On 11/9/17 10:58 PM, RichD wrote:
> On November 8, Mark Lipton wrote:
>>> I tried Arrogant ******* ale yesterday, a dark brew.
>>> The only thing I noticed was a strong burnt taste, like
>>> french roast coffee. I can't say it was pleasant, though
>>> at least it got a rise out of my taste buds,
>>> Does this character indicate malty or hoppy?
>>
>> I'm not much of an ale drinker, but it sounds to me like they gave the
>> malt a dark roast, as they do with Porter and Stout.
>
> Perhaps.
>
> But those normally have a sweet taste, where this had none.
> How do they impart that sweetness, anyhow?

The roasting process breaks down the starch in the grain to give glucose
and other small sugars, all of which taste sweet to us (and which the
yeast converts into alcohol). Whether the ale tastes sweet or not will
depend on how efficiently the sugars to alcohol. It occurs to me that
some of the higher sugars like maltodextrin probably can't be
metabolized by yeast, so maybe they account for the sweetness of Porter
(stout doesn't taste very sweet to me but YMMV). Maybe the roasting
that produces this ale doesn't produce much maltodextrin, or maybe they
add an enzyme that converts maltodextrin to glucose.

Mark Lipton

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