ABSTRACT
Sorghum beer is an indigenous African alcoholic beverage that has
been long traditionally brewed in the Savannah region of Nigeria; over
the years there has been a problem with the Keep ability of these beers.
Contemporarily, a conceptual approach of hopping these beers with an
indigenous hop extracts; Utazi (Gongronema latifolium) has relatively
improved its chemical properties compared to the Unhopped beer. This has
been proven from the following; appreciable decrease in its ethanol
content, total acidity, volatile acidity, Aspergillus prevalence from
the forth day of its bench storage relative to the Unhopped beer which
manifested in the second day. This clearly shows that the hopped sorghum
beer with Utazi has a decreased rate of deterioration compared to the
conventional Unhopped counterpart.
CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION:
Beer is an alcoholic beverage made from cereal grains, usually
barley, but alsocorn, sorghum, millet, rice, wheat, and oats. Beer is
made using a process calledfermentation, in which microscopic fungi
called yeast consume sugars in the grain,converting them to alcohol and
carbon dioxide gas (Michael, et al, 2004). Over 70styles of beer are
available today. Each style derives its unique characteristics fromits
ingredients and subtle differences in its brewing process (Gunsch,
2010).Throughout history, wherever cereal grains were grown, humans made
a beerlike beverage from them: they used wheat in Mesopotamia, Barley
in Egypt, Millet andSorghum in other parts of Africa, rice in Asia, and
corn in the Americas. Today, beer making is a major industry worldwide
(Dornbush, et al, 2006).
Our indigenous African Beers are sourced fermented drinks made
withSorghum, Maize or Millet. ‘Pito’ is a dark brown traditional
alcoholic beverage of Binis in the western part of Nigeria prepared from
malted grains (Maize, Sorghumor both) with a pleasant sour taste
(Ekundayo, et al, 1969). ‘Burukutu’ another indigenous alcoholic drink
made from sorghum,Savannah region of Nigeria(Uveve, et al , 2000)