It stands to reason that if we want good beers we must follow as closely as possible the methods used by those who know how to make them best of all the commercial brewers. Obviously we cannot possibly follow the commercial brewer through every process from growing the barley and hops to bottling the finished product, with gigantic machines handling two or three hundred bottles a minute. Nevertheless, we can follow him most of the way.
Firstly, we can by-pass two of the most highlyskilled operations by buying quite cheaply ready-touse ingredients – the very same materials as used by the commercial brewer. Thereafter we can follow him very closely indeed. In fact, we might well be very tiny miniatures of the great man himself.
Naturally, the beginner lacks the skill and technical knowledge to start with, but he quickly acquires a very simple technique or ‘knack’ of knocking up some really first-class beers, and he does this consistently after a few initial experiments. If this is so; and if our beer making is going to be simple with good results assured, there would seem to be no need here for a lengthy discourse on some of the technicalities of commercial brewing. But there is. Anybody can make good beers, but I believe that if the whole process is understood you will be able to see how closely you are following ‘the great man himself,’ so that you can see for yourself the importance of the simple methods you will be using. That highly technical processes go on naturally and unseen during these processes need not be discussed here. The fact that they do go on, how and why they go on without you having much to do with it will be discussed later on.
It is a fact that beer making is a natural process, apart from the boiling which is necessary if wild yeasts and bacteria are to be prevented from spoiling the finished product. The changes that take place in the ingredients are natural changes; all we need do is to start them off. Boiling halts these changes and destroys the causes of spoiled beers. Adding yeast merely starts the processes in a liquor freed of the enemies of successful brewing.
The art in commercial brewing is in selecting the materials best suited to the types and varieties of ales and beers turned out by each particular brewer. Any drinker worth his salt will have a wide knowledge of the various ales, beers and stouts available in the houses of the various brewers. The fact that each differs is the result of careful blending of ingredients.
Quality is of the utmost importance. Therefore, brewery groups grow their own barley and hops and harvest and process them according to their needs or select the best from overseas. The body in beer comes from malt obtained from selected barley; hops add flavour, ‘tang’ and bitterness where this is required and, of course, preservative properties.
Yeast in itself adds nothing to beers, yet without it beer would not ‘happen’. The action of yeast on sugar in the wort (prepared liquor) produces alcohal, without which the wort would remain wort and never become beer.
Sugar is essential if the yeast is to produce alcohol _ this point is covered in more detail in the practical section. Invert sugar is used in all breweries, not because it contributes flavour or any effective properties to the finished product, but because it is more readily fermentable than other sugars.
Barley is grown extensively in this country and very often the finest barley in the world is produced here. The quality naturally depends on soil conditions and the weather – the latter being, as we all know well enough, somewhat unpredictable. For this reason a good deal of barley is imported from areas where the climate is more reliable and better suited to growing the very best regularly each season to offset the poor quality sometimes produced here. Thus the commercial brewer might well use, in addition to some grown here, barley from Egypt, California, Canada, and perhaps India as well as from Europe.
Barley is but a seed and, within its husk, like all seed, is the germ of new life with a plentiful supply of food for the young plant.
Barley and malted barley appear identical. Barley is hard – so hard that the miller uses stone to grind it. Malted barley on the other hand is easily cracked with the teeth to exude the soft sweetness which is malt.
Malting barley is a highly skilled operation bypassed by amateurs who buy ready malted barley or malt extract. In malting barley, the maltster brings about artificial growing conditions so that the seed reacts as if it had been sown in soil. These growing conditions are stopped when the maximum yield of malt can be expected. Firstly, the barley is heaped and watered until germination takes place and growth begins. He then spreads this on the malting floor and never takes his eyes off it, as it were. Warmth and moisture encourages growth of the shoot within the husk and also brings about digestive ferments which cause starches and other substances to change into malt. When the young shoot still within the husk is about three-quarters along the seed, the maximum malt yield is reached. At this stage further growth is halted by drying or lightly cooking in a kiln. Thus the all-important malt is kept within the husk. The mass of rootlets is then removed and the malted barley – or malt, as it is now called – is stored for use as required.
The fuller flavored, darker colored malts are obtained by higher temperatures than those destined for pale ales which are of the palest color. Crystal malt is produced by gas-oven treatment. Some malts are roasted while others – brown malts in particular – are produced in kilns burning wood fires.
Using one malt alone or blending two or many in the mash tun is the skill by which the brewer produces the beers for which he is famed. And it is here, by experiment, that the home brewer can turn out something quite remarkable once he has gained a little experience from using the simple recipes and methods detailed in the practical section.
Hops were once described as a noxious weed and outlawed by royal decree, but without them beers as we know them today would not exist. They are easy to grow – indeed, my grandfather used to grow them in the same manner as runner beans. Many country pubs are festooned with hops during the season; it is from such as this that home wine makers on a visit to the country pinch a few for adding to wines which benefit from the addition of a hop or two.
The fully grown, pale green hop bears some resemblance to a pine cone except that it is less tapered and paper-soft instead of woody-hard.
Take a handful of freshly picked hops and the palms immediately become sticky or tacky. This is because essential oils and resins have developed in the cone, and it is at this stage, when the cone is ‘ripe’, that the hops are gathered, for it is now that the full flavour is reached. Now – or a little earlier – the hop pickers converge on the hop garden in their thousands. Whole families up sticks, as it were, and sally forth for three or four weeks’ working holiday where they can be assured of a good time into the bargain.
The drying of hops is a skilled craft. The hops are spread over the cloth-covered porous floor of the drying kiln through which warm air is passed until sufficient moisture has been removed to ensure that the hops keep well. If too dry the flavour is spoiled; if not dry enough they could turn mouldy on storing. When suitably dry the hops are packed by presses and stored until required for use.
The first operation in commercial brewing is the milling of the malted barley. As with drying hops, and malting the barley, skill is required if the best results are to be obtained. The malted barley is milled so that it is hardly more than cracked. From the mill the malted crushed barley or ‘grist’ is conveyed to the mash tuns (our mash tun will be a two-gallon polythene pail, as we shall see later on). The mash tuns of the brewery are enormous copperdomed vessels, often holding many thousands of gallons. It is in these that the first great changes take place. The malt is fed into these and mixed with water – from now on called ‘liquor’ simply because in the brewery there is no such thing as water except the stuff they wash the floors with. Brewery liquor, then, and malt form the wort in the mash tun. This is brought to and maintained at a temperature suited to the particular enzyme whose action is required to take place first. It is then increased and increased again until the brewer is satisfied that the changes brought about by the various enzymes are complete. At this stage the wort is boiled. As soon as the malt is put in the mash tun and wetted, the process halted in the malting kiln recommences. Starch is converted to sugars by digestive ferments or by the enzyme action just mentioned. Temperature control during this stage is essential because certain enzymes work – bring about their changes – at temperatures that would destroy others. U nderheating would merely leave certain enzymes inactive so that the desired changes would not take place – or only partly take place. Complete change by enzyme action is necessary if good beers are to be produced.