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The science of brewing

3 min read
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W&J College students Colten Crawford and Morgan Baxter fill bottles with freshly brewed beer.

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Bags of malt, wheat and barley used in the beer-making process

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Color-coded bottle caps instead of labels identify different beers in Patricia Brletic’s beer-making class. Hops hang over the bottles.

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Robbie Iuliucci, associate professor of chemistry at Washington & Jefferson College, oversees Morgan Baxter as she does a trace metal analysis on fluids in the chemistry lab.

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Beer-making equipment used in Patricia Brletic’s class at W&J College

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Patricia Brletic, W&J chemistry professor

Among the hundreds of science textbooks inhabiting Patricia Brletic’s office at Washington & Jefferson College is a section devoted to beer making.

On one shelf, “The Beer Makers Handbook” and “1,000 Years of Brewing” sit against “Physical Chemistry.”

It’s not as odd a pairing as one might think.

For the past 10 years, Brletic has taught a craft brewing course at W&J.

“There are tons of science – not just chemistry, but physics and biology – in everything around us, so when it comes to food and beverages, you can really explore the science behind why certain things happen and work the way they do,” said Brletic, a chemistry professor. “And that includes beer.”

Brletic started home brewing a little more than a decade ago, after she decided to develop a chemistry course that focused on making beer.

Her first attempts went “surprisingly well, but they were a bit messy,” she said.

Brletic started out with a kit that included all of the ingredients she needed to make a mild ale. After she got a handle on the brewing process – it took about three or four batches – Brletic bought raw ingredients “and went from there,” she said.

She also attended the Siebel Institute in Chicago to learn the technical aspects of brewing.

This summer, eight students (including accounting and communications majors) took the four-credit class, working in the college’s cafeteria kitchen to make beer. They headed into the lab to test their beers for color, bitterness and alcohol content.

“The students will tell you it’s a lot of work,” said Brletic. “It’s not an easy class. But they enjoyed making their own beer and taking it with them.”

There’s also a practical element to the class.

Craft and microbrewing has developed into a multi-billion dollar industry, growing from just eight craft breweries in the United States in 1980 to more than 2,000 nationwide today. A class like Brletic’s can provide essential knowledge and a foundation for a viable career in craft brewing.

Across the country, colleges and universities are offering business and technical courses in brewing.

What’s the most important part of making craft beer?

“Probably the most important thing is cleanliness. You can’t pasteurize, which would involve heating everything well in excess of 250 degrees Farenheit. You can sanitize, which is where you essentially reduce the number of microbes because you want your yeast to be able to feed on the sugar. If the bacteria get in there and feed on the sugar, you’ll have an awful-tasting beer,” said Brletic. “So keeping things clean is the best thing you can do.”

Once a commercial beer drinker, Brletic now enjoys the array of craft beers available in Southwestern Pennsylvania – including the ales, porters and stouts her students make.

“It’s just like anything homemade,” said Brletic. “Once you make your own bread or cookies and compare it to something commercial, it just tastes so much better.”

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