Barley malt is traditionally the cornerstone of beer production; however, recent challenges, including declining yields and quality have compelled breweries to explore alternatives. Simultaneously, consumer preferences are shifting toward more diverse, sustainable, and functional beer options. Consequently, breweries have increasingly turned their attention to alternative unmalted cereals. While unmalted brewing with barley has been extensively studied, knowledge of alternative cereals and pseudocereals remains limited. To address this gap, small-scale mashing experiments with exogenous enzymes were conducted on 11 unmalted cereals and pseudocereals: two- and six-row barley, wheat, khorasan, spelt, einkorn, triticale, tritordeum, sorghum, buckwheat, and rye. Initial experiments were conducted to evaluate alcoholic wort production by varying critical parameters affecting wort quality, such as pH and milling size. Filtration efficiency was significantly enhanced by lower pH and finer milling for barley, wheat, khorasan, and spelt, whereas tritordeum, triticale, einkorn, and sorghum showed less improvement. Preliminary investigations into buckwheat and rye revealed high wort viscosities. Among triticum-related cereals, most exhibited acceptable original gravities and free amino nitrogen (FAN) contents, although einkorn was an exception, showing increased soluble high molecular weight proteins. Sorghum demonstrated the lowest original gravity and FAN content. Sugar profiling confirmed high levels of fermentable sugars across samples.
Smout et al. (Wed,) studied this question.