Comments on: There is no ‘I’ in sugar http://appellationbeer.com/blog/there-is-no-i-in-sugar/ Tue, 22 May 2012 16:56:30 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: Thomas Cizauskas http://appellationbeer.com/blog/there-is-no-i-in-sugar/comment-page-1/#comment-258465 Thomas Cizauskas Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:02:41 +0000 http://appellationbeer.com/blog/?p=2241#comment-258465 Succinct post, and good comments to it. Right on, Brother Stan! Succinct post, and good comments to it.

Right on, Brother Stan!

]]> By: Jeff Alworth http://appellationbeer.com/blog/there-is-no-i-in-sugar/comment-page-1/#comment-258334 Jeff Alworth Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:50:00 +0000 http://appellationbeer.com/blog/?p=2241#comment-258334 Craft brewing employed many useful old wives tales, but now it needs to abandon them. Like: all malt = good beer adjuncts = bad beer small brewery = honest craftsman large brewery = producer of corporate swill big beer = well-crafted I'm sure there are others. These should have been considered shorthand for people new to beer in about 1988. They really add more confusion than they relieve. And to show that even the best of us can stow away these old chestnuts, I'll confess that I was unaware that candi sugar was wholly in disuse now. What's that picture I saw of monks making it on long strands of twine? Was that a historic picture? A wise man once told me I need to get out more. What I need is to get to Belgium. Craft brewing employed many useful old wives tales, but now it needs to abandon them. Like:

all malt = good beer
adjuncts = bad beer
small brewery = honest craftsman
large brewery = producer of corporate swill
big beer = well-crafted

I’m sure there are others. These should have been considered shorthand for people new to beer in about 1988. They really add more confusion than they relieve.

And to show that even the best of us can stow away these old chestnuts, I’ll confess that I was unaware that candi sugar was wholly in disuse now. What’s that picture I saw of monks making it on long strands of twine? Was that a historic picture?

A wise man once told me I need to get out more. What I need is to get to Belgium.

]]> By: Séan Billings http://appellationbeer.com/blog/there-is-no-i-in-sugar/comment-page-1/#comment-258261 Séan Billings Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:40:41 +0000 http://appellationbeer.com/blog/?p=2241#comment-258261 The anti adjunct prejudice comes from the macro brands overusing them to cut costs, regardless of what happens to beer quality as a result. The adjunct haters also point to the Reinheitsgebot forbidding adjuncts (as if that law was designed for anything other than the Bavarian nobility maximising it's malt tax profits) and seem to forget about the world class English ales and Stouts that use adjuncts of various kinds. Sugar in particular is reviled because of it's use in those horrible cheap liquid extract kits. A can of hoped malt extract and a kilo of sugar. Ferment it in the hot press at 30C+ and then expect it to taste like a lager. The few people who didn't chuck the hobby right there went on to better ingredients and inexplicably, blamed the sugar for the bad beer (although 1kg in a 1.04x gravity beer is way too much). I would never attempt to make a Belgian style strong ale without some sugar. The anti adjunct prejudice comes from the macro brands overusing them to cut costs, regardless of what happens to beer quality as a result. The adjunct haters also point to the Reinheitsgebot forbidding adjuncts (as if that law was designed for anything other than the Bavarian nobility maximising it’s malt tax profits) and seem to forget about the world class English ales and Stouts that use adjuncts of various kinds.

Sugar in particular is reviled because of it’s use in those horrible cheap liquid extract kits. A can of hoped malt extract and a kilo of sugar. Ferment it in the hot press at 30C+ and then expect it to taste like a lager. The few people who didn’t chuck the hobby right there went on to better ingredients and inexplicably, blamed the sugar for the bad beer (although 1kg in a 1.04x gravity beer is way too much).

I would never attempt to make a Belgian style strong ale without some sugar.

]]>