Barley has many uses in our society being used in whiskey, beer, bread, soup and even cattle feed.  Barley was the first domesticated grain in the Near East where remains were found dating back to 1500 BC along with millet and wheat.  Barley became so important in these cultures that they used it as a currency in exchange for goods and services.  It wasn’t long after that the Egyptians discovered beer by fermenting barley.  Egyptians at first made their beer by mixing barley and water with bread in order to ferment it.  It turns out the wild yeast from the bread was the culprit for making the fermentation happen.  So if you could imagine their beer was filled with chunks of bread (doesn’t sound too appetizing), what they then did was used straws made out of reed from the Nile river to suck under the bread floating at the top.  It has been discovered that the Egyptians developed over 17 different types of beer.

There are 2 varieties of barley: six-row barley and two-row barley.   As the name describes six-row barley has 6 rows of grains along the head of the grain and two-row barley has 2 rows of grains along the head of the grain.  The main difference in the two has to deal with the protein content in the grain.  Two-row barley has a lower protein content than six-row barley and thus has more fermentable sugar.  So for making alcohol where yeast needs all the sugar it can get, two-row barley is the best for making whiskey and beer.  Six-row barley has a high protein so is used for human consumption and livestock feed.  In areas where corn is not suitable for production, a finishing diet of barley is the defining characteristics of Western Canadian beef which has been marketed as a “better tasting beef”.  Finishing cattle on barley gives the beef a different taste than cattle that are finished in traditional American feedlots on corn.  To achieve a different taste, American beer producers use six-row barley malt.   This works for them because they use other grains such as rice or corn to help boost the sugar content.   So next time you enjoy a Budweiser take a look at the can or bottle and you will notice that it says it uses rice.  This gives it a unique taste that makes it the most popular beer producer in the US.