Expert: Matt Dick - 12/19/2008

Question
I am interested in non-alcoholic beers, but can't find any definitive info on how to make it at home. I've been reading up on the process and wonder if the fermentation of the wort with yeast can be skipped. What does the yeast do for beer (besides making ethanol and CO2)? Any suggestions?

Answer
Hmm... good question, and I'm not at all sure I can answer it.  Yeast will definitely impart some taste, and when you drink a beer and detect some notes in it that are bread-like, you're picking up on a little of what yeast is doing.

But that having been said, yeast mostly just does the alcohol/CO2 thing.  You can make non-alcoholic beverages and still use a little yeast.  In fact root beers are made this way (the naturally carbonated root beers--none of the big manufacturers).  If you look up a good root beer recipe you'll see in it described how to use yeast just at bottling time to create a nice, natural carbonation without imparting very much alcohol (NA beers, in case you didn't know, have alcohol in them, just below some critical legal limit (0.5% in the US)).

I would imagine that creating a NA beer is similar to root beer, with a beer-like wort in place of the root beer syrup.  The trick will be to get a nice, deep, integrated flavor without the fermentation.  Also be careful about sanitation, without the alcohol, the beer will be infectable for its entire life-cycle.

I hope that helps a little.

Matt