Budweiser pressured into listing ingredients

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For the first time, the brewer’s website lists the ingredients of these two beers: “Water, Barley Malt, Rice, Yeast, Hops.”
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Isn't that more or less exactly what it's always said ON THE CAN? :confused:

Budweiser+can+2011.jpg


Shocking. :cross:

Food blogger Vani Hari began the petition on Wednesday, amid suspicions that many mainstream beers contained added ingredients like high fructose corn syrup, stabilizers, artificial colorings, and even fish swim bladders, as she explains on her website. “I grew concerned about the beer after discovering there is a long list of additives the government has approved for use,” she wrote.
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You mean, the stuff that's in pretty much all the rest of our food these days? Oh God, I'm so appalled by the thought that cheap beer might have $#!tty ingredients. :p

And any idiot who knows anything about the brewing process know's that "fish bladder" is neither harmful nor actually in the finished product. :mad:
 
“we know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to brew and age. Our exclusive Beechwood Aging produces a taste, a smoothness and a drinkability you will find in no other beer at any price”

That has got to be right up there with "better ingredients, better pizza, papa johns" in the top 10 bull**** lines that are totally legal to use in advertising and shouldn't be. no other brand which costs so much to brew and age? a taste you will find in no other beer at any price?

ARE YOU FAHKING KIDDING ME? Budweiser is one of my favorite examples of the style, but the only way they could spend the most to brew and age this is if you took their TOTAL cost of all their beer per year for this one style. Because it costs about $.10/can to brew and age and sells for for what, $.50/can? And you will find the taste in no other beer at any price because other beers cost more and taste different i.e. better.
 
If you look at all the Large commercial breweries then that statement is true. Miller uses extracts in most of their beers. In fact, we took over an old Miller brewery and one of our engineers on the project told me they had to get rid of four extract tanks to make room for more grain silos. Budweiser is still mashed along with a cereal mash. The ingredients are still high quality and it's still Beechwood aged, although they do use less beechwood than they use to. That in itself is an expensive part of the cost of Bud. The amount of steam usage and manpower to "cook" the beechwood is not cheap! Beachwood doesn't add flavor it just gives the lager yeast a place to hang out so it just doesn't sink to the bottom. This allows the beer to ferment quicker, which saves money. It also makes a nice filter when they drain a tank. You may not like the taste of the beer but I guarantee you it's the highest quality of any beer made! Oh, and we don't use fish bladders, we use DE filters and centrifuges. :mug:

Go here for more info: http://www.tapintoyourbeer.com/
 
tootal said:
If you look at all the Large commercial breweries then that statement is true. Miller uses extracts in most of their beers. In fact, we took over an old Miller brewery and one of our engineers on the project told me they had to get rid of four extract tanks to make room for more grain silos. Budweiser is still mashed along with a cereal mash. The ingredients are still high quality and it's still Beechwood aged, although they do use less beechwood than they use to. That in itself is an expensive part of the cost of Bud. The amount of steam usage and manpower to "cook" the beechwood is not cheap! Beachwood doesn't add flavor it just gives the lager yeast a place to hang out so it just doesn't sink to the bottom. This allows the beer to ferment quicker, which saves money. It also makes a nice filter when they drain a tank. You may not like the taste of the beer but I guarantee you it's the highest quality of any beer made! Oh, and we don't use fish bladders, we use DE filters and centrifuges. :mug:

Go here for more info: http://www.tapintoyourbeer.com/
Click to expand...

Great post.

And, my beer does contain sea weed and some horse hoof as well. The distinctive flavor!
 
High fructose corn syrup. As a I said in another thread, even if a beer uses corn sugar, it is completely fermented, which makes me think of John Cleese in the dead parrot sketch: "This sugar is no more! It has ceased to be! It is ex-sugar."

I hope no craft breweries follow suit and cave in to this F&@%ing dolt.
 
This is the same woman who explained that hops make a beer dark... Not exactly an expert in the field.
 
I'm actually shocked if they really don't use corn syrup. Would surely be cheaper than rice, no? I'll wait for the results of the mass spectrometry re. the corn...
 
I can't help but think that the guys at Bud are getting a huge kick out of this. Laughing their asses off. "Gee, you really pestered us into it. We hate to give up the secret recipe for beer but... since you asked so nicely..."

Let see her try to petition for the ingredients of her Smirnoff Ice. I bet she'd find what she's looking for there.
 
Listing a beer's ingredients as "water, barley, rice, yeast, and hops" is a lot like listing a sandwiches ingredients as "bread, vegetables, meat, schmear, and seasonings."

Also, since the quantity of ingredients has to be listed from largest to smallest, it's interesting to note they add more yeast than hops.
 
hunter_la5 said:
Isn't that more or less exactly what it's always said ON THE CAN? :confused:



Budweiser+can+2011.jpg




Shocking. :cross:







You mean, the stuff that's in pretty much all the rest of our food these days? Oh God, I'm so appalled by the thought that cheap beer might have $#!tty ingredients. :p



And any idiot who knows anything about the brewing process know's that "fish bladder" is neither harmful nor actually in the finished product. :mad:
Click to expand...

It's a wonder anybody reads her blog!
What a moron!



Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
Beernik said:
Listing a beer's ingredients as "water, barley, rice, yeast, and hops" is a lot like listing a sandwiches ingredients as "bread, vegetables, meat, schmear, and seasonings."
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No, your sandwich example uses broad food categories like meat and vegetables whereas the BW ingredient list drills down into the exact type of grains, plants and organism (yeast), water is water. Their ingredient list doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for anything else and other than saying what strain of yeast or what type and brand of barley what else is there?
 
SpeedYellow said:
I'm actually shocked if they really don't use corn syrup. Would surely be cheaper than rice, no? I'll wait for the results of the mass spectrometry re. the corn...
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AB uses corn grits in several products such as Busch. They do a cereal mash while the rest of the malt is in a protein rest. Add it back to raise the temps into the beta amylase zone. So, in essence, they are doing a single decoction on all their beers using cereal grains.

This whole thing reminds me of when those guys sued because AB was watering down their beer. Well, they lost that one. AB high gravity brews, just like every other large brewery. The 7%, or higher on light beers, does get mixed with "blending water" to bring it down to 5%. The blending water has been filtered and carbonated and is actually really nice to drink! I'm thinking Tangerey and a lime?:D
 
I think Foodbabe is a total Nut job (and I don't mean that in a good way). Companies need to stand up to these type of people, tell them to get an attorney and make us give it to you. These are the same people that use scare tactics without any basis and have no repercussions for their inaccurate claims.
 
Hmmmm. Seems they are using my ingredient list. Thankfully they can't put it together.

If anyone sees Krackin's Kream Ale out there let me know.
 
funny thing: I don't care what Bud uses for ingredients or process since I don't drink it. I just wanted to drop a smart-mouth post just to be an a-hole.

mission success.
 
fijigus said:
“we know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to brew and age. Our exclusive Beechwood Aging produces a taste, a smoothness and a drinkability you will find in no other beer at any price”

That has got to be right up there with "better ingredients, better pizza, papa johns" in the top 10 bull**** lines that are totally legal to use in advertising and shouldn't be. no other brand which costs so much to brew and age? a taste you will find in no other beer at any price?

ARE YOU FAHKING KIDDING ME? Budweiser is one of my favorite examples of the style, but the only way they could spend the most to brew and age this is if you took their TOTAL cost of all their beer per year for this one style. Because it costs about $.10/can to brew and age and sells for for what, $.50/can? And you will find the taste in no other beer at any price because other beers cost more and taste different i.e. better.
Click to expand...

Actually I'm pretty sure AB makes very low profit on each product so that they can sell more product and make more money (like most hugely successful consumer goods companies and retailers).

I also laugh at the people worried about GMO corn.
 
Don't drink Budweiser much, unless it's at a ball game or free but this is ridiculous. Slipperly slope. Wait until that nutrition label is required on all beer and inspection and regulation starts putting the hammer down on craft breweries, slowing the rise of great American beer.
 
Quoted from first press release:

...“As American consumer needs evolve, we want to meet their expectations,” a spokesman said.

Thats just a fancy way of saying since we are getting our butts kicked by home, nano, and other micro breweries, we want to appease to the shrinking crowd that still drinks our beer.
 
Here's another good write up about it: http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/vani-hari-a-k-a-the-food-babe-the-jenny-mccarthy-of-food/

This is a good quote that I think gets to the essence of it all:
Surely MillerCoors and Anheuser-Busch were aware of the deceptive “yoga mat chemical” gambit used by Hari to such effect earlier this year. I wouldn’t give Hari the time of day, either. Unfortunately, companies live and die by public perception. It’s far easier to give a blackmailer like Hari what she wants than to try to resist or to counter her propaganda by educating the public. And, make no mistake, blackmail is exactly what Vani Hari is about. (NOTE ADDED AFTER PUBLICATION: Forbes blogger Trevor Butterworth calls this sort of strategy “quackmail.” Damn. Another term, like “quackademic medicine,” that I wish I’d thought of. Meanwhile Jay Brooks calls it “yellow journalism,” which to me is being far to kind to the Food Babe, who has demonstrated her intolerance of dissent and outright intellectual dishonest time and time again. That’s why I think Tom Cizauskas is more accurate to refer to what the Food Babe does as “calumny.”)
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strambo said:
No, your sandwich example uses broad food categories like meat and vegetables whereas the BW ingredient list drills down into the exact type of grains, plants and organism (yeast), water is water. Their ingredient list doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for anything else and other than saying what strain of yeast or what type and brand of barley what else is there?
Click to expand...

Budweiser is not legally obligated to divulge their ingredient lists. Which means that they're also not legally obligated to be completely honest.

You really think that Budweiser doesn't modify their water chemistry from brewery to brewery? How much CaCl or phosphoric acid do they add to their water to get the pH and minerals right? Would FoodBabe freak out if Budweiser said, "we add phosphoric acid to our water to regulate the pH of the mash?" Yes, she absolutely would. So that's why Budweiser didn't divulge that info.
 
My favorite is when that hipocritical "babe" posted that sulfites in beer were bad for you......................while posing with a glass of red wine...................which everyone knows had a metric **** tonne more sulfites than any beer.
 
Years ago (20 or so, by my recollection), there was a list of "95 chemicals that major brewers use but don't have to divulge" that was easily accessible on the intrawebz. I can't seem to find it now, but there are additives in Budweiser that are not listed on the label, including heading agents (how else would something so devoid of body actually form a head?).

The same is true of fining agents and other such things added. Probably not very much in the finished product, but it's in there...
 
jpc said:
Years ago (20 or so, by my recollection), there was a list of "95 chemicals that major brewers use but don't have to divulge" that was easily accessible on the intrawebz. I can't seem to find it now, but there are additives in Budweiser that are not listed on the label, including heading agents (how else would something so devoid of body actually form a head?).

The same is true of fining agents and other such things added. Probably not very much in the finished product, but it's in there...
Click to expand...

Sounds like you have more than enough information to start an anti-chemical food blog. ;)
 
It's funny. She's worried about all sorts of additives and other crap added to the beer that might make it harmful to your health. I would suggest if one is that worried about those additives they probably should be worried about the main poison in beer, namely the alcohol.
 
tootal said:
If you look at all the Large commercial breweries then that statement is true. Miller uses extracts in most of their beers. In fact, we took over an old Miller brewery and one of our engineers on the project told me they had to get rid of four extract tanks to make room for more grain silos. Budweiser is still mashed along with a cereal mash. The ingredients are still high quality and it's still Beechwood aged, although they do use less beechwood than they use to. That in itself is an expensive part of the cost of Bud. The amount of steam usage and manpower to "cook" the beechwood is not cheap! Beachwood doesn't add flavor it just gives the lager yeast a place to hang out so it just doesn't sink to the bottom. This allows the beer to ferment quicker, which saves money. It also makes a nice filter when they drain a tank. You may not like the taste of the beer but I guarantee you it's the highest quality of any beer made! Oh, and we don't use fish bladders, we use DE filters and centrifuges. :mug:

Go here for more info: http://www.tapintoyourbeer.com/
Click to expand...

I was under the impression that the beechwood doesn't keep the yeast in suspension, but acts as a fining agent to help take the yeast out of suspension to clarify the beer. This is added at the lagering stage, which would make more sense, since the beer is already fermented at this point.
 
roger_tucker said:
It's funny. She's worried about all sorts of additives and other crap added to the beer that might make it harmful to your health. I would suggest if one is that worried about those additives they probably should be worried about the main poison in beer, namely the alcohol.
Click to expand...

Or the chemicals in her makeup, her car, the color painted on her walls in her home, her clothes, her soap, her . . .

It's almost like everything in the world is made from chemicals or has a chemical makeup. :ban:
 
She's an insufferable worrywart who tells other, like-minded insufferable worrywarts exactly what they want to hear.
 
fijigus said:
“we know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to brew and age. Our exclusive Beechwood Aging produces a taste, a smoothness and a drinkability you will find in no other beer at any price”

That has got to be right up there with "better ingredients, better pizza, papa johns" in the top 10 bull**** lines that are totally legal to use in advertising and shouldn't be. no other brand which costs so much to brew and age? a taste you will find in no other beer at any price?

ARE YOU FAHKING KIDDING ME? Budweiser is one of my favorite examples of the style, but the only way they could spend the most to brew and age this is if you took their TOTAL cost of all their beer per year for this one style. Because it costs about $.10/can to brew and age and sells for for what, $.50/can? And you will find the taste in no other beer at any price because other beers cost more and taste different i.e. better.
Click to expand...

I am a little hesitant to admit this, but this post cracked me up because I have a friend that memorized that line 20+ years ago over a 12 pack of Budweiser we were sharing and he can still say it on demand today. This is despite the fact that both of us moved on in our beer tastes many years ago. "we know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to brew and age. Our exclusive Beechwood Aging produces a taste, a smoothness and a drinkability you will find in no other beer at any price”
 
jpc said:
I was under the impression that the beechwood doesn't keep the yeast in suspension, but acts as a fining agent to help take the yeast out of suspension to clarify the beer. This is added at the lagering stage, which would make more sense, since the beer is already fermented at this point.
Click to expand...

You forget about Krausening. Once it's out of the Alpha tanks it goes into the Lagering tanks where it is given some fresh wort. At a certain point they close the blow off valve and it naturally carbonates. The beechwood does attract the yeast but it just allows more contact area for the beer. The more beer in contact with the yeast the faster it ferments.

Oh, and we don't use phosphoric acid anymore, we now use sulfuric. Ooooo! the same stuff that's in your battery!!

As far as water goes, we use to just filter St. Louis city water with carbon and brew with it. To make all the breweries taste the same we now all use a RO system along with carbon filters and build the water the same everywhere.
 

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