subject: How Do You Make Non-alcoholic Beer? [print this page] We do get this question from time to time because not everyone wants to drink beer with alcohol in it, but still want a high quality brew. The process for making a non-alcoholic beer is very easy, and anyone can do it. All you have to do is make a beer like normal. Add the yeast, transfer the beer, etc. just like you normally do. Obviously, at this point you have a beer with alcohol in it. So how do you get rid of the alcohol? Just before you are ready to bottle, you heat the beer up to 175 F.
This is a quick run down of the process for you:
1. Make beer like normal,
2. When you are ready to bottle heat the beer to 175 F for 15 - 20 minutes. Alcohol has a lower burn off rate then having to boil your beer. Try to stay as close as you can to the 175 F temperature to prevent off flavors. When you first start heating the beer you are going to notice a very strong alcohol smell. This is perfectly normal because the alcohol is starting to be burned off and will release itself from the beer,
3. Cool off beer to below 80 F
4. Add yeast and sugar
5. Bottle
You have to use more yeast in a non-alcohol beer if you plan on bottling because you will kill what yeast you have already used to make the beer when you heat it up. If you are kegging the beer, you do not have to add any yeast at this point because you are going to force carbonate the beer anyway.
Making a non-alcohol beer is very easy to do, but there is one major draw back. When the beer is heated to release the alcohol, the beer will become very bitter. We aren't talking like a very hoppy beer bitter. We are talking a beer that you might swear was made out of nothing but hops, bitter.
Hint: All you have to do is cut down on the hops at the beginning, and the beer will turn out fine. If your total recipe calls for 2 ounces of hops, only use a total of 1 ounce. Trust us; the beer will be plenty bitter.
Hint: Beer styles like pale ales and I.P.A.'s are not recommended for a non-alcohol beer as they are way too hoppy. Try a nice wheat beer or maybe a red ale instead. You want the beer to be lacking a lot of hop bitterness before you burn off the alcohol.
Hint: It also isn't a bad idea to use hops with a low alpha acid. This way you get a nice hop flavor, but it isn't over powering to drink. We can't stress enough how bitter the beer will be once you burn off the alcohol
