Thursday 13 November 2008

Malt, sugar and hops

I used to only own volume 2 of "Brewing Science and Practice" by H. Lloyd Hind. The volume entitled "Brewing Processes". When I started work on the book, I though it advisable to pick up volume 2: "Brewing Materials". It was a wise decision.

The bits on sugar, in particular, are very handy. They answer some of my questions and many of yours. I'm still feeling shit (another stomach bug) so I'll keep it short.

According to Hind, seven types of sugar were used in brewing:
  1. Cane sugar, derived from sugar can and sometimes sugar beet.
  2. Invert sugars, made by inversion of sugar cane.
  3. Starch sugars, including corn syrups and glucose, made from cereals, usually maize.
  4. Mixtures of the above.
  5. Caramels, made from cane sugar or glucose.
  6. Lactose or milks sugar, only used in milk stout.
  7. Honey, very rarely used.

Fascinating, eh? As an extra bonus, here's the analysis of brewing sugars no. 1, 2 and 3:

1 comment:

Kristen England said...

Awesome Ron!

These numbers come out to be on par with my calculations and are right on with todays invert sugar syrups.