Chemical-analytical and sensory characterisation of non-alcoholic beer: Impact of dealcoholisation, flavouring and ageing.

Non-alcoholic beer (NAB) is becoming increasingly prominent on the market. This is due to changing consumer patterns, governmental regulations, and promotion by major brewing companies. There is no one-size-fits-all pathway for NAB production. Some methods focus on adapting the traditional brewing process, e.g. limiting levels of fermentable sugars by applying higher temperatures during the mashing process and/or limiting formation of ethanol through low temperatures or unconventional yeast strains during fermentation. Alternatively, ethanol can be removed from beer at the end of production via thermal or membrane processes. Regardless of the applied methodology, the resulting chemical-analytical and sensory profiles of NAB greatly differ from ‘standard’ alcoholic beer.

Despite improvement in production technologies and flavouring strategies over the past decades, non-alcoholic beers are still generally less appreciated by consumers than regular, alcohol containing, beers. Undesired sensory properties of non-alcoholic beer include a ‘worty’ off-flavour, an unsatisfactory mouthfeel and low perception of fruity/estery flavours. Despite growing economic relevance, relatively little academic research focusses on characterisation of the chemical-analytical and sensory differences between non-alcoholic and alcoholic beers. Particularly, how these differences arise during processing and how they can be reduced via flavouring strategies has not been intensively studied. This highlights the need for more research in this emerging field in brewing research and forms the central research framework of this PhD thesis.