Caramel For Brewing

Caramel in the Brewing Process

A valuable brewing ingredient for more than a century, caramel contributes to the character of beer on every continent. Caramel provides color, flavor and consistency to beer. It also has applications in a variety of related products, including cider and non-alcoholic malted beverages.

What is Caramel?

  Caramel results from the controlled heat treatment of carbohydrates, typically glucose syrup. The glucose and food-grade catalysts are used to facilitate the browning process and provide stability. The finished beer caramel, a long polymer chain, is a positively-charged colloidal solution and is therefore stable in beer, which also has a net positive charge. Caramel is inert, physically stable when stored properly and has bacteriostatic properties.

Why Use Caramel?

Caramel is a great way to adjust beer color throughout any part of the brewing process. Caramel allows you to adjust color in the kettle, as late as final filtration or in the serving tank. With caramel you can darken your beer without adding the astringent flavors associated with dark malt.

Dosage

Dosage will vary by style. Traditional ales require 0.02% or more of caramel coloring to add color. Certain dark beer, including some stouts and bocks, might require a higher caramel dosage. Lagers require less caramel to obtain color consistency than other types of beers (typically 0.01%). Adjusting a larger type beer to a bock beer color would require an addition of 0.05 -0.075%.

If you want to make some caramel malts for your customers to meet their brewing or distilling requirements, then just talk with us. More information about the roaster machine which can produce more than 50+ special malts can share with you! Cheers!

---Laizhou Yingtai Team