Labels:text | bird | newspaper OCR: Extra Light for the American market. Ironically, the corn adjunct originally used to cut costs is now considered essential for flavor when brewing for the American taste. American Beer Without Mashing To give a lighter, crisper malt flavor, corn adjunct can and does replace up to 45% of the malt in some commercial beers. Though clarity and shelf life in- by William Moore results in a clearer, longer lasting beer, You've quaffed more corn than you though with reduced head retention. crease, head retention proportionally suffers when malt is replaced by corn realize. Though more often thought of as Clarity, lower costs, and a longer shelf adjunct. If you want to preserve head- an ingredient in foods, corn has been life were probably more important to ing. it is a good idea to limit corn to 30% used extensively in American commer- the early lager brewers with their crude or less of the total mash, as done by Hei- cial brewing since the European- or nonexistent filtering equipment than neken when brewing for the American inspired lager boom of the mid 1900's. a proportional loss of head retention, so market and Miller when brewing Originally employed to reduce costs and the use of corn adjunct became quickly Lowenbrau. dilute the high nitrogen content of U.S. widespread in American commercial Home brewers have been brewing malt, corn was quickly found to produce brewing. lighter adjunct beers for years, using a beer with a less satiating, snappier malt with a substantial amount of corn taste, ideally suited to the often warm sugar to cut costs and produce a lighter climate of our country. beer. Unfortunately, beers produced Before 1840, virtually all beers pro- with substantial added sugar always duced in the United States were ales, lean towards a thin, cidery flavor, be- porters, or wheat beers. Around 1820, cause corn or cane sugar is highly re- German immigrants began to arrive in fined, produced from corn or cane large numbers, creating an instant starches steeped in hydrochloric acid market (in the areas they settled) for and cooked to convert the starches into German-style beers. At this time, brew- sugars. On the other hand, grist com- ers in Denmark and Germany were per- posed of pale malt and brewers corn fecting the lager style of brewing, and flakes converts to fermentable sugars the newly American Germans were via the natural enzymes in the malt, re- quick to notice. Purportedly, the first sulting in a malt and corn extract con- chill-brewed lager was brewed in Phila- taining the full spectrum of malt and delphia in 1840 by a man named John Just as hops were first used as a pre- corn flavor, fermentable sugars and un- Wagner, and the clear, refreshing style servative, not for taste, in the middle fermentable body-building dextrins. caught on like wildfire with the immi- ages, corn adjunct was first used pri- Beers produced by mashing pale malt grant German brewers and the United marily to reduce costs and increase and brewers corn flakes together have a States. clarity in the new lager breweries of the light and crisp malt and corn flavor, Originally added to beer as a cheaper mid 1900's, faced with chill haze and without a trace of the familiar thin, ci- mashable starch to cut the higher cost of costly refrigeration for the first time. dery character inherent in all beers pro- malt, corn was soon found valuable in re- Like hops, the lighter flavor of corn has duced with refined sugars. ducing chill haze and increasing the caught on to a tremendous degree with Up to now, home brewers have shied shelf life of the new lager beer, as its pro- beer drinkers worldwide, especially in away from corn adjunct beers, either teins, unlike those of malt, are not made North and South America, and beers as frowning on them because they were too liquid (solubilized) by mashing. Pro- diverse as Carlsburg, Augsburger, Bal- light in flavor or because they required teins in solution contribute to chill haze, lantine, Molson, Rolling Rock, Rainier, laborious mashing, as no brewing malt flavor instability, and head retention. Schlitz, Stroh's, Miller, and Heineken extract to date has been mashed with Accordingly, the use of corn adjunct to all use corn adjunct to lighten the malt dilute the malt mash (and its proteins) flavor to make a more refreshing beer ... continued on inside cover William's Brewing. Box 2195, San Leandro, CA 94577 Sheet #12
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