Malt liquor

“ Another way to make a cheap malt liquor is to take a bushel of malt, with as much water and hops as if two bushels of malt were allowed in the common way, and put seven pounds of the coarsest brown sugar into the boiling wort. This makes a very pleasant liquor; is as strong, and will keep as long without turning sour or flat, as if two bushels had been employed. Twenty gallons of good beer may be made from a bushel of malt, and three quarters of a pound of hops, if care be taken to extract all their goodness. ”

“ Men in time will refrain when that goes with their grain; Till it does ’tis in vain that their wills you coerce; For the man whom by force you turn out of his course, Without fear or remorse will soon take to a worse.
Of course, in asserting malt liquors to be the temperance drink, or drink of the temperate, it must be understood that we refer to the ordinary ales and beers of to-day, in which the amount of alcohol is small, and which are very different from the potent liquor drank by the topers of the past, who were rightly designated malt worms. ”

“ It would add to the goodness, as well as sining of your malt liquor, if you took two quarts of wheat, and make them very dry and crisp in an oven, or before the fire, and boil them in your first copper of wort.—They would strain off with your hops, and might be put with them into the second copper. [Pg 170]
Of the fining of Malt Liquors.
It is most desirable to have beer fine of itself, which it seldom fails to do in due time, if rightly brewed and worked; but as disappointments some times happen, it will be necessary to know what to do in such cases. ”

“ Both wine and malt liquors have a greater tendency to swell the body than ardent spirits. They form blood with greater rapidity, and are altogether more nourishing. The most dreadful effects, upon the whole, are brought on by spirits, but drunkenness from malt liquors is the most speedily fatal. The former break down the body by degrees; the latter operate by some instantaneous apoplexy or rapid inflammation.
No one has ever given the respective characters of the malt-liquor and ardent-spirit drunkard with greater truth than Hogarth, in his Beer Alley and [70] Gin Lane. ”

“ The incidents attending this specie of malt liquor are so many, so short of existence, so contrary to one another, and often so different from what should be expected in the different periods of the year, that an attempt to guard, in a just proportion, against every one of them, and against what may happen, and oftentimes does not, must be fruitless. ”

“ The deplorable practice of swilling adulterated malt liquor two or three times a day, begun in early boy and girlhood among English servants, had not in America, as I am convinced it has with us, laid the foundation for later habits of drinking in a whole class of the community, among whom a pernicious inherited necessity for the indulgence is one of its consequences ”

“ State (Ala.) 8 South. 855, it was said: 'Malt liquors have neither vinous nor spirituous liquors as an ingredient. * * * 'Spirituous liquors,' 'vinous liquors,' and 'malt liquors' are not synonymous terms, but each refers to a liquor separate and distinct from each other. Lager beer is a malt liquor, and the court takes judicial notice of this fact. * * * The statute having prohibited the sale of spirituous and vinous liquors, only, malt liquors are not included. ”

“ Malt, well grown, and worked as before, but over-dried, though with a proper degree of heat, will become of so tenacious a nature, as to require a long time before134 it can admit of the outward impressions of the air to relax or mellow it, that is, before it is fit to be brewed with all the advantages it otherwise would have; and in proportion as it has black specks on being masticated, so much of its parts being charred is a diminution to the strength of the liquor, besides impressing it with a burnt or nauseous taste. ”

“ As high liquors used to extract low dried malt will form a must capable to preserve itself equally a long time, as an adequate liquor used to high dried malt doth; and the first of these methods having greatly the advantage of the other in point of taste, as 130 degrees of dryness in malt is one, from its change of color, where part of its finer principles may be supposed to be evaporated. It may not be amiss to enquire if there be not reasons why malt, less affected by fire, should be used for manufacturing this commodity. ”

“ C. D. Redcliffe, in giving his views on alcohol, in the form of a conversation between himself and a patient, speaks very positively on this point. “The glass of malt liquor,” he writes, “or cyder or perry or common wine, if the man have the luck to live in a wine-growing country, will {434} cost less than the amount of ordinary food which must otherwise be eaten in order to preserve health. ”

“ From hence it is, that in some Places their Malt Liquors are exceeding good, because they brew with Pale or Amber Malts, Chalky Water, and keep their Drinks in close Vaults or proper dry Cellars, which is of such Importance, that notwithstanding any Malt Liquor may be truly brewed, yet it may be spoiled in a bad Cellar that may cause such alternate Fermentations as to make it thick and sour, tho' it sometimes happens that after such Changes it fines itself again ”

“ When ‘out of condition’ or adulterated, porter, more than perhaps any other malt liquor, is totally unfit for use as a beverage, even for the healthy; and when taken by the invalid, the consequences must necessarily be serious. ”

“ Malt spirit, or gin, the favourite liquor of the lower order of people, which is characterised by the peculiar flavour of juniper berries, over which the raw spirit is distilled, is usually obtained from a mixture of malt and barley: sometimes both molasses and corn are employed, particularly if there be a scarcity of grain. But the flavour of whiskey, which is made from barley and oats, is owing to the malted grain being dried with peat, the smoke of which gives it the characteristic taste. ”

“ I am much disposed to extol the virtues of malt liquors. When properly fermented, well hopped, and of a moderate strength, they are refreshing, wholesome, and nourishing. It is a common observation, that those who drink sound malt liquors are stronger than those who drink wine; and to those who are trained to boxing, and other athletic exercises, old home-brewed beer is particularly recommended, drawn from the cask, and not bottled. ”

“ Malt liquors are divided into small beer, strong beer, ale, and porter. Small beer is best calculated for common use, being less heating and stimulating than other malt liquors. When used soft and mild, after having been thoroughly fermented and purified, it forms an excellent diluent with food, more especially at dinner. ”

“ Jackson, 97 Miss. 237, 30 L.R.A (N.S.) 1078, 52 So. 873, construed the statute as prohibiting the sale of all malt liquors, whether in fact intoxicating or not, and this construction of the state law is binding here. The court said: 'Poinsetta may or may not be an intoxicant, but it is a malt liquor, and as such is prohibited from being sold in this state. The prohibition law cannot be made effective unless it excludes all subterfuges.' (100 Miss. 650, 657, 56 So. 316.) ”

“ The basis of all wines is a sweet: this circumstance for brewing beers agreeable to the palate must always be attended to. Next to this, it is required that the liquor should possess all the strength, it can fittingly be made susceptible of. Pale malt, as it retains the whole virtue of the grain, yields the strongest beers. The finest oils being fittest for fermentation, malt dried by fierce heats, in a great measure loses these, and what remains are not only coarser oils, less miscible with water, but such as bring with them the impressed taste of fire. ”

“ Nor is it found to differ, when analysed, from beer made from malt. There is certainly a popular prejudice against it, which may arise in a great measure from the love of the people for the historic drink made from malt. Though analysts cannot distinguish between malt liquors and beers made from sugar, there is usually a slight difference in flavour between them. It is a noteworthy fact that most of the largest firms, having extensive private businesses, brew from malt and hops. Their success certainly indicates the direction in which the popular taste runs. ”

“ A glass or two of good wine can never do any harm; neither can a cup of good, genuine, "humming ale." The chemists tell us that the London ale is a horrid and narcotic compound; and so, in truth, by far the largest portion of it is. But there are two or three honest men in the metropolis, who sell genuine Kennet, Nottingham, and Scotch ales, from whom it is very easy to procure it quite pure. If, however, malt liquor does not agree with the stomach, or what is the same thing, is supposed not to agree, it is a very easy matter to substitute wine for it. ”

“ There is another Inconvenience attending the distilling of Malt Spirit, which is, when all the Bottoms, or gross mealy Fœculence is put into the Still along with the Liquor, the thinner Part of the Wash going off in Form of Spirit; the mealy Mass grows by Degrees more and more stiff, so as to scorch towards the latter Part of the Operation. ”

“ He must begin with more accuracy at the mash tun than the malt distiller, as it is there he must not only regulate the strength, but, partially, the flavour and transparency of his malt wine. His object does not end with the malt distiller's, nor, like his, concentre in one focal point, the solution of the whole of the farina of the plant or grain employed, regardless of milkiness or transparency; he must carefully take the heats of his liquor, so as to solve and combine the qualities he has in view ”

“ There can be no way better for making good small Beer, than by Brewing it from fresh Malt, because in Malt as well as in Hops, and so in all other Vegetables, there is a Spirituous and Earthy part, as I shall further enlarge on in writing of the Hop; therefore all Drink brewed from Goods or Grains after the first or second worts are run off, is not so good and wholsome, as that intirely brewed from fresh Malt, nor could any thing but Necessity cause me to make use of such Liquor ”

“ A small quantity of malt, at all times, but especially when brewed in large vessels, parts too readily with the heat which extraction requires; and, on the contrary, if the quantity of malt be very great, the heat may not be uniformly spread. A forward beer inclinable to acidity is often the result of too short a grist; a thick, stubborn, and rank liquor many times is produced from too large a one. Every advantage may be had in brewing, properly, five or six quarters of malt; it is difficult to succeed if the number exceeds fifty. ”

“ Sometimes the water—always spoken of as “liquor” in a brewery—rises in the tun, and the malt comes in from {333} above, but in many breweries the malt and water run in together, a machine mixing them before they enter. When the malt-tea has stood long enough—huge revolving rakes mixing the mash meanwhile—the amber infusion (technically “wort”) is drawn off and more water added, until all the goodness has been extracted from the malt, the empty husks or “grains” only being left. With grains pigs and cows are often fed, and not brewers’ horses, as is popularly imagined. ”

“ The salts the water has obtained, or perhaps had, being sheathed by the oils it draws from the malt, rather become saccharine, which cannot be the case when oils are acted upon by a strong heat, entirely void of any such property; but malt, the more it is dried, the longer is it capable of maintaining itself in a sound state, and the liquor brewed with it will, in proportion to its dryness, keep the longer sound, the hotter the water is, applied to malt, provided its heat doth not exceed the highest extracted degree, the more durable and sound will the extract be. ”

“ The newer the hops are, the better they always prove; the fragrance of their flavour being in some degree lost by keeping, notwithstanding the care used in preserving them. Private families, who regard only the flavour and salubrity of their malt liquors, should use from six to eight bushels of malt to the hogshead of their strongest beer. The quantity of hops must be suited to the taste of the drinker, and to the time the liquor is intended to be kept. From two to three pounds will be sufficient for a hogshead, though some go as far as six pounds.—Mr. ”

“ This bad Economy in Brewing has brought on such a Disrepute, and made our Malt Liquors in general so odious, that many have been constrain'd, either to be at an Expence for better Drinks than their Pockets could afford, or take up with a Toast and Water to avoid the too justly apprehended ill Consequences of Drinking such Ales and Beers. ”

“ The malt distiller is not allowed to furnish, under a heavy penalty, any crude or raw spirit to the rectifier or manufacturer of gin, of a greater strength than seven per cent. over proof. The rectifier who receives the spirit from the malt distiller is not allowed, under a certain penalty, to sweeten the liquor with sugar or other substances ”

“ Nearly every county in England, and nearly every town of any size, has been at one time or another noted for its malt liquors. The renown of some localities has been evanescent, having depended probably upon the special art of some “barmy” brewer or skilful ale-wife, whilst of others it may be said that years only increase their fame and spread their reputation.
From a perusal of those queer old collections of quackery, magic, herb-lore and star-lore, the Saxon Leechdoms, it may be gathered that our Saxon ancestors brewed a goodly assortment of malt liquors. They made beer, and strong beer ”