Beer Brewing Ingredients – Does Barley Display More Qualities of Being a Surreal Crop?

When it comes to brewing beer as we all commonly know it, there are three major ingredients required to complete the process. Hops are used as a flavoring aspect, yeast is added to convert the fermentable sugars into alcohol, but barley is the key ingredient from which the sugars are obtained. As the fourth largest produced cereal grain crop in the world, barley predominantly serves its purpose as a major animal feed, but it is often used in foods of a healthy nutritional value, and is also the root ingredient in the manufacture of beer. There are two common types available of the grain suitable for brewing, which are known as two-row and six-row barley.

The six-row barley is a natural mutation of the two row version, and is higher in protein content which is found more suitable for animal feed. It is commonly used in some North American lager beers, but mostly when there are other adjuncts added to provide additional sugars, such as corn and rice. Two-row barley however has lower protein content with more fermentable sugars present, therefore it is this which is better adapted to beer brewing, and is traditionally used in many European beers. Its lower protein content lessens the chances of a beer becoming cloudy, and also requires less time steeping in water for partial germination to occur, which is essential for malting. Malted barley also serves as the key ingredient to whiskey production by distillation of unfermented green beer, and although it may be the most predominant and popular source of sugars required for beer brewing, it is not a compulsory element.

If the word ‘malt’ is in the title of any consumable product, it commonly refers to the process to which the cereal grain used as an ingredient has been subjected to. To achieve malting, whole grains are soaked in water and allowed to germinate for a short period, then the sprouting process is abruptly halted by kiln-drying the grains with the use of hot air. This procedure develops the enzymes in the grain required to modify its starches into sugars such as glucose, fructose, sucrose, maltose, etc, and also further enzymes known as proteases used to break down proteins. Barley however contains a high enzyme content which makes it to be the most commonly malted grain available, with wheat being the second. With the sugars required for fermentation to produce alcohol, and formatted proteins suitable for the yeast conversion, malted barley is therefore the most popular choice for brewing beer.

There are two categories used by brewers in reference to malt, which are base malts and specialty malts. Base malts refer to malted barley which contains enough enzymes to convert their own starch into sugars, as well as some starch from other unmalted grains which may be added during the conversion process known as mashing. Specialty malts however have very little diastatic power and low enzyme content, so these are particularly used to provide color, flavor, and body to the final brew. These malted grains were most commonly subjected to additional heat treatment by means of roasting, which converts their starches into sugars non-enzymatically by a simple applied cooking process. Once the barley has undergone all the preparation necessary through malting, it is then sent for mashing which activates the enzymatic process by stewing the grains in hot water for a short period. This eventually results in a sweet liquid known as wort, and it is then transferred to the next important stage of flavoring and sterilization.

By: Jorge Zarate

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