Craft Adjunct

An adjunct is a grain which replaces some of the malt during the mashing process.It mops up the excess enzymes which otherwise would lead to hazy beer and prevents pale beer from becoming too dark.

 

Michael (@TongoRad) has basically answered your questions in this thread but permit me to expound a bit.

A better adjunct beer would be the beer style of Classic American Pilsner (CAP) in my opinion. In America before Prohibition the adjunct lagers (CAPs) were flavorful beers. They had a bigger hop presence in all three phases (bitterness, flavor and aroma) and the amount of adjunct was judicious (e.g., 20% of the grain bill vs. a beer like Bud Light having something like 40% adjunct).

Why don't craft breweries make more of a beer like a CAP? I think that Michael hit the nail on the head in his post where be remarked about the snobbery of BA beer drinkers concerning this sort of beer style. Among the beer geek crowd there is a lot of prejudice concerning AAL beers so they would be prejudiced and reticent to purchase a beer like a CAP.

There is one brewery that produces a CAP on a rotating basis: Straub 1872 Lager. I discussed this beer in a past thread: http://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/straub-1872-lager.144714/

The other option is to homebrew your own CAP. I have a CAP in my lagering chamber right now.

Cheers!

 

god I love that beer

 

Other Half Brewing and Threes Brewing teamed up and made Tres Equis. A corn adjunct Mexican style lager: http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/33510/197052/

 

Also don't forget that many Belgian beers use Candi Sugar (dubbels) or White Sugar (tripels).

Even some English Pale Ales add sugar.

 

I believe this, but I think we can go beyond "brewpubs." I bet most people have no idea how much corn and sugar are really employed commercially beyond the big American brews - by American craft brewers, English, Belgian, and German brewers.

I noticed that Goose Island's Festivity Ale uses rice and sugar. I can think of another beer that uses rice but I'll leave that for the conspiracy theorists and demonizers.

 

Longboard Lager....Kona Brewing
Lobo Lager....Pedernales Brewing
Hans Pils....Real Ale
Nooner....SN
Session Lager....Full Sail
Little Yella Pils....Oskar Blues
Prima Pils....Victory
Upslope Craft Lager....Upslope
None of these may have adjuncts in them, but they are all are fine replacements and much better.
Cheers!

 

Carton Canyon is excellent.

 

Sugar is not an adjunct.

 

Why not? Many use the term adjunct to refer to something that contains fermentable sugars. Now I'm confused.

 

Yes it is.

 

Based on the common usage of the term here, there will be different definitions floating around. I'm shocked!
Michael Jackson claimed that a beer that used sugar was not "all-malt."

 

There are both Starch Adjuncts (corn, rice, oats, rye) and Sugar Adjuncts (Candi, Caramel syrup, Honey).

 

Grain Belt = craft macro

Not to be confused with macro c(k)raft (blue moon)

 

Personally, I don't really care what adjunct ingredients (or whatever you term various sugars) are used unless the brewery makes claims NOT to use any. Otherwise, rock on, and I don't care if you disclose it or not.

 

So we're at least a bit grounded on what an adjunct is, here's a (hopefully helpful) definition from a credible source.

Adjuncts:

Adjuncts can be divided into two broad groups: kettle adjuncts and mashable adjuncts. Kettle adjuncts, like honey or candi sugar, contain fermentable sugar and are added to the kettle in the boil. Mashable adjuncts contain starch. This starch needs to be converted to sugar before it can be used by brewer’s yeast. These starchy adjuncts must be mashed, which means that enzymes degrade the starch to fermentable and unfermentable sugars and dextrins.

Mashable Adjuncts

Mashable adjuncts can be further divided into two groups, depending on whether the adjunct has the enzymes it needs to break down starch. Malted adjuncts, like malted wheat or malted rye, contain enzymes; other adjuncts, like corn or rice, lack them. They rely on the fact that malted barley has a surplus of enzymes, enough to convert the starch of both barley and adjunct.

Copied from: https://byo.com/mead/item/94-adjuncts-explained

(I have no idea why the word mead is in the address, but I guess that's OK.)

 

I agree with your ‘definition’ that sugar is an adjunct.

Perhaps part of the confusion is the BeerAdvocate definition of an AAL:

“American Adjunct Lager

Description:
Light bodied, pale, fizzy lagers made popular by the large macro-breweries (large breweries) of America after prohibition. Low bitterness, thin malts, and moderate alcohol. Focus is less on flavor and more on mass-production and consumption, cutting flavor and sometimes costs with adjunct cereal grains, like rice and corn.”

Cheers!

 

The thing is, though, that those comments did include classist rhetoric and inserted value judgements where there shouldn't be any. All beer styles can be well or poorly made, and all points in between; finely crafted or slap dash. Coming across a great representation of any type should be a worthy pursuit. We shouldn't let the fact that damn near all industrial pale lagers are not well made cloud the overall perception of the style ; those are two separate issues.

And Dave, I think the answer to why it's not often done has more to do with the audience than the brewers. Why go through considerable effort to not be appreciated in the end?

 

Is it even possible to make a really good American adjunct lager? I mean, isn't that kind of like saying "gosh, I wish someone could make a really good White Castle cheeseburger".

 

Maybe you can expand on the classist rhetoric piece because I don't see it. I'd also need some clarification on what you mean when you say value judgement shouldn't be present... because as a consumer, how I spend my money (outside of taxes and being forced to buy a powerball ticket when the jackpot is 1.5BB) is all about value judgement.