All the companies in the Heineken Česká Republika pay special attention to the selection of raw materials and adhere to time-tested production techniques. The companies use raw materials that form the basic characteristics of the specific brands – the highest quality hops, malt, water and yeast.
Beer is an ancient beverage that used to be brewed by the Egyptians, Babylonians and Greeks. It was also known to the Slav people. In the Middle Ages beer was brewed by the monasteries. The brewing industry went through a boom at the time when the Bohemian kings were founding fortified towns and were giving their citizens different privileges. One of these privileges was the privilege to brew beer and produce malt. The Bohemian aristocracy gained the privilege to brew beer when the St. Wenceslas contract came into effect in 1517. In Bohemia, beer has always been brewed for one’s own use too – like a family style beer.
In the depths of brewing history we can find the origin of some technical terms that are used even up to the present day: malting floor – a spacious paved room, usually vaulted, where they caste steeped barley and where it germinated; mash tun – here in the brewhouse the whole process of beer production begins; the crushed malt is mixed with warm water; mash copper – the crushed malt is boiled here and the fermentable sugars released into the water; lauter tun – brewhouse equipment, which separates the leached malt (spent grain) from the unhopped wort; copper – here the unhopped wort is boiled and hops added cooler tun – a shallow tub made of wood (copper, steel) where the wort cools down fermenting cellar – cooled premises where beer fermentation takes place after adding yeast Seemingly simple recipe for brewing beer which is still in use today.
Today’s modern technology enables the breweries in the Heineken Česká Republika to prepare high quality beers. The production of beer starts in the brewhouse where the crushed malt is mixed with warm water in the mash tun – the technical term for this process is mashing in. In the mash tun the mixture is gradually warmed up to technologically important temperatures so that the starch, proteins and other complex substances split into simpler ones. This stage of the production is called mashing. The finished product is clarified in the lauter tun. The acquired unhopped wort is boiled with hops which gives the beer its hop aroma. The unhopped wort boiled with hops is called wort. After that, the wort is cooled down to the pitching temperature, it is pitched and it is pumped over to the fermenting tanks. The fermentation process takes approximately 10 days. The fermented beer is called young or new beer and it must mature in the storage tanks. During the storage time the carbon dioxide is absorbed and rounds off the taste and aroma of the beer. After that, the beer that is intended for filling is relieved of its yeast through filtration equipment. Finally, the beer is pumped to the filling room, where it is filled into stainless steel kegs, bottles or cans. The usual shelf life of bottled beer is 6 months and for canned beer 12 months.
