Malt

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Malted barley
Malting is a process applied to cereal grains, in which the grains are made to germinate (by soaking them in water [1]) and are then quickly halted from germinating further (by drying/heating it with hot air before the plant develops).[2][3] Malting is thus a combination of two processes; notably the sprouting process and the kiln-drying process. These latter terms are often preferred when referring to the stadium of brewing for batches of beer (or other beverage) are in (this, as they provide more in-depth information).
The term malt refers to several products of the process:
The grains to which this process has been applied, for example malted barley;
The sugar derived from such grains which is heavy in maltose, such as baker's malt used in cereals such as Rice Krispies.
A product, based on malted milk, similar to a malted milkshake (i.e., "malts").
whisky or beer can also be called malt as in Alfred Edward Housman's aphorism "malt does more than Milton can, to justify God's ways to Man."

Contents
1 Uses
2 Malting
3 Mashing
4 References
5 See also


Uses

Homebrewing malt extracts: liquid in a can and spray dried.
Malted grain is used to make beer, whisky, and malt vinegar. Malting grains develops the enzymes that are required to modify the grain's starches into sugars, including monosaccharides (glucose, fructose, etc.) and disaccharides (sucrose, etc.). It also develops other enzymes, such as proteases which break down the proteins in the grain into forms which can be utilized by yeast. Barley is the most commonly malted grain in part because of its high diastatic power or enzyme content. Also very important is the retention of the grain's husk even after threshing, unlike the bare seeds of threshed wheat or rye. This protects the growing acrospire (developing plant embryo) from damage during malting, which can easily lead to mold growth. It also allows the mash of converted grain to create a filter bed during sparging (see brewing). Other grains may be malted, although the resulting malt may not have sufficient enzymatic content to convert its own starch content fully and efficiently and may create a "stuck sparge" .

Malting

A oast house in Kent

A smoke channel in a oast house
A malting, sometimes called maltings, malthouse, oast house or malting floor, is a building that houses the process of converting barley into malt, for use in the brewing or distilling process. This is done by kiln-drying the sprouted barley. This is usually done by spreading the sprouted barley on a perforated wooden floor. Smoke, coming from a oasting fireplace (via smoke channels) is then used to heat the wooden floor (and thus, the sprouted grain with it). The temperature thus employed is usually around 55° Celsius. A typical floor maltings is a long, single-story building with a floor that slopes slightly from one end of the building to the other. There are a number of maltings buildings still in existence, and a handful are still operational. Floor maltings began to be phased out from the 1940's in favour of 'pneumatic plants'. Here large industrial fans are used to blow air through the germinating grain beds and to pass hot air through the malt being kilned. Like floor maltings these pneumatic plants are batch processes but of considerably greater size, typically 100 tonne batches compared with 20 tonne batches for a floor maltings.

Mashing
It is to be noted that malt is often divided into two categories by brewers; notably those that need mashing and those that don't need mashing.[4] Light colored malts such as pale ale malt, pilsener malt and malted wheat need to be mashed to convert the starches into fermentable sugars. Pre-converted -or "speciality"- malts (caramel or crystal malts) don't need to be mashed.

References
^ "How to brew"-manual by John Palmer
^ "Quality Factors for Malting, Brewing and other End-uses", Oregon State University. Retrieved on 2007-04-13.
^ What is malting?
^ Malt division by mashing and not mashing
Make Your Own Malt, Brew Your Own magazine (ISSN 1081-826X ), August 1997, pp. 32-36.
UK Malt The website of The Maltsters' Association of Great Britain. UK Malting Barley information and malt images.

See also

Look up malt in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Mash ingredients
Beer style
Malta (soft drink)
Malt beverage
Malt liquor
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malt"
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Beer Brewing Basics

Beer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Beer is made by brewing. The essential stages of brewing are mashing, sparging, boiling, fermentation, and packaging. Most of these stages can be accomplished in several different ways, but the purpose of each stage is the same regardless of the method used to achieve it.

Mashing manipulates the temperature of a mixture of water and a starch source (known as mash) in order to convert starches to fermentable sugars. The mash goes through one or more stages of being raised to a desired temperature and left at the temperature for a period of time. During each of these stages, enzymes (alpha and beta amylase primarily) break down the long dextrins that are present in the mash into simpler fermentable sugars, such as glucose. The number of stages required in mashing depends on the starch source used to produce the beer. Most malted barley used today requires only a single stage.
Sparging (a.k.a. lautering) extracts the fermentable liquid, known as wort, from the mash. During sparging the mash is contained in a lauter-tun, which has a porous barrier through which wort but not grain can pass. The brewer allows the wort to flow past the porous barrier and collects the wort. The brewer also adds water to the lauter-tun and lets it flow through the mash and collects it as well. This rinses fermentable liquid from the grain in the mash and allows the brewer to gather as much of the fermentable liquid from the mash as possible. The leftover grain is not usually further used in making the beer. However, in some places second or even third mashes would be performed with the not quite spent grains. Each run would produce a weaker wort and thus a weaker beer.
Boiling sterilises the wort and increases the concentration of sugar in the wort. The wort collected from sparging is put in a kettle and boiled, usually for about one hour. During boiling, water in the wort evaporates, but the sugars and other components of the wort remain; this allows more efficient use of the starch sources in the beer. Boiling also destroys any remaining enzymes left over from the mashing stage as well as coagulating proteins passing into the wort, especially from malted barley, which could otherwise cause protein 'hazes' in the finished beer. Hops are added during boiling in order to extract bitterness, flavour and aroma from them. Hops may be added at more than one point during the boil. As hops are boiled longer, they contribute more bitterness but less hop flavour and aroma to the beer.
Fermentation uses yeast to turn the sugars in wort to alcohol and carbon dioxide. During fermentation, the wort becomes beer. Once the boiled wort is cooled and in a fermenter, yeast is propagated in the wort and it is left to ferment, which requires a week to months depending on the type of yeast and strength of the beer. In addition to producing alcohol, fine particulate matter suspended in the wort settles during fermentation. Once fermentation is complete, the yeast also settles, leaving the beer clear. Fermentation is sometimes carried out in two stages, primary and secondary. Once most of the alcohol has been produced during primary fermentation, the beer is transferred to a new vessel and allowed a period of secondary fermentation. Secondary fermentation is used when the beer requires long storage before packaging or greater clarity.
Pasteurisation is an optional stage of the beer process in which the beer is slowly heated and cooled to kill off any existing bacteria in order to maintain longer shelf life. This is generally a stage not included in higher end beers, but is quite common in mass-produced beers such as American-Style lite beers, and other mass-produced lagers. It is less common in ales as pasteurization can change the many flavours.
Packaging, the fifth and final stage of the brewing process, prepares the beer for distribution and consumption. During packaging, beer is put into the vessel from which it will be served: a keg, cask, can or bottle. Beer is carbonated in its package, either by forcing carbon dioxide into the beer or by "natural carbonation". Naturally carbonated beers may have a small amount of fresh wort/sugar and/or yeast added to them during packaging. This causes a short period of fermentation which produces carbon dioxide.