For some people the art of making beer is more like a black art. But the truth is that it’s actually quite simple to turn hops, yeast, water, and grains into beer. Some even say that the work of the brewer in making beer is very minimal. It is mainly the work of the yeast cells that give you the rewarding beer product in the end.

The process of making any type of poker beer always starts with a barley grain. When you take any grain it is basically just a seed, but it still contains all those chemical properties that it will need to sprout into a full fledge barley plant provided it is given the right conditions. This is why it is always the job of the maltster to have the ability to fully utilize the potential of the yeast to achieve the final product the way he or she wants. The main task here is to give the barley seed the impression that it is ready to sprout. For this you have to give it some warm water. This sprouting process will result in the activation of the enzymes present in the barley grain that can then be used by the brewer when in the mash. The maltster keeps an eye out for when the sprouting process begins. As soon as, he notices that process, he gently but quickly starts to dry up the kiln, by putting all the enzymes in suspension. By the end of drying process all the sprouts are taken out while the grains are left behind which are then sent ahead into the brewer.

Once you are done with the malting process you reach the mashing process. By this time all your malted barley will be in your brewer and will be full of enzymes and starches that were activated previously. From here ahead the brewer will then throw all the grains into a large bath of warm water that is kept at the temperature of 148 or 158 degrees Fahrenheit. This is called the mashing process. This is when the enzymes are all reactivated when they are exposed to this high temperature. It initiates a chemical reaction in which all the enzymes start attacking and breaking down all the starch in the barley into simpler sugars. This is the main goal of the mashing process.

There is a special container used by the brewer which is called the lauter tun. This is specially designed to contain all the mashed up grains without letting any leakage of the grains while still allowing the water to slowly seep out by the end of the process. These special lauter tun containers have insulation in them or any other type of method which allows the container to keep a constant temperature at all times.

Once the brewer judges that all of the starches in the grains have been converted then the temperature is further raised to 165 or 170 degree Fahrenheit that will help to stop the enzymatic process.