Smart Brewers Find Ways To Re-Purpose The Byproducts Of Beer-Making

The problem for craft beer brewers is what to do with the thousands of pounds of spent hops and grains used to make the beer so popular among today’s beer lovers. Jeff Fegley of eastern Pennsylvania, for example, uses Czech Saaz hops to make his Knuckleball blonde ale. But he no longer carts the spent grain to the landfill. He ships it to a local farm where it is used to feed the cattle that end up as prime cuts of beef found on local restaurant menus, including Fegley’s own Allentown and Bethlehem BrewWorks. Spent grain isn’t just used as cattle feed. Farmers, bakers and entrepreneurs are using spent grain to make, for example, edible six-pack rings and to feed the spent-grain boiler used at an Alaska brewery.