Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1884-1886, 1885-07-21
HOW LAGER BEER IS sRswen.


The Process Described in IN Interesting
Manner-Nhs Haze les P1syh
TBaltinpp 1n1
Theoretically. iss vss5 seW 70 brew bear.
You get your malt Q11k18lR s&sr & With
hot water, strain il q - III t1ls7xhaes
with hops, coal Il q, 1t u fsrnsns
and drink It. Practically, it isn't
quite SO easy. It requires . knowledge,
or a wisdom rather, that tins and
experience only can bring, to know how
long to stir. how much extract to use, and
how much tops, how long to boil and how
long to cool and fast to ferment, and how
long to keep These are secrets which every
brewer keeps to himself, very distinctly
But he will very cheerfuIy show you the
brewery. Tha malt house Is not in use this
year, because he can buy the malt as cheaI
as the harley. But he shows you the large
vats where the barley is STEPPED, the long
floors On which the soaked, swollen grain i.
spread gu: until it attains a certain growth
There are the kilns in which it is slowly
dried when il has sufficiently sprouted, and
then it is malt, ready for brewing. This he
only explains. because, as stated, most
brewers found it cheaper to buy the malt
than to malt the barley.
Away up in the top,nost story of the
brewery the malt is thoroughly cleaned Of
every impurity, and the little sprout 1t got
in tho malt house is broken of by intricatey
beautiful machinery Then it drops one
floor to the mill, and is ground to a sweet,
Write fur. And now the brewing proper
begin Into q huge circular tub Of sheet
iron, with capacity Of 600 gallons-the
mash tub-it slides. and thick copper pipe
supplies hot water Here ingenious machin-
cry stirs it round and round-how long is
the brewers secret Tho color of the beer
depends much on this, and no two brewers
brew beer OF exactly the same shade II
varies from a pale amber to q rich dark
brown.
The extract that drips from the mash tub
after several hours of stirring is the pure ex
tract of malt. 1t has a sweetish taste, natur
ally, for the duty of the mash tub is to con.
vert all. or nearly all. of the starch in the
barley into sugar. The residue Of grain
hulls, etc, is run out of the tub and sold to
the cattle Dealers The extract drips into a
largo kettle On the next floor below. Here
the hops. first cut up into smaller pieces, are
thrown in, and the two are boiled. The
brewer knows how much hops and how long
it boils. When he stops boiling it is beer,
but, Of course, not the lager beer that
CutcIs tHs NcoTy at D cents u gas. IL u9s
not yet fermented From the kettle, whose
capacity is 400 barrels, it is run into a large,
shallow reservoir, on cool floor. where q con-
slant current Of fresh ar cools it off. The
famous Muenchen beer is said to owe much
Of its reputation to the cool air that comes
fresh, strong, and fragrant from the neigh.
BORING HartZ mountains.
But the cool air alone is not enough, o.
pecially in summer time, and so the bee:
flows over long coil of bright tubes, which
are Kept cold by q constant stream Of water.
In some breweries a strong brine runs
through the tubes. Completely cooled, the
beer now runs into the enormous watts that
rest in tho three vaulted cellars. one beneath
the other, the third being forty feet below
the surface. Thick coils of PIPE run through
tho cellars, through which brine carries the
cold produced by fine ammonia ice
machine on the ground floor of the brewery
The coils are everywhere covered with &
coating of ice an inch thick. The tempera-
ture of the deepest cellar. where lies tie
beer that has been ferInenting betwesn two
AMI three months, and is consequently ready
for market, Is several degrees below tho
freezin, point Here it is drawn OF into
small kegs, and an endless chain HOSTS the
keg up the forty feet to daylight in an in
slant.