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Comparisons of Modern U.S. and Canadian Malting Barley Cultivars with Those from Pre-Prohibition: Malt Extract and Osmolyte Concentration (1)

​U.S. and Canadian pre-Prohibition and modern elite malting barley cultivars were evaluated for gross kernel characteristics (i.e., plumpness, thins, and kernel protein) and development of malt extract (ME) and osmolyte concentration (OC) over the course of Congress mashing to determine malt quality improvement in these phenotypic traits since the end of Prohibition. Kernel plumpness was considerably higher in modern barley cultivars (96.1 ± 1.1%) compared with pre-Prohibition cultivars (84.1 ± 9.4%). However, kernel weight was only slightly higher in modern cultivars (48.9 ± 2.6 mg) compared with pre-Prohibition (46.3 ± 2.5 mg). This difference in kernel density suggests that pre-Prohibition kernels are prone to be steely and modern kernels are prone to be mealy. This led to the hypothesis that modern cultivars would develop ME and OC more rapidly than pre-Prohibition cultivars during mashing. There was considerable variation in pre-Prohibition cultivar development of wort ME and OC compared with modern cultivars over the course of mashing. Modern cultivars developed both wort ME and OC considerably more rapidly during early mashing, suggesting that their malts were considerably more modified than pre-Prohibition cultivars, possibly owing to mealy kernels. This supports the aforementioned hypothesis. Except for the last time point in mashing, modern cultivars had higher OC levels than pre-Prohibition cultivars throughout mashing. Also, except for the pre-Prohibition cultivar O.A.C. 21, the significantly (P > 0.0001) highest OC levels were in modern cultivars throughout mashing. Also, means of modern cultivar OC values at each time point were always significantly (P = 0.0005 to 0.0029) higher than pre-Prohibition cultivars. This was in contrast to changes in ME for pre-Prohibition cultivars over the course of mashing, for which the pre-Prohibition cultivar Silver King was significantly (P > 0.0001) higher than all other cultivars at the end of mashing, and means of ME for modern and pre-Prohibition cultivars were not significantly different at 75 and 115 min into mashing. These data indicate that measures of wort OC demonstrate the superior performance of modern cultivars in mashing better than measures of wort ME. Keywords: Malt extract, Malt quality, Osmolyte concentration, Mashing, Wort