exBEERiment | Impact Adding Table Sugar To Wort During The Boil Has On A Double IPA

Author: Steve Thanos

In its purest form, beer is made from just four basic ingredients – water, malt, hops, and yeast. While brewers have come up with myriad methods for extracting relatively high amounts of sugar from malt, sticking solely to these ingredients poses a few issues, for example increased body and decreased attenuation. As such, many brewers, at least those comfortable bucking tradition, have opted to replace some of the malt in certain recipes with basic table sugar, claiming it increases alcohol while minimally impacting aroma, flavor, or mouthfeel.

Table sugar, or sucrose, is a disaccharide consisting of glucose and fructose that’s essentially 100% fermentable by common brewer’s yeasts. As such, it’s use allows for the production of higher strength beers that maintain some impression of dryness, which is essential for styles such as Double IPA. However, there are some who disagree with the idea that table sugar imparts neutral characteristics to beer, claiming it can lend an unpleasant cider-like flavor, while others believe all malt worts can result equal dryness levels when using the right process.

When it comes to beer, I don’t discriminate much and enjoy drinking most styles. However, while I’m certainly a fan of Double IPA, I’ve found I tend to prefer those that drink more like a standard IPA, meaning they’re crisp and well attenuated. While designing a Double IPA recipe recently, I began to wonder just how big of an impact the use of table sugar has on the final product, so I designed an xBmt to see for myself!

| PURPOSE |

To evaluate the differences between a Double IPA made with all malt and one made with a portion of table sugar (5%) added during the boil.

| METHODS |

For this xBmt, I went with a Double IPA recipe that’s essentially an amped up version of my house IPA, swapping out a portion of the grains for 5% table sugar in one batch.

Fred

After collecting 2 sets of water and lighting the flame to get them heating up, I weighed out and milled the grains.

Once the water for each batch was adequately heated, I incorporated the grains then checked to make sure both were at the same target mash temperature.

While the mashes were resting, I prepared the kettle hop additions.

Once each 60 minute mash was complete, I removed the grains then boiled the worts for 60 minutes, adding the sugar to one batch with 15 minutes left in the boil. I then quickly chilled the worts with my JaDeD Brewing Hydra IC before transferring identical volumes from each to separate fermenters.

Hydrometer readings showed both worts achieved the same target OG, indicating Brewfather’s calculations were spot on.

The filled fermenters were placed in my chamber and left to finish chilling to my desired fermentation temperature of 68°F/20°C for a few hours before I pitched a pouch of Imperial Yeast A10 Darkness into each.

At 5 days into fermentation, I added identical dry hop charges to both batches, then when signs of activity were absent another week later, I took hydrometer measurements showing a very minor difference in FG.

At this point, the beers were transferred to CO2 purged serving kegs and placed on gas in my keezer where they were burst carbonated overnight before I reduced the gas to serving pressure. After a week of cold conditioning, they were ready to serve to tasters.

| RESULTS |

Shoutout to the organizers of the 2024 CHAOS Homebrew Club BrewBQ for allowing me to collect data at their event. A total of 36 people of varying levels of experience participated in this xBmt. Each participant was served 2 samples of the beer made with all malt and 1 sample of the beer made with 5% table sugar added to the boil in different colored opaque cups then asked to identify the unique sample. While 18 tasters (p<0.05) would have had to accurately identify the unique sample in order to reach statistical significance, only 16 did (p=0.11), indicating participants in this xBmt were not able to reliably distinguish a Double IPA made with all malt from one where a portion of the malt was replaced by table sugar.

My Impressions: Out of the 5 semi-blind triangle tests I attempted, I correctly identified the odd-beer-out 3 times, though admittedly, those were largely lucky guesses. I perceived both beers as being quite dry with a delightful hop pungency that melded well with the malt character I personally enjoy in Midwest-style IPA.

| DISCUSSION |

Whereas some brewers prefer to stick as closely to tradition as possible and generally mind the Reinheitsgebot, others enjoy using less common ingredients as a means of achieving some desired goal. Simple sugar is one such ingredient that, when added during the boil, is widely viewed as an effective means of boosting the strength of a beer while contributing little other perceptible qualities. Interestingly, tasters in this xBmt were unable to reliably distinguish a Double IPA made with all malt from one where a portion of the malt was replaced by table sugar.

In considering explanations for this result, it seems possible the amount of sugar used simply wasn’t enough to have the intended effect. However, in a past xBmt, tasters were unable to tell apart a Belgian Tripel made with 10% table sugar from one made with all malt. Perhaps the sheer strength of the beer or the higher hopping rates covered up any impact of the variable, which would be curious seeing as sugar often used in higher ABV styles.

I was surprised by these findings, as I’ve always believed the use of sugar in beer lends strength and dryness without adding any additional flavor or mouthfeel. My knee-jerk reaction was to write-off using sugar in place of malt, at least in stronger styles like Double IPA, as it apparently has minimal impact. However, it then occurred to me that table sugar is substantially cheaper than malt, and since using it doesn’t appear to negatively affect beer, subbing some in for a portion of grain is an easy way to save a little coin.

If you have any thoughts about this xBmt, please do not hesitate to share in the comments section below!

Support Brülosophy In Style!

All designs are available in various colors and sizes on Amazon!

Follow Brülosophy on:

FACEBOOK   |   TWITTER   |   INSTAGRAM

If you enjoy this stuff and feel compelled to support Brulosophy.com, please check out the Support page for details on how you can very easily do so. Thanks!