Matthew Suffidy wrote: So I have not heard too much about how beer is made. Are there any main differences? Beer is made from grains- predominately 6 Row barley -Water, hops and yeasts.
Like the lees have to be removed still? The fermention of beer is similar to wine in that the removal of "lees" removes the chance of certain off flavors getting into the beer.
The grains must be boiled as to make the starches convertable? Boiling grains = bad, Malted grains are heated with water to create a mash.
Some yeast are better at processing starches? And why the alchol limit, ah because the yeast are not able to process the wierd materials at higher alochol levels? Beer yeast has a lower alcohol tolerance than wine yeast. But you can ferment up to 20% and possibly higher. Also the high alcohol content of wine is a recent a introduction for wine. Historically few wines were over 9% or 10% ABV. As a side note the Boston Beer Company holds the Guiness World record for the highest alcohol content in a fermented beverage (including wine) with the beer Utopia. It actually takes about 14 years for this beer to mature and is only released once every
2 years in extremely limited quantity.
I like how wine is basically self sanitary and beer is not. Like you basically can't get sick on 13% wine right? Actually no bacteria can survive the fermentation process in beer or wine. Proper sanitation is needed in brewing and vinting to stop wild bacteria and yeasts from infiltrating and changing the flavor of the beverage. And personally a gallon of Carlo-Rossi makes me sick just to look at, and it isnt even 13% ABV.
Try
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for more general info. There are also many books on the subject some more scientific than others.