How is beer made?

How is beer made?

Jeff Evans (Freelance beer Writer) gives expert video advice on: How old is beer?; How has the brewing process changed over the years?; How is beer made? and more...

The brewer takes malted barley, soaks it in hot water to extract all the important enzymes, starches and sugars that are needed for the brewing process, then runs the resultant liquid off into another vessel called a copper, where it's boiled up with the addition of hops, which add bitterness and other flavours to a beer. That liquid is then cooled down, flowed into a fermentation vessel and yeast is added. The yeast starts to ferment the beer, and after about a week, you have beer in a primitive form. What happens after that depends on the sort of beer you're making. If it's a lager that'll be stored at low temperatures for weeks, if not months, so the yeast can continue to condition the beer, to round out the rough edges. If it's an ale, very often it will be packaged into a cask, with the yeast continuing in the beer, and taken to a pub where a secondary fermentation continues, right up until the point it's being served.