Non-alcoholic beer: what it is, how it is made, composition and how much alcohol it contains

What is non-alcoholic beer

Beer soft drink is a frothy malt beverage that differs from its prototype by having a much lower alcohol content, up to 0.002% alcohol, which appeared in the 70s of the last century.

Initially, the drink was aimed at drivers who often got into accidents after a glass or two of regular beer taken on the road. Later, the target audience of the innovative product was joined by fans of a healthy, but at the same time, low-stress lifestyle, people who want to give up alcohol painlessly, pregnant women, as well as beer drinkers forced to take medications incompatible with ethanol.

How non-alcoholic beer is made

The first method

At the first stage, the technology for producing the beverage we are interested in is no different from the conventional one. Т.е., first, beer soft drink is brewed in the same way as regular drinks of this kind are brewed.

Then, the first possible discrepancies may begin. If the "non-alcoholic" effect is achieved by eliminating or interrupting fermentation, special yeast is added to the wort that does not actually process barley sugar - maltose; or fermentation is stopped by abruptly cooling the beverage, which leads to the death of yeast cultures. The result is a liquid that contains almost no ethyl alcohol, but has an obscenely pronounced malt flavor.

The second method

If instead of under-alcoholization, the manufacturer prefers to get rid of alcohol in the finished product, the fermentation process is brought to the end, after which the maximum possible amount of ethanol is removed from the drink. In rare cases, this result is achieved by heating the liquid to a temperature exceeding 80°C, which removes virtually all alcohol with irreversible loss to the taste of the drink.

The most commonly used methods are vacuum evaporation and vacuum distillation, which lead to the evaporation of alcohol at lower temperatures, while the taste of the final product, although deteriorating, is not as bad as in the case of full-scale heat treatment.

The third method

Finally, there is a membrane method of de-alcoholization, in which ethanol molecules are "filtered out" using a fine-pore membrane (reverse osmosis) or a special filtration film (dialysis). As a result of these rather lengthy processes, a substance is obtained that, as in the previous cases, is somewhat inferior to the original version.

Then, to give the drink some additional similarity to its alcoholic counterpart, various chemical compounds and flavors are added to it, if you need to saturate the product with an additional taste, for example, lime.

All of this, coupled with the aforementioned additional operations, make beer soft drinks more expensive than ordinary foamy drinks that no one tortures.

Composition of non-alcoholic beer

The composition of beer zero includes almost the same ingredients as in a regular drink.

The composition: malt, water, hops, yeast cultures and various branded additives of natural origin (herbs, spices, berries, etc.).).

How much alcohol is in non-alcoholic beer

These drinks contain from 0.002 to 1.5% ethanol. At the same time, in most countries, this figure should not exceed 1%. In any case, some alcohol is still present in the soft drink.

Accordingly, the question: "is it possible to get drunk from such drinks?", theoretically, we would give a positive answer. Of course, a fatal combination of several factors is required to produce this tragicomic effect.

For example, if a person with low alcohol resistance drinks 5 liters of one and a half degree beer, then due to the interaction of ethanol and the Mendeleev volume of chemicals, he can get not only relatively mild alcohol poisoning, but also a slight overdose and even a slight hangover...

Non-alcoholic beer for the driver

According to the producers of "zero" beer products, a driver who has consumed them may not be afraid of meeting with traffic police.

Technically, it is. After drinking two liters of soft drink, the blood will contain from 0.09 to 0.11 ppm of ethanol.

Whereas, according to the not the most lenient Russian legislation, the alcohol content in the exhaled air of a driver should not exceed 0.16 ppm, and the level of ethanol in the blood can reach 0.35 ppm...

How much does non-alcoholic beer weather

The beer smell (not to be confused with overbreathing) inherent in this type of soft drink can last for 10-15 minutes after drinking a bottle and for about half an hour after consuming two liters.

And if the driver does not withstand an appropriate pause before getting behind the wheel, zealous traffic police can suffer with him on all sorts of additional alcohol examinations, and on top of that - make him pass a test for reaction and coordination of movements.

Can minors drink non-alcoholic beer?

There is an old saying: "first - candy with rum, then - rum with candy, then - just rum". If we apply it to our situation, we can say that it is only one step from non-alcoholic to regular beer.

Accordingly, we would recommend that teenagers whose developing bodies have a reduced resistance to alcohol should not get addicted to the aforementioned alcohol-containing drink.

In this case, the real manifestation of adulthood is not the dashing tossing of a couple of cans of Zero, but the ability to resist the influence of the crowd. Moreover, one should refuse the offered drink calmly, confidently and without unnecessary bravado.

Can Muslims drink non-alcoholic beer?

It is well known that Islam prohibits alcohol consumption. As the Prophet Mohammed said: "Anything that intoxicates is forbidden, and anything that intoxicates in large quantities is also forbidden in small quantities.".

Thus, the drink in question, which can lead to intoxication in large quantities (no matter how much), should be avoided by any pious Muslim.

Update: 14.03.2017

Category: Beer, Cider, Ale