8 Beers you should never drink... supposedly

[Pogierob]

Here’s some harmful ingredients that are commonly found in beer:

• GMO Corn Syrup
• GMO Corn
• High Fructose Corn Syrup
• Fish Bladder
• Propylene Glycol
• Monosodium Glutamate (MSG)
• Natural Flavors
• GMO Sugars
• Caramel Coloring
• Insect-Based Dyes
• Carrageenan
• BPA
• & lots more!

Harmfulness - HFCS > ethanol. Phew..

the "& lots more' is a bit of a worry. It could be ANYTHING...!!!!

WATCH OUT FOR THOSE NATURAL FLAVOURS!!!!

deadly **** those natural flavours, I'd never want those in my beer

 

[wide eyed and legless]

Thing is most of those ingredients are found in countless food items.

 

[TimT]

deadly **** those natural flavours, I'd never want those in my beer

Gasp! I hear they have chemicals in them!

 

[manticle]

Beer is a superfood though. An organic superfood with antioxidants.

 

[manticle]

And enzymes

 

[TimT]

Was poking about at a local naturopath today and found on the shelf a number of weird items that would be good for brewing; of relevance to this discussion, a 'vegetarian enzyme' pill that not only contained 'amylase' but also protease and lipase (they're milk-curdling enzymes - apparently we normally have them in our own bodies. Chymosin is the one cheesemakers use though). Also: 'milk thistle' pills - milk thistle being another old herb sometimes used to flavour ales. Was kind of tempted to buy some, crush them up and use them in my next herbal brewing experiment.

 

[nathan_madness]

MSG, really. If you ferment that out you end with GHB in ciders. There were some discussions on here before about it. Or you can Google it.

 

[jaypes]

MSG, really. If you ferment that out you end with GHB in ciders. There were some discussions on here before about it. Or you can Google it.

Mostly cheap chinese beers use MSG

 

[Green-Lobster]

I avoid GMO`s were i can . quite happy to cross these of any list . not like im stuck for choice and they are all unremarkable.
CUB beer does not claim to be GMO free , but i have a soft spot for Melbourne Bitter.
I think there should be honesty in labeling . If your proud of what you make, label it . let the buyer make an imformed choice .

 

[manticle]

I avoid unnecessary apostrophes where I can.
Genetic manipulation and modification, depending on your definition of what it constitutes, has been going on for a long time. It's why we have insulin, burmese cats and brewer's yeast.

 

[Rdyno]

I have little knowledge on modern genetic manipulation techniques, but in saying that I have looked into older styles and from my knowledge they are different. As far as I was aware modern techniques came about after the equipment was developed to brake DNA down and reinsert it into other strains.

Just a bit of bragging I'm friends with a professor in botany that specialises in genetics he worked on the team that made a wheat strain that was resistant to something, the funny thing is I never talk about plants with him lol except when asking him about his garden of course.

 

[manticle]

They've been inserting dna into strains for yonks as far as I'm aware. Not suggesting there's no potential issues, just that there is a lot of scaremongering based on ignorance.

 

[Rdyno]

They've been inserting dna into strains for yonks as far as I'm aware. Not suggesting there's no potential issues, just that there is a lot of scaremongering based on ignorance.

What is your definition of yonks? I was trying to find some info on my friends work (I will have to ask him) and found some info on x-ray mutilation but the common method seems to be inbreeding or more correctly http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosis . As far as the DNA manipulation go's I would've thought the 70's or 80's would've been around the time they first had these technologies which not that long ago.

Here is a link to wheat I chose wheat because of my last post also because it is in beer and is a crop that would be considered high on the GMO priority list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat .

 

[TimT]

P J O'Rourke wrote about GM and anti-GM activism in All The Trouble in the World in 1994.... so it's been round in its modern form for more than 20 years at any rate.

But engineering was practiced in cruder forms before DNA was found by James Watson and Francis Crick: for instance, crops were irradiated to encourage mutations. Prior to that, for many many eons people have been selectively breeding animals and plants (and in the case of yeast, fungus) - a crude but effective form of engineering.

 

[manticle]

What is your definition of yonks? I was trying to find some info on my friends work (I will have to ask him) and found some info on x-ray mutilation but the common method seems to be inbreeding or more correctly http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosis . As far as the DNA manipulation go's I would've thought the 70's or 80's would've been around the time they first had these technologies which not that long ago.

Here is a link to wheat I chose wheat because of my last post also because it is in beer and is a crop that would be considered high on the GMO priority list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat .

Yonks for me is in relation to how alarmist people have recently become about it. Bigger than a beesdick smaller than an eon.
When I studied biology in high school, gene splicing for various purposes, including medical (actually mostly) was a well established technology. I was in high school in the early 90s. As I implied - most diabetics rely on genetically manipulated material daily.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

MSG, really. If you ferment that out you end with GHB in ciders. There were some discussions on here before about it. Or you can Google it.

Cheap apples and some MSG from the asian shop...I knew them cider blokes had something going on...

 

[sp0rk]

As far as I was aware modern techniques came about after the equipment was developed to brake DNA down and reinsert it into other strains.

That is Genetic Engineering (or Genetically Modified Crops, depending on where you are from), not Genetic Modified Organisms per se
All GE is GMO, not all GMO is GE

 

[GalBrew]

People have been inserting genes into yeast and bacterial for a long time. Zero of these bugs have ever been used to ferment beer. What would be the pony when we have so many excellent yeast available. There needs to be an economic imperative before genetically modified anything is put in our beer/food.

 

[Dave70]

I should be in New York now, was due to leave on Tuesday, 2 weeks ago I had a gastroscopy found a large tumour in my stomach just below my oesophagus, had CAT scan, PET scan and last Thursday another gastroscopy and laparoscopy by the surgeon yesterday a heart check and today my first Chemotherapy.
Chances of survival less than 30%, cause, first question, do you smoke, no, do you drink, yes, how much, how often, because I drink every night, according to the surgeon and oncologist that is the cause.
What a load of pish, it seems that it doesn't matter if one has been hanging around any carcinogenic chemicals it has to be the drink.
I will admit we all know alcohol is toxic but from what I have read there is a myriad of causes for cancer anyhow I have cut out the alcohol and eating an extremely healthy diet, if I don't beat the cancer I will give it a bloody good fright.

On a funny note the Oncologist advised me not to go down Jim Stynes route, I asked what route was that then, he leant forward and said he drank his own urine and had coffee enemas, I jokingly told him I had tried the coffee enema and I didn't like it, he asked why I told they didn't put any sugar in it.

Off topic.

REPORTED..

 

[TimT]

There needs to be an economic imperative before genetically modified anything is put in our beer/food.

I've seen a few articles talking about the possibility. The economic imperative would be making a better yeast more suited to the task of brewing, which would attract interest from brewers - obvious examples would be better ester production or quicker ferments; I'm sure there are many others that scientists are working on at the moment.

I've heard that brewer's yeast these days has completely lost the ability to breed because brewers don't like the unpredictability - that may or may not be true, but it reminds me of those Monsanto-engineered seeds you hear about occasionally - seeds which only work for one generation, and then have to be bought again from the supplier. Clever - but ultimately of dubious benefit: good for the companies who engineer the seeds (I'm sure it's not just Monsanto), not much good for anyone else. A yeast which can't breed would ultimately be much more susceptible to infections.

Personally, I think wild yeast has a lot to offer too... so maybe we don't need to wait around for new and weird yeast strains. They might be floating around the house right now h34r: