IMPROVEMENTS IN BREWING AND DISTILLING
Year: 1854

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by David Beck at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 10th July 1854.
I, DAVID BECK, of Carlton House, Southampton, in the County of South-
ampton, Doctor of Medicine, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN BREWING AND DISTILLING" to be as follows:-
By the short and imperfect mode of infusing and macerating hop, adopted in
the present process of brewing malt liquors, only a very small quantity of the
bitter and other active principles contained in the said hop is thus extracted,
while the beautiful aroma and essential or volatile oil of hop is allowed almost
totally to escape into the open air; I adopt, therefore, the following improved
process:-
a). I distill off the aroma and essential oil from the hop, either before or after
the
process of infusing and macerating of the hop had been effected, and add
the odoriferous water and volatile or essential oil to malt liquors at such a
time as may be thought best for and consistent with the preservation of those
volatile ingredients.
6). This distillation of the volatile principles of hop I carry on in two
different ways, that is, with the assistance of alcohol, or other ingredients similar
to alcohol in their solvent powers, or merely with the assistance of water, in
the same way as perfumed waters are distilled.
c). During the distillation and consequent digestion of hops, particularly
with the assistance of such solvents as alcohol, the bitter and other active

page_text: principles contained in hops are solved and extracted in greater quantities than
is done by the present system of treating the hop.
d). Instead of simply infusing or briefly macerating hop in malt liquors, as
is done in the present mode of brewing, I cause the hop to be inserted into
the vessels containing such liquors, and there to remain as long as the liquors
last, so as to allow the hop a chance of macerating slowly and gradually, and.
thus to impart to such malt liquors its bitter and and aromatic principles.
e). As the active principles of hop are intimately combined with a peculiar
and characteristic sort of resin, I adopt also another method in addition to
that of the alcoholic for solving that resin, so as fully to develope and seperate
from hop the said resin and its main attributes. This method consists in
treating hop leaves with alkalies, such as potass, soda, ammonia, and such like,
or with alkaline earths, such as lime, and the like.
The alkalies or alkaline earths serve also to disengage and seperate from
vegetable substances of hop all the other active ingredients which are useful to
malt liquors.
2dly, the present mode of extracting the principal qualities from malt is
very imperfect, both in the process of brewing, as also in that of distilling; for,
according to the highest authorities, malt contains in 100 parts,-

page_text: In the process of distilling, the entire quantity of this starch is retained by
the grain, and is sent off for feeding the lower animals.
The small quantity of starch diffused in malt liquors is (as far as it goes)
nutricious to the consumer; but, on the other hand, this very starch, in
conjunction with a few other vegetable ingredients, causes malt liquors to
undergo a speedy acetous fermentation and to turn sour.
Now, my process consists in converting the whole quantity of starch con-
tained in or extracted from malt or grain into saccharine matter, and this I
effect by means of acids, but particularly by the sulphuric acid. After a
sufficient decoction, I seperate the acid from the said saccharine matter by
chalk, or any other absorbent or alkaline substance or liquid. The saccharine
matter is then fermented in the ordinary way for the purposes of brewing or
distilling, so that by means of my process I obtain from the same quantity of
malt a greater quantity of malt liquor or of alcohol than is obtained by the
present mode of brewing or distilling; and at the same time, the malt liquors
thus brewed, on account of their being freed of the starchy fecula, resemble
more the grape wine in their qualities, and are capable of being preserved for
a greater length of time (than those brewed on the present system) without
turning sour.