Here's another article.
I didn't put in the URL. Unfortunately the site was a breeding ground for pop-up ads. <_<
Hope this helps.
Warren -
Sinamar", the trade name for the black malt extract from the Weyermann Malting Co., has a very contemporary ring to it, but the product first hit brewhouses back in 1903.
The specialty maltster, based in Bamberg, Germany introduced Sinamar Malt Extract just after the turn of the last century. It was, and is, made entirely from roasted malt, and is described as "black and complex as an authentic espresso."
According to Thomas Kraus-Weyermann, the Company's Vice President of Technical Operations, the introduction of Sinamar revolutionized operations at dark beer breweries. "Many beer styles, especially the darker ones, place contradictory requirements on the brewer," he notes. "The challenge is to put opaqueness into the beer while keeping acrid, burnt flavors out of it. This applies not just to such lager beers as Bock, Munich Dunkel, and Schwarzbier, but also to such typical British-style ales as brown ale, Porter, Scotch ale and stout.
"The dark color in all these beers comes from the intense roasting of the malted barley," Kraus-Weyermann continued, "but the roasting process also accentuates acrid bitter notes that stem from the barley's husks. When these notes are leached into the wort during mashing and lautering, the resulting beer can cause an unexpected and unpleasant jolt to the drinker's palate. So it is not surprising that brewers and maltsters were looking for a raw material that would supply the required color but de-emphasize the harsh, and sometimes offensive, bitterness of severely roasted malts. The Sinamar process developed here at Weyermann at the beginning of the twentieth century, therefore, was largely in response to that perceived demand for a gentler dark brew on the part of the consumer. Sinamar changed many dark brews into the drinkable, smooth and pleasing beverages they are today.
"The Sinamar innovation was the result of two engineering achievements," Kraus-Weyermann adds. "First we found a way to mechanically remove the husks from the barley before it was malted, thereby eliminating the source of the bitterness from the product altogether. Second, we then made a wort from that now dehusked barley and found a way to vacuum-evaporate it into a concentrated extract. By adding this all-natural, grain-based color extract to their kettles or fermenters, brewers have since then been able to make flavorful, malty, dark brews from their normal, enzyme-rich, pale and amber foundation malts without having to overload their mash tuns with chocolate or black malts. Thus Sinamar gave dark-beer brewers the added benefit of increased mash efficiency."
Johann Baptist Weyermann, the great-grandfather of current Company President Sabine Weyermann, had secured a patent for making his "debittered color beer," as Sinamar was them known, in 1902, one year before the first production run. T
The company marked the 100th anniversary of that first production batch of Sinamar liquid color malt on July 19. Today the product is made using a completely automated process, with about 200,000 gallons produced each year.
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