Beer is one of the oldest types of alcoholic drinks in the world, and the most widely consumed. It is the third most popular drink overall after potable water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of starches, mainly derived from cereal grains—most commonly from malted barley, though wheat, maize (corn), rice, and oats are also used. During the brewing process, fermentation of the starch sugars in the wort produces ethanol and carbonation in the resulting beer. Most modern beer is brewed with hops, which add bitterness and other flavours and act as a natural preservative and stabilizing agent. Other flavouring agents such as gruit, herbs, or fruits may be included or used instead of hops. In commercial brewing, the natural carbonation effect is often removed during processing and replaced with forced carbonation.
Digitalis is a genus of about 20 species of herbaceous perennial plants, shrubs, and biennials, commonly called foxgloves.
Hops are the flowers of the hop plant Humulus lupulus, a member of the Cannabaceae family of flowering plants. They are used primarily as a bittering, flavouring, and stability agent in beer, to which, in addition to bitterness, they impart floral, fruity, or citrus flavours and aromas. Hops are also used for various purposes in other beverages and herbal medicine. The hops plants have separate female and male plants, and only female plants are used for commercial production. The hop plant is a vigorous, climbing, herbaceous perennial, usually trained to grow up strings in a field called a hopfield, hop garden, or hop yard when grown commercially. Many different varieties of hops are grown by farmers around the world, with different types used for particular styles of beer.
A toxic heavy metal is any relatively dense metal or metalloid that is noted for its potential toxicity, especially in environmental contexts. The term has particular application to cadmium, mercury and lead, all of which appear in the World Health Organization's list of 10 chemicals of major public concern. Other examples include manganese, chromium, cobalt, nickel, copper, zinc, silver, antimony and thallium.
Kombucha is a fermented, lightly effervescent, sweetened black tea drink commonly consumed for its purported health benefits. Sometimes the beverage is called kombucha tea to distinguish it from the culture of bacteria and yeast. Juice, spices, fruit or other flavorings are often added.
Pruno, or prison wine, is an alcoholic beverage variously made from apples, oranges, fruit cocktail, fruit juices, hard candy, sugar, high fructose syrup, and possibly other ingredients, including crumbled bread. Bread is incorrectly thought to contain yeast for the pruno to ferment. Pruno originated in prisons, where it can be produced with the limited selection of equipment and ingredients available to inmates. The concoction can be made using only a plastic bag, hot running water, and a towel or sock to conceal the pulp during fermentation. The end result has been colorfully described as a "bile flavored wine-cooler". Depending on the time spent fermenting, the sugar content, and the quality of the ingredients and preparation, pruno's alcohol content by volume can range from as low as 2% to as high as 14%.
Chhaang or chhyang is a Nepalese and Tibetan alcoholic beverage also popular in parts of the eastern Himalayas, Yakkha, Limbu, Dura, Newar, Sunuwar, Rai, Gurung, Magar, Sherpa, Tamang and Lepcha communities. Among the Lepcha, it is called Chi. It is also known as jaarh in Nepal.
Beer in Africa, especially lager, is produced commercially in most African countries, and varieties of beer are also made by indigenous people. Beer is served in a range of locales, from neighbourhood shebeens to upscale bars. Many countries have standardized beer bottle sizes, which are cleaned and re-used, and so when buying beer at a store often people must pay a deposit on the bottle as well as the price of the beer. An alternative to glass-bottle beers is local beer sold in tetra-pak style paper cartons.
Bongkrek acid is a respiratory toxin produced in fermented coconut or corn contaminated by the bacterium Burkholderia gladioli pathovar cocovenenans. It is a highly toxic, heat-stable, colorless, odorless, and highly unsaturated tricarboxylic acid that inhibits the ADP/ATP translocase, also called the mitochondrial ADP/ATP carrier, preventing ATP from leaving the mitochondria to provide metabolic energy to the rest of the cell. Bongkrek acid, when consumed through contaminated foods, mainly target liver, brain, and kidneys along with symptoms that include vomiting, diarrhea, urinary retention, abdominal pain, and excessive sweating. Most of the outbreaks are found in Indonesia and China where fermented coconut and corn-based foods are consumed. In October 2020, nine members of a family in China died after eating corn noodles contaminated with Bongkrek acid.
Gluten-free beer is beer made from ingredients that do not contain gluten, such as millet, rice, sorghum, buckwheat or corn (maize). People who have gluten intolerance have a reaction to certain proteins in the grains commonly used to make beer, barley and wheat. The hordein found in barley and the gliadin found in wheat are types of gluten that can trigger symptoms in sufferers of these diseases. Gluten-free beer is part of a gluten-free diet.
Digitalis lanata, vernacularly often called woolly foxglove or Grecian foxglove, is a species of foxglove, a flowering plant in the plantain family Plantaginaceae. It gets its name due to the woolly indumentum of the leaves. D. lanata, like other foxglove species, is toxic in all parts of the plant. Symptoms of digitalis poisoning include nausea, vomiting, severe headache, dilated pupils, problems with eyesight, and convulsions at the worst level of toxicity. The plant is also harmful to other animals.
Burkholderia gladioli is a species of aerobic gram-negative rod-shaped bacteria that causes disease in both humans and plants. It can also live in symbiosis with plants and fungi and is found in soil, water, the rhizosphere, and in many animals. It was formerly known as Pseudomonas marginata.
Commercial sorghum is the cultivation and commercial exploitation of species of grasses within the genus Sorghum. These plants are used for grain, fibre and fodder. The plants are cultivated in warmer climates worldwide. Commercial Sorghum species are native to tropical and subtropical regions of Africa and Asia.
Millet beer, also known as Bantu beer, malwa, pombe "Tchouk" or opaque beer, is an alcoholic beverage made from malted millet that is common throughout Africa. Its production process varies across regions and in the southern parts of Africa is more commonly known as umqombothi. Millet beer varies in taste and alcoholic content between ethnic groups. It is served in calabash gourds.
k-Strophanthidin is a cardenolide found in species of the genus Strophanthus. It is the aglycone of k-strophanthin, an analogue of ouabain. k-strophanthin is found in the ripe seeds of Strophanthus kombé and in the lily Convallaria.
Corn beer is a beer style made from corn (maize). The drink is a traditional beverage in various cuisines. Chicha, the best-known corn beer, is widespread in the Andes and local varieties of corn beer exist elsewhere.
The following lists events that happened during 2015 in the Republic of Mozambique.
In 1900, more than 6,000 people in England were poisoned by arsenic-tainted beer, with more than 70 of the affected dying as a result. The food safety crisis was caused by arsenic entering the supply chain through impure sugar which had been made with contaminated sulphuric acid. The illness was prevalent across the Midlands and North West England, with Manchester being the most heavily affected.
