Cold Mash in Brewing Process: Optimization of Innovative Method for Low-Alcohol Beer Production

Beer is described as a drink susceptible to changes, so any modification in the production process will cause variations in the sensory profile and chemical composition. Alcohol removal during low-alcohol beer production may significantly influence the quality of the beverage. Development and physicochemical characterization of low-alcohol beers from modified processes were performed in this study. In order to obtain low-alcohol beers, modifications were carried out in stages of the production process, in relation to malt concentration, malt processing, and mashing temperature. Fractional factorial design was applied at two levels to an optimization study, demonstrating that only the parameters of extract content and alcohol content were significant, with systematic influence of these factors in the response. Alcohol content showed results of 4.93% in the standard beer and 0.97–2.35% in the samples with low-alcohol content.