The Robinsons Brewing Process

With a multi million pound investment into the brewery, we will be the proud owners of an energy efficient brewhouse which retains more flavour within the beer and includes the largest Hopnik in the world. The Hopnik is a 2.5 metre vessel into which hops are submerged into the brew during the brewing process, meaning we can be a bit more adventurous with our ales in 2012.

Brewing Process Stage 1

Borehole

Water used for brewing is drawn from one of two brewery boreholes up to 180 metres (600 feet) deep. This water is well suited for brewing but we make some adjustments to it for different beers, including reducing some of the hardness. After this has been done we refer to it as Brewing Liquor which is usually shortened to ‘Liquor’. Some borehole water is used directly for cooling (attemperating) the fermentations.

Cold Liquor Tank

This vessel holds 54,000 litres (11,900 gallons) of brewing liquor and supplies the whole of the brewhouse.

Hot Liquor Tank

This vessel holds 54,000 litres (11,900 gallons) of hot brewing liquor and supplies the whole of the brewhouse. The heating is provided very largely by recovering heat from the brewing process. The two main sources of recovered heat are the vapour condenser (recovering energy from the vapour given off during boiling the wort) and the wort cooler, which uses cold brewing liquor (which is thereby heated) to cool the wort prior to fermentation.

Malt

Malt is made mainly from barley but also from several other cereals, especially wheat. The malting process mimics the natural germination of the grain in the field. Barley is steeped in water and then spread on floors until the shoot and rootlets start to emerge. It is then dried (kilned). The grain looks somewhat unchanged at the end of this process but a lot of the starch has been converted to sugar and the grains are more friable (crumbly). The extent of the kilning determines the colour of the malt and hence the beer, as well as influencing flavour.

Sugar

To some brews sugar is added. This may be done for flavour reasons or to increase the fermentability of the wort.

Cereals

We have the option of using unmalted “raw” cereals although currently these would only be used by a contract brewing customer who particularly requested it.