Husk Separation (Kubessa Method) Impacts the Aging Chemistry of Beer

The removal of husks before the mashing process, also known as the Kubessa method, is an established brewing practice often positively associated with smoothness and better flavor-stability of beer. Empirical evidence on the effect of the Kubessa method on beer, however, has been lacking. Similarly, our study’s comprehensive analysis of established brewing attributes revealed that traditional methods do not fully capture the impact of husk separation in beer brewing. Conclusive evidence of the Kubessa method’s impact on beer aging chemistry was obtained through ultrahigh resolution mass spectrometry (FT-ICR-MS), revealing intricate molecular details inaccessible to conventional analytical techniques. The compositional information on thousands of molecules in Kubessa beer was resolved and compared to whole malt mashing. Machine learning algorithms applied to aging experiments identified over 500 aging-related compounds inhibited by husk separation. Complementary Time of flight mass spectrometry (ToF-MS) coupled with chromatography further confirmed that the mashing of husks introduces sulfur-containing lipid compounds. These significant differences in the beer composition provide valuable insights for further investigation into the staling protective effect of husk-separation (Kubessa process) during beer production, as empirically demonstrated in this work.