Hops Session
John Paul Maye, S.S. Steiner, Inc., New York, NY, USA
Co-author(s): Robert Smith, S.S. Steiner, Inc., Yakima, WA, USA;
Richard Wilson (deceased); Harald Schwarz, S.S. Steiner, Inc., New York,
NY, USA
ABSTRACT: Most consumers view a natural looking foam head
as an important part of a good quality beer. For this reason, brewers
have been using tetrahydroisoalpha-acids and hexahydroisoalpha-acids to
improve the foam and lacing of their beers for many years. Today many
brewers seek a more natural foam enhancing hop product. We’ve
investigated and found that alpha-acids, from CO2 hop
extract, can significantly improve the foam stability of a number of
commercial beers at low concentrations. Since alpha-acids are not very
bitter, they can be added to any beer to improve foam without affecting
bitterness. Aqueous solutions of alpha-acids can be made that are both
physically and chemically stable. Alpha-acids treated beers showed
improved foam stability over an extended storage period demonstrating
the foam enhancing potential of this natural product.
John Paul
Maye is the technical director at Hopsteiner. He received his Ph.D.
degree in organic chemistry from Purdue University in 1994, under 2010
Noble Prize winning chemist Ei-ichi Negishi. John started his work as a
hop chemist in 1993 and has worked in hops ever since. He is credited
with publishing several papers and patents and in 2000 won the ASBC Eric
Kneen Memorial Award for his work on developing HPLC standards for
isomerized and reduced alpha-acids. He is also a founding member of the
International Hop Standards Committee and has been an ASBC member since
1994.
VIEW PRESENTATION 142
