Water

Water is used for many purposes in the brewing process, such as cleansing, cooling and, of course, is the primary ingredient used in the production of beer. Beer contains approximately 90% water and, consequently, water exerts a predominant influence upon the type, quality and character of the finished product.

The kind and amount of minerals found in solution are the factors by which water is determined to be "hard" or "soft." Here in the Northwest we are fortunate to possess excellent water for brewing, much like that found in Pilsen, which is softer in character. Knowing the composition of their water,  brewers can use brewing salts/minerals to adjust it to fit the style of beer they are producing.

Hops

McMenamins is fortunate to be based in the Pacific Northwest, where a large portion of the world’s hops are grown. We have access to the freshest, finest hops available, and many of our beers showcase hops for this reason. New hop strains are developed each year it seems, and you can be sure that if we can get these new strains you will be able to sample them in our beers.

Though a bit more primitive than most modern brewery practices, we still use only whole hop cones, not processed pellets, plugs or oils. Hops fall into two main primary classifications – aromatic and bittering.  Many varieties can and are used in both applications to some degree.

Hops

Many factors affect the hop profile of a beer:

• Type of hops used
• Amount of hops used
• When the hops are added
• Freshness of the hops
• Malt profile of the beer
• How vigorous of a rolling boil the brew kettle can produce
• Amount of evaporation during the boil
• Dryhop/no dryhop

Hops

There is an infinite number of ways to hop a beer and brewers are constantly trying to figure out ways to maximize the hop utilization rate in all of our beers.  Dry-hopping, late-hopping, wet hopping you name it and we've tried it.

Although each hop has unique properties, they generally fall into three aromatic/flavor groupings: citrus, floral & spicy.  A few examples of our widely used hop varietals and their categories are:

• Citrus – Cascades, Chinook, Centennial
• Spicy – Sterling, Crystal, Tettnanger
• Floral – Amarillo, US Goldings 

Malt

The main source of fermentable sugars for our beers comes from 2-row pale malted barley. Wheat malt, Pilsner malt, and rye malt are also used to create unique, specific profiles in our beer. We also use a variety of specialty malts that have been malted and roasted to bring out specific desirable flavor and coloring characteristics. The majority of these are barley, but occasionally a brewer may use a specialty roasted wheat. These specialty grains are roasted in a similar to coffee beans with some roasted slowly at low temperatures, while others are roasted quickly at high temperatures.  Grains have been roasted to achieve a specific hue, a color rating in the industry known as "Lovibond".  This rating allows a brewer to chose accurately among many variations of colored carmel, and dark/black roasted malts and thus exercise tight controls while designing and producing consistently colored & flavored batches of the same standard recipe.

Malt

As mentioned, malt colors are rated on a scale known as "Lovibond" and are frequently referred to as "L". For example, our pale malt is about 1.8L, while the crystal malt used in Hammerhead to give it the nice amber/red color is 80L. The black barley used in Terminator is about 500L.

As with the hops, a brewer has a wide cross-section of of varieties and brands when deciding which grains to use in a mash. Everything is dependent on the style of beer chosen.  A brewer will generally work backwards from the original vision of what their beer is supposed to be to determine the type and amount of grains to be used as the basis of the recipe.

Yeast

"Brewing yeasts may be classed as "top cropping" (or "top fermenting") and "bottom cropping" (or "bottom-fermenting"). Top cropping yeasts are so called because they form a foam at the top of the wort during fermentation. Bottom cropping yeasts are typically used to produce lager-type beers, though they can also produce ale-type beers. These yeasts ferment more sugars, creating a dryer beer, and grow well at low temperatures."

--From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Though McMenamins uses primarily our own proprietary yeast strain, many other top and bottom fermenting cultures are incorporated annually.  Many locations produce lagers, Bavarian-style weiss & bock biers; and Belgian styles -- all which depend on yeast characteristics to remain stylistically accurate.