Basics ||Breweries || Companies || Packaging & Shipping || Drinking || Prohibition || Beer Today || Exhibit Home
The basic ingredients found in nearly every type of beer are water, malted barley, hops, and yeast. Hot water is mixed with crushed barley malt grains to produce a sugary liquid called wort. The wort is then drained off the spent grains and boiled with hops to add flavor. After the hopped wort is chilled, yeast is introduced to the liquid, inducing fermentation as the yeast converts the sugars in the wort to alcohol. Most beers are left to ferment from one to three weeks, then allowed to age for a week or longer before packaging.
Advertisement
Joh. Barth & Sohn, hop growers and dealers
From American Brewer, publication of the Master Brewers' Association of America
1940
Advertisement (detail)
Mellomalt
U.S. Malt Company
From American Brewer, publication of the Master Brewers' Association of America
1939
Advertisement (detail)
Hans Hinricks, Inc., malt & hops dealer
From American Brewer, publication of the Master Brewers' Association of America
1940
Advertisement (detail)
Hops-Em, liquid hops
National Hops Laboratories, Inc.
From American Brewer, publication of the Master Brewers' Association of America
1939
Pamphlet
On hops
M.H. Russ & Company, hop merchants
Prague
1876
Hops
Hops flowers ready to be used for brewing beer.
Recipe for Strong Beer (detail)
The American practical brewer and tanner
by Joseph Coppinger
1815
Early beer recipes often called for unusual ingredients; this recipe from 1815 lists lean beef and ground mustard in addition to barley and hops.
Basics ||Breweries || Companies || Packaging & Shipping || Drinking || Prohibition || Beer Today || Exhibit Home