reach heights of 25 feet or more. Hops have a bitter quality and a pungent aroma, both of which are imparted to the beer during the boil. Their bitterness serves to balance the sweetness of the malt. In addition to contributing both flavor and aroma, hops have a preservative, antiseptic quality, which inhibits spoilage and aids in head retention and flavor stability. Hops can be used in beer in several forms: liquid oil, pellets, or in their entirety. Some brewers like to use whole cones or leaf hops, although many prefer the more convenient and compact pellet form created when whole hops are pulverized and compressed. Hop oils are rarely used by home brewers.
Many hop varieties are easy to grow at home in most US climates. They are usually ready for harvest in mid-August or early September.
Pelletized hops are convenient to use and easy to store.
Hops produce a sticky, fragrant substance called lupulin, which contains both essential oils and resins. The resins contain both alpha and beta acids. Alpha acids are responsible for bittering, beta acids more so for flavor and aroma. Each hop variety is assigned an alpha acid unit (AAU) value, indicating its bittering potential. This number, representing a percentage, is usually a range, as the AAU fluctuates from harvest to harvest. In recipe formulation or beer style guidelines, bitterness is represented as a different range called International Bitterness Units (IBUs).
Hop resins need a good rolling boil in order to become soluble and therefore impart their bitterness to the beer. Hops are added at various stages of the boil; the longer the hop resins are boiled, the more alpha acids are extracted. The first hop addition, at the boil, is called the bittering hop, while the final addition is the aroma hop. Additionally, some beers are “dry hopped.” In this technique, hops are added to the fermenter, rather than the kettle, largely to enhance the beer’s aroma.
A hop farm in Mabton, Washington. Most US hops are grown in the Pacific Northwest.
Hop production for commercial use is centered in Europe, the United States, Canada, and Australia. In the US, hops have traditionally been grown in the Pacific Northwest, although smaller hop farms have been springing up all over the country. Hops are grown from rhizomes, or rootstocks, and not seeds; they are available for planting in the spring. Home brewers with a green thumb will find it’s easy to grow hops in many parts of the country, provided you have the room. Hops are a flower, and are therefore perishable. Old hops will develop a cheesy character, which can be transferred to the beer.
Semiliquid yeast slurry is ready to be pitched.
Both bittering and aroma hops are available in many varieties, each with their own characteristics, including bittering, flavor, and aroma. Bitterness aside, different hop varieties can impart a wide range of flavors and aromas, such as earthy, floral, fruity, citrusy, piney, and minty. Some varieties, such as the German noble hop Hallertau, have been cultivated for centuries. The so-called “noble hop” varieties tend to provide more aroma than bitterness.
Liquid yeast is available in “smack packs.” Once activated, the yeast combines with nutrients to create a starter.
Yeast is a fungus; a live, one-celled organism. Th ere are yeasts strains specific to baking, wine making, and brewing; they are generally called Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
During the fermentation period, the yeast gobbles up the sugars created during the mashing process, converting them to ethyl alcohol. Yeast is also responsible for CO2 (carbon dioxide), another by-product of fermentation. CO2 is responsible for “carbonating” the beer – making it effervescent.
Although there are several hybrid strains, yeast basically falls into two classes: ale yeast and lager yeast. Ale yeast is a top-fermenting yeast, while lager is a bottom- fermenting yeast. Comparatively, ale yeast is fast-acting and active at warm temperatures, while lager yeast requires cooler temperatures and demands more fermentation and conditioning time. Within the subsets of ale and lager yeasts are strains particularly suited to certain beer styles.
Th is amazing organism can also have a tremendous impact on beer flavor. Although some yeasts have a neutral character, others have distinct characteristics. For example, it is the yeast specific to German Hefeweiss that gives the beer its classic banana and clove-like flavor andaroma.
Yeast options used to be rather limited – packets of dry yeast, available in ale or lager strain, were added directly to the cooled wort, or first rehydrated and added as a liquid. Today, however, the home brewer can choose from a wide array of both liquid and dry yeasts specific to numerous styles of beer. Some yeasts are multipurpose – an American ale yeast, for instance – while others are specific to the style.
If properly cared for and harvested correctly, yeast can be “repitched” in subsequent batches of beer, although most home brewers prefer to purchase yeast as needed.
Unconventional ingredients often play a large role in today’s craft beer recipes. Many brewers still adhere to traditional style guidelines, using only hops, barley, water, and yeast, but others regularly brew beers that incorporate more unusual and flavorful ingredients, some more exotic than others. Ingredients such as honey, molasses, fruits, herbs, and spices hark back to the old or even ancient days of brewing. As craft beer has evolved, it’s become increasingly common to see beers made with unusual ingredients, such as chocolate, chili peppers, and coffee. Pumpkin ale, a very popular seasonal style of beer, is a good example of this trend. Many of today’s craft brewers are adventurous and creative, looking to “wow” the craft beer drinking public. It’s easy to brew with special ingredients, but there is one important caveat: anything other than your basic ingredients should be added to the wort during the boil or immediately afterward, or to the fermenter post-fermentation, in order to avoid contaminating your beer.
Many products, including wood chips, are available to the home brewer interested in emulating a variety of beer styles.