The Brewhouse

In the brewhouse, the milled barley is steeped, as you would tea, in a vessel called the mash tun. This process, called mashing, converts the starches in the grain to fermentable sugars which the yeast will eat to make alcohol. After one hour of mashing, the sugar water, or "sweet liquor" in brewer's lingo, is pumped into the brew kettle.

Heat is added and the sweet liquid is boiled with hops. First, flavoring hops are added at the boil and give the beer flavor (bitterness). Aromatic hops are then added at the end of the boil and give the beer it's aroma. The liquid is now called wort (wert).