Do professional breweries ever use extract?

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bperlmu

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I was just wondering whether malt extract was ever used by professional breweries or is really just a homebrewer thing? just something ive been curious about....
 
I've heard rumors of some using it, but I don't believe that many if any do, given that extract brewing is more expensive than whole grain (imagine multiplying that times 100 or more), as well as limiting your options for the types of beers you can make.
 
About the only time that I can see a real brewery using any form of extract is in the creation of an outrageously high abv brew.
 
In one of the episodes of his "radio" show, Jamil talked about a brewpub, I am afraid that I do not remember which one, that brews extract beers. He commented on the awards that they have won with their extract brews, and the fact that in blind taste tests, people can not tell the difference between their beers and AG beers. If I remember correct, the reason for them doing extract had to do with space limitations.
 
An extract based brewery could fit in a modest sized closet allowing a space constrained bar/restaurant to be a brewpub. I could see it making sense in a number of locations as a marketing ploy. I know I go out of my way for brewpubs. I could not see it making sense for a microbrewery whose only product is beer.
Craig
 
My friend worked in a brewery and he said the brewmaster would take a gravity reading at the end of the sparge and if the gravity was not dead on he added dme to get his target OG.
 
Yes, there are breweries that use extract. In several cases I know of, it is a matter of waste disposal. If you can't sell (or give away) your spent grain, this can be a real problem. Pound for pound, spent grains are higher in protein that raw grains. Yeast and hop trub are also good food for cattle. But, some places like Orange Country California, trucking grain out to the cows would be a major expense.
 
I went to a brewpub recently that had a glass wall separating the resutrant from the brewhouse. Stacked all around the brewhouse were big bags of Briess DME. I'm not sure if this is all they use for there base malt but they had enough of it that they could.
 
NY states oldest brew pub used to be(might still be but i think they contract out now) and extract brewery. Their beers pretty much sucked.
 
Most Guiness outside Ireland is brewed by extract.

In the USA, for example, Guinness Draught is usually brewed by Labatts using hopped malt extract from Guinness.

So technically it still "comes from ireland", though Guinness has not been an Irish company for a long time.

nick
 
Beerlord said:
NY states oldest brew pub used to be(might still be but i think they contract out now) and extract brewery. Their beers pretty much sucked.
mcsorleys?
 
HP_Lovecraft said:
Most Guiness outside Ireland is brewed by extract.

In the USA, for example, Guinness Draught is usually brewed by Labatts using hopped malt extract from Guinness.

So technically it still "comes from ireland", though Guinness has not been an Irish company for a long time.

nick

Not sure where you heard this, but it has to be flawed. With the amount of guinness sold, it would be incredibly expensive to use malt extract, especially hopped malt extract, given that they probably do use hop extract. And according to guinness themselves "All the GUINNESS® sold in the UK, Ireland and North America is brewed in Ireland at the historic St. James’s Gate Brewery in Dublin."

And how do you figure that they haven't been Irish for long, "1759 -
Arthur Guinness signs a 9,000 year lease on a disused brewery at St. James’s Gate, Dublin for an initial £100 and an annual rent of £45." 250 years seems like a while to me.
 
HP_Lovecraft said:
Most Guiness outside Ireland is brewed by extract.

In the USA, for example, Guinness Draught is usually brewed by Labatts using hopped malt extract from Guinness.

So technically it still "comes from ireland", though Guinness has not been an Irish company for a long time.

nick

My understanding is that Guinness Draught is brewed at St James' Gate and shipped, while Guinness Extra Stout is contract-brewed here by Labatt using malt extract. And apparently a total disregard for quality.
 
bperlmu said:
I was just wondering whether malt extract was ever used by professional breweries or is really just a homebrewer thing? just something ive been curious about....

The guy at my LHBS was recently telling me about the guys from Garrison (one of Halifax's micros) stopping by occasionally to pick up malt extract, usually on the order of ten or twenty kilos. My understanding is that they use that for experimenting as a time-saver, but all the beer they sell is made from scratch.
 
As to Guinness not being Irish, I believe the point the poster was making is that it has not been Irish for a long time now, since, according to Wikipedia,
"The parent company has been headquartered in London since 1932 and was later merged with Grand Metropolitan plc and developed into a multi-national alcohol conglomerate named Diageo."

As to Guinness and extract, this is also from Wikipedia...
"Guinness Foreign Extra Stout, is a 7.5% abv version sold in Europe, Africa, the Caribbean and Asia. The basis is an unfermented but hopped Guinness wort extract shipped from Dublin, which is added to local ingredients and brewed locally. The strength can vary, for example, it is sold at 5% abv in China, 6.5% abv in Jamaica and East Africa, and 8% abv in Singapore.[14][15] In Nigeria a proportion of sorghum is used. Foreign Extra Stout is blended with a small amount of intentionally soured beer.[16]"
 
rabidgerbil said:
As to Guinness not being Irish, I believe the point the poster was making is that it has not been Irish for a long time now,

True, though it wasnt meant as an insult. My grandparents came from Ireland, and I happen to like Guinness. My point was that it doesnt really matter where it comes from since Guinness itself doesnt represent much of Ireland for me. Its too hyper-marketed.

Oddly, during my last trip to Ireland, most young adults were drinking Budweiser. Also brewed at the Guinness factory in Dublin.
 
I have these feelings too.
To me it's like making cookies from scratch or buying the just add water version.
It's sort of a bad example because the box kind taste better than my homemade cooking. Steeping grains is fun. Mixing in DME is not. Extracts seem so inside the box....boring. This much of that grain and this much of that one and this and that. I'm making my own beer. I want the best and I'm not looking for the easy way to do it.
 
david_42 said:
Yes, there are breweries that use extract. In several cases I know of, it is a matter of waste disposal. If you can't sell (or give away) your spent grain, this can be a real problem.
There's a great brewpub in Portsmouth, VA, named Alt Platz, where all of the beer is brewed via extract + grain or partial mash recipes. The brewer simply can't efficiently dispose of several hundred pounds of spent grain. So, he buys bulk liquid extract at a very reasonable price, and his profit margin is such that he is now looking for a bigger venue. I had the good fortune to sit in on a brew day there, and I was very surprised at the simplicity of the process. It was simple homebrewing on a very grand scale. If you ask me, pure genius!
 
blaqball said:
I have these feelings too.
To me it's like making cookies from scratch or buying the just add water version.
It's sort of a bad example because the box kind taste better than my homemade cooking. Steeping grains is fun. Mixing in DME is not. Extracts seem so inside the box....boring. This much of that grain and this much of that one and this and that. I'm making my own beer. I want the best and I'm not looking for the easy way to do it.
You are highly misinformed. Though I brew all grain and take great pride and satisfaction in making great brew from fairly raw ingredients, I have to acknowledge that extract brewing affords almost as much flexibility as all grain brewing. Specialty grains can be used to GREAT effect in extract brewing. You should not discount it as a very valid and very creative process through which to create great beer.
 
The basis is an unfermented but hopped Guinness wort extract shipped from Dublin, which is added to local ingredients and brewed locally.

While this is still technically extract I wonder if it counts for the purpose of the poster's question. I mean, if they make their own wort and then concentrate it themselves (or contract to do it) for shipping and then redo it, it is a little different that a typical "extract" batch since they still control the ingredients, quality and consistancy.
 
There's a ton of breweries/brewpubs that make their own hopped wort and use that as a basis for 6 or 7 of their beers. I dislike these places because you'll order a sample flight and everything tastes the same.
 
Not sure where you heard this, but it has to be flawed. With the amount of guinness sold, it would be incredibly expensive to use malt extract, especially hopped malt extract, given that they probably do use hop extract. And according to guinness themselves "All the GUINNESS® sold in the UK, Ireland and North America is brewed in Ireland at the historic St. James’s Gate Brewery in Dublin."

And how do you figure that they haven't been Irish for long, "1759 -
Arthur Guinness signs a 9,000 year lease on a disused brewery at St. James’s Gate, Dublin for an initial £100 and an annual rent of £45." 250 years seems like a while to me.
Well said
 
Not sure where you heard this, but it has to be flawed. With the amount of guinness sold, it would be incredibly expensive to use malt extract, especially hopped malt extract, given that they probably do use hop extract. And according to guinness themselves "All the GUINNESS® sold in the UK, Ireland and North America is brewed in Ireland at the historic St. James’s Gate Brewery in Dublin."

And how do you figure that they haven't been Irish for long, "1759 -
Arthur Guinness signs a 9,000 year lease on a disused brewery at St. James’s Gate, Dublin for an initial £100 and an annual rent of £45." 250 years seems like a while to me.
Correct . Irish through and through .Irish employees Irish recipe Irish ingredients what more is needed
 
Irish recipe? Guinness? Pretty sure Arthur Guinness was brewing something based on London Porter, after receiving a few tips from an established London Porter brewer who moved to Dublin.
 
Some of the real small brewpubs use extract because they don't have the resources to brew from grain. That can be a space limitation or a lack of labor to brew all day and run a taproom and/or restaurant. When you run a small brewing operation that kicks out twenty gallon or smaller batches you spend a lot of time brewing if you're making sales. Simply no way to brew twelve or more hours every day, run a bar and run everything else involved with a restaurant. These smaller operations are less common than they used to be. They've either grown up or squeezed out by larger breweries.

You will find more breweries than you think keep DME on hand for when a mash doesn't go as well as it should. Easier to throw in some DME to hit preboil gravity than boil down to the right gravity.

I hear some of the breweries pumping out pastry stouts add DME to backsweeten their beers. Obviously requiring yanking the yeast out. I'm not sure how true that it but I wouldn't be surprised.
 
I was just wondering whether malt extract was ever used by professional breweries or is really just a homebrewer thing? just something ive been curious about....
Yes. There are places that do all extract brewing and there are places that use DME as "additives"
 
Sort of off topic but I think a few of the large operations during prohibition stayed afloat making large cans of hopped malt extract marketed as a nutritional product 😉. I’m for sure I have seen a can of Pabst syrup in my day someplace.
 
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