Thesis 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.

Thesis Overview

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)