Adjunct Misinformation

It was The Holy Roman Empire. Martin Luther had a lot to say about this after a while. It has always been an interesting world when humans are involved, but

I understand your point, and I am very directly Bavarian. But my hackles never rise over this stuff, but I do know Bavaria kinda genetically.

 

We need a term for what some are mistakenly called adjuncts. Have there been any thoughts or ideas on this?

 

Yeah! I like @bbtkd's term: "add-junks".

 

well.....the problem with that is that it sounds just like adjuncts

 

Oh yeah! Good point! We gotta keep on thinkin'.

How about "food ingredients" or "real food ingredients" or "food ingredients that don't belong in beer, even though coffee in stouts tastes awesome"? Xocoveza is a great example. When it's done right and with real, not artificial ingredients.

 

Well, yeah, because it's meant to mock people misusing "adjunct"

And it's spot-on accurate.

 

Maybe you could start a new thread with a poll on this topic?

My vote would go for calling this stuff "flavorings".

Cheers!

 

I’m all about language evolving. I don’t quite subscribe to it in this instance. But I think for better or for worse we’re stuck with adjunct as a catch all term now. It’s too late to try and think up something else.

 

So if adjunct means any thing besides malt, hops, and yeast added to a beer what is the word for the non malt fermentables?

 

Macronutrients?

 

Yeah, language "evolves" but that is not always positive. Seems to me that when a word loses a specific meaning and becomes more generalized, that is a loss for accurate communications. Contrary to the opinion (sorry, can't find the post above) that people who dislike the misuse of the term are coming from a negative, older viewpoint of actual adjunct usage - once a standard "craft" opinion, even written into the B.A.'s definition - I sure don't fit into that category. I'd rather see
'rice and corn in my beer" * than chocolate, fruit or peanut butter.

*To quote that cringe-worth video that starred many of these same FMB brewers...

I think the usage is by those whole think that using industry jargon - in this case, of course, misusing it - makes them sound more knowledgeable. But, of course, misusing it does just the opposite.
____________

AA's. (Actual Adjuncts).
---------

 

I know it's gone too far when someone in the bp sale thread claims that bp was the first brewery "to adjunct an ipa... " with the fruited sculpin. Never mind that rice IPAs and wheat IPAs and probably f'ing IPAs have been around a long time, trying to sound smart by calling adding fruit to a beer "adjuncting" is just aggravating. And as @jesskidden points out above, it doesn't lead to clearer communication about the topic at all.
The argument seems to be "since some people started misusing a word, probably out of a desire to sound better informed on a hobby than they really were, and it has caught on, we should all adopt this less precise and less useful misusage as 'evolution of language'". I reject that argument. Chocolate is a flavoring ingredient , fruit puree is a flavoring ingredient. Adjunct has a meaning that conveys actual information about the product, there's no reason to adopt a new usage just to help us all SOUND smarter

 

In German, Danish and Swedish the term for adjuncts is rohfrucht/råfrugt/råfrukt ("raw fruit"), so I guess Sculpin might have been the first "rohfrucht IPA"?

 

From now on I'm telling anyone who misuses adjunct to "get rohfruct in ipa"

 

Yeah, I think I saw that post, in which the poster claimed IIRC that Grapefruit Sculpin was brewed because of the "hop shortage" (interesting theory, but the years didn't line up - 2008 for the latter vs 2013 for the IPA's release) but that would then make that fruit ingredient not a "Malt Adjunct" but a "Hop Adjunct" !

The longest-lived US-brewed India Pale Ale, Ballantine IPA (circa ~1878 - ~1995, call me when a modern one breaks that record ), was brewed using corn grits as an adjunct. Pretty there were a few US pre-craft IPA's that used rice and, of course, many likely used corn-derived sugars or syrups.

 

Interestingly, one could argue that things like corn or rice, which are used to provide fermentable sugars and contribute to both the alcohol content and fundamental character of the finished beer, are not actually "adjuncts" within the meaning of the word, but rather are integral in creating a particular final product.

 

As a born and bred scot who was totally against independence (though fuck me - with what’s happening now doesn’t actually seem that bad of an idea) you can call me Scottish and British. I’ll happily accept either. You’re right though. Don’t call me English.

 

I was also annoyed by the use of the term "adjunct" in this new context, but it's been going on for a few years, and I've gotten over it. A lot of breweries and beer fans use it in this way.

I suppose cookies could be considered an adjunct in the traditional sense if added to the mash, but I doubt that's what's going on here.

 

That ain't what my copy of Elsevier's Dictionary of Barley, Malting and Brewing in Six Languages [1961] from the European Brewery Convention says:

Unless, you know, it, too, "evolved"...

Wait. "Surrogate" "Substitute" ... what the hell, aren't those a volunteer birth-mother and a type of teacher?
How can a word mean more than one thing!