Brewing Process

1. ABC starts with the finest domestic 2-row malted barley. The malting process consists of steeping the raw barley in warm water to allow germination to begin and then dried to stop germination.

2. The grain is cracked in a roller mill to expose the starch. Depending on the style of beer, specialty malts may be also added. Specialty malts are simply 2-row barley that has been roasted at various temperatures for various lengths of time, resulting in colors from the tan to black. In general, the darker the beer color, the greater the percentage of specialty malts.

3. The milled malt or 'grist' is transported by auger to the mash tun, which is an insulated tank with a screen in the bottom. It is the tank on the left in the photo below.

4. The grist is mixed with hot water for "mashing". Mashing converts (through the action of naturally-occurring enzymes in the barley) the starch in the malt to sugars over a period of 90-120 minutes.

5. This is followed by 'sparging' in which the sweet liquid, called 'wort' is drained from the mash tun into the brew kettle and then rinsed with additional water to remove all the sugars.

6. The wort is brought to a boil. Bittering hops are added at the beginning of the boil, while hops used for aroma and flavor are added toward the end of the boil, which lasts for 1-2 hours. Hops also function as a natural preservatives.

7. The wort is pumped through a heat exchanger to cool it to about 70 degree, for ales. The wort is then pumped to a temperature controlled fermentation vessel, where yeast is "pitched" or added to initiate fermentation, during which yeast cells convert the sugars to alcohol and carbon dioxide over a period of 3-4 days.

8. When fermentation is complete, the temperature is dropped to near freezing, which causes the yeast to drop out of suspension. Cold conditioning then takes place for a period of 8-10 days.

9. The beer is then filtered through both a diatomaceous earth (D.E.) filter and a plate and frame filter on its way to the bright tanks. Filtering removes yeast and protein particles to produce crystal clear beer.

10. The beer is carbonated in the bright tank and immediately bottled and/or kegged.