AAMU’s Winfred Thomas Agricultural Research Station Among Planting Sites
AAMU Plays Significant Role in First Beer Brewed from Alabama-Grown Barley
A brewery in Mobile recently released the first beer brewed from Alabama-grown barley malt. Alabama A&M's Winfred Thomas Agricultural Research Station played played a significant role in the project. "As part of the collaboration, we evaluated many varieties of barley,” says Dr. Ernst Cebert, Research Associate Professor and Manager of the research station.
Cebert says the collaborative project funded by the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs (ADECA) began in 2021. Mr. Jeremy Schmutz and his team at HudsonAlpha were the lead and invited Alabama A&M University and Auburn University to join. Cebert and AAMU Research Assistant Professor Dr. Xianyan Kuang, are co-PIs, and graduate student Andrion Erves is part of the team. Kuang says Erves is still working on the project, which will be complete in April of next year.
“AAMU received a $176,000 subaward grant and our role was to plant and evaluate varieties of barley," adds Cebert. "We started with 25 different varieties, then 33 the following year, and evaluated them to see which ones are better for our climate and soil type in Northern Alabama. Last year, with the field trials’ data including ours, HudsonAlpha narrowed it down to four varieties for scale up productionm. AAMU is one of the planting sites with a larger acreage. The plants were harvested this past summer and sent to the brewery. We are very excited about the outcome.”
“We are happy that despite COVID 19, we were able to collect three years of plot-scale data evaluating these varieties on yield, winter kill, and other challenges growing barley. We provided the data to HudsonAlpha, which helped contribute to the decision in narrowing down the top performers,” said Kuang.
The project also includes the evaluation of dry beans (black beans and pinto beans) as summer crops for planting after the barley is harvested in the spring. Erves is using this project to complete her master's thesis, including barley for beer. “Being part of a project that’s already contributing to a new beer produced in Alabama is very exciting."
More: https://www.hudsonalpha.org/first-beer-brewed-from-alabama-grown-barley-malt-released-at-mobile-brewery/