Vegetarianism and beer

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Samuel Smith Brewery's Imperial Stout - a vegetarian beer Samuelsmithstout.JPG
Samuel Smith Brewery's Imperial Stout – a vegetarian beer

Beer is often made from barley malt, water, hops and yeast and so is often suitable for vegans and vegetarians. [1] [2] Some beer brewers add finings to clarify the beer when racking into a barrel. Finings can include plant-derived products, like Irish moss, or animal-derived products, like isinglass and gelatin. [3]

Contents

Most breweries do not reveal if they do or do not use animal products in the processing of their beers; some exceptions are Samuel Smith, Heineken, Harp Lager, Anheuser-Busch, the Marble Brewery in Manchester, the Black Isle Brewery, and Black Sheep Brewery, all of whom have declared they make vegetarian and/or vegan beer. [4]

Ingredients and additives unsuitable for vegetarians and vegans

Finings

The British writer Roger Protz says that beer glassware only became popular in the 19th century, and that British cask ale is traditionally served unfiltered.

Most beer is filtered without the need for animal products, and so remains vegetarian; however British cask ale producers do not filter the beer at the end of the production process. [5] When beer is left unfiltered, the yeast that fermented the wort, and turned the sugar in the barley into alcohol, remains in suspension in the liquid. The yeast that remains suspended in the beer creates a cloudy appearance, and can have a yeasty flavour. [6] Finings are used to clear the beer of yeast there are a variety of agents used as finings, including silicon dioxide, gelatin, polyclar, and isinglass. [7]

Isinglass is the most common fining used to clear cask ale. Isinglass is produced from the swim bladders of fish, usually sturgeon, though also those in the polynemidae, sciaenidae and siluridae families; [8] as it is an animal product, cask ale cleared with isinglass is not considered vegetarian.

Glycerol monostearate

A brewer may also use some form of animal product in the later stages of beer processing, such as glycerol monostearate, which is used to create a foam or head on the finished beer. [9]

Honey

Honey is added to some beers as an adjunct, for flavouring and to sweeten the beer. Though generally considered suitable for vegetarians, honey is an animal product, so is not suitable for vegans.

Lactose

Some beers, particularly milk stouts, contain lactose, a sugar derived from milk, and are thus not suitable for people who abstain from eating dairy products.

Packaged beers

Other than bottle conditioned, beers which are packaged in cans, bottles or kegs are filtered in some form, either pasteurised or cold-filtered. In general filtering does not require the use of finings, [10] though animal finings may be used on some batches that are too hazy to be cleared easily by the regular filtering methods.

Vegetarian breweries

Even though many beers are vegetarian, most brewers do not reveal which beers contain animal products. Those brewers who have published this information include Bartleby's Brewery, [11] Samuel Smith, [12] Anheuser-Busch, [13] MillerCoors, [14] the Marble Brewery in Manchester, UK, [15] the Black Isle Brewery, [16] Little Valley Brewery, [17] the Pitfield Brewery, [18] Black Sheep Brewery. [19] the Epic Brewing Company, [20] and Broken Compass Brewing Company. [21]

Guinness opened a new filtration plant in 2016 that made their beer vegan-friendly [22] which was expanded in 2017 to include all Guinness (i.e. all draught, bottle and can forms). [23]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beer</span> Alcoholic drink made from fermented cereal grains

Beer is one of the oldest alcoholic drinks in the world, the most widely consumed, and the third most popular drink after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of starches from cereal grains—most commonly malted barley, although wheat, maize (corn), rice, and oats are also used. The fermentation of the starch sugars in the wort produces ethanol and carbonation in the beer. Most modern beer is brewed with hops, which add bitterness and other flavours and act as a natural preservative and stabilising agent. Other flavouring agents, such as gruit, herbs, or fruits, may be included or used instead of hops. In commercial brewing, natural carbonation is often replaced with forced carbonation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brewing</span> Process in beer production

Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brewer, at home by a homebrewer, or communally. Brewing has taken place since around the 6th millennium BC, and archaeological evidence suggests that emerging civilizations, including ancient Egypt, China, and Mesopotamia, brewed beer. Since the nineteenth century the brewing industry has been part of most western economies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Draught beer</span> Beer served from a cask or keg

Draught beer, also spelt draft, is beer served from a cask or keg rather than from a bottle or can. Draught beer served from a pressurised keg is also known as keg beer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Real ale</span> Traditionally made and served beer

Real ale is the name coined by the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) for beer that is "brewed from traditional ingredients, matured by secondary fermentation in the container from which it is dispensed, and served without the use of extraneous carbon dioxide".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Isinglass</span> Substance obtained from the dried swim bladders of fish

Isinglass is a form of collagen obtained from the dried swim bladders of fish. The English word origin is from the obsolete Dutch huizenblaashuizen is a kind of sturgeon, and blaas is a bladder, or German Hausenblase, meaning essentially the same. The bladders, once removed from the fish, processed, and dried, are formed into various shapes for use.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sinclair Breweries</span> Parent company of Orkney Brewery in Quoyloo, Stromness, Orkney, Scotland

Sinclair Breweries Limited is the parent company for Orkney and Atlas ales. Orkney Brewery was founded in March 1988 at the old schoolhouse in Sandwick, Orkney, one mile from Skara Brae and was one of Scotland's first microbreweries. Atlas was formed in 2002 and merged with Orkney Brewery, where both beers are now brewed. Owned and run by Orcadian, Norman Sinclair, Orkney Brewery is Orkney's oldest brewery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Batemans Brewery</span> Brewery based in Wainfleet, Lincolnshire, England

Batemans Brewery(George Bateman & Son Ltd) is an English brewery based at Salem Bridge Brewery in Wainfleet, Lincolnshire, and founded in 1874. The company owns 69 public houses, with 23 situated in Boston alone. The brewery focuses on cask conditioned ales, their best known being XB and XXXB. Their slogan is "Good Honest Ales".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Black Sheep Brewery</span> Brewery in Masham, North Yorkshire, England

The Black Sheep Brewery is a brewery in Masham, North Yorkshire, England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beer in England</span> Beer in England

Beer has been brewed in England for thousands of years. As a beer brewing country, it is known for top fermented cask beer which finishes maturing in the cellar of the pub rather than at the brewery and is served with only natural carbonation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timothy Taylor Brewery</span> Brewery in Keighley, West Yorkshire, England

Timothy Taylor's is a family-owned regional brewery, founded in 1858 by Timothy Taylor, in Keighley, West Yorkshire, England. Timothy Taylor's moved to larger premises in 1863 at Knowle Spring in Keighley, where they remain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vegetarianism and wine</span>

The production of wine often includes a process called fining, in which fining agents are added to wine to remove proteins, yeast, and other suspended organic particles, and later filtered out. Fining agents can be either animal, carbon, or clay-based. Animal-based fining agents include gelatin, isinglass, egg white (albumen), and casein.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bright beer</span> Beer in which yeast is no longer in suspension

Bright beer is beer in which yeast is no longer in suspension. There are several methods used for clearing yeast from beer, from waiting for the yeast to drop of its own accord to filtering it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Worthington Brewery</span> British brewery founded in 1761

Worthington Brewery, also known as Worthington & Co. and Worthington's, is a British brewer founded by William Worthington in Burton upon Trent in 1761. It is the second oldest continuously brewed British beer brand, after Whitbread. The best known Worthington beers are its Creamflow nitrokeg bitter and White Shield India Pale Ale.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marble Brewery (Manchester, England)</span> Microbrewery based in Manchester, UK

The Marble Brewery is a microbrewery in Manchester, England which makes cask ale from organic and vegetarian ingredients.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Guinness</span> Irish brand of beer

Guinness is an Irish dry stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in 1759. It is now owned by the British-based multinational alcoholic beverage maker Diageo. It is one of the most successful alcohol brands worldwide, brewed in almost 50 countries, and available in over 120. Sales in 2011 amounted to 850,000,000 liters. In spite of declining consumption since 2001, it is the best-selling alcoholic drink in Ireland where Guinness & Co. Brewery makes almost €2 billion worth of beer annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brewery</span> Business that makes and sells beer

A brewery or brewing company is a business that makes and sells beer. The place at which beer is commercially made is either called a brewery or a beerhouse, where distinct sets of brewing equipment are called plant. The commercial brewing of beer has taken place since at least 2500 BC; in ancient Mesopotamia, brewers derived social sanction and divine protection from the goddess Ninkasi. Brewing was initially a cottage industry, with production taking place at home; by the ninth century, monasteries and farms would produce beer on a larger scale, selling the excess; and by the eleventh and twelfth centuries larger, dedicated breweries with eight to ten workers were being built.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">De Struise Brouwers</span> Microbrewery in Oostvleteren, Belgium

De Struise Brouwers is a microbrewery located in Oostvleteren, Belgium.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Filtered beer</span>

Filtered beer refers to any ale, lager, or fermented malt beverage in which the sediment left over from the brewing process has been removed. Ancient techniques included the use of straw mats, cloth, or straws, and frequently left some sediment in the drink. Modern filtration, introduced at the end of the 19th century, uses a mechanical process that can remove all sediment, including yeast, from the beer. Such beer is known as bright beer and requires force carbonation before bottling or serving from a keg. In the United Kingdom, a beer which has been filtered in the brewery is known as "brewery-conditioned", as opposed to unfiltered cask ales.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wells & Young's Brewery</span> Brewery formed by a merger of Charles Wells Ltd and Youngs Brewery

Wells & Young's Brewery was formed in 2006 from a merger of the brewing operations of Charles Wells Ltd and Young's Brewery. Charles Wells initially had a 60% stake and Young's 40%. In 2011, Charles Wells took full control when it bought Young's 40% stake. Wells & Young's is now responsible for brewing, distributing and marketing Charles Wells' and Young & Co's brands at the Eagle Brewery in Bedford.

Beer is produced through steeping a sugar source in water and then fermenting with yeast. Brewing has taken place since around the 6th millennium BC, and archeological evidence suggests that this technique was used in ancient Egypt. Descriptions of various beer recipes can be found in Sumerian writings, some of the oldest known writing of any sort. Brewing is done in a brewery by a brewer, and the brewing industry is part of most western economies. In 19th century Britain, technological discoveries and improvements such as Burtonisation and the Burton Union system significantly changed beer brewing.

References

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