All our beers are Gluten Free! But how do we do it?

Firstly, it's worth defining what Gluten Free actually means. In the UK, Gluten Free is defined by a beer that has less than 20ppm (parts per million) of gluten.

Making beers Gluten Free is actually reasonably easy in 2025. It can just cost a bit more money. The additional costs come from using additional/different ingredients and also the legal requirement to test and verify each batch to ensure it is below 20ppm.

The first way of doing it...is by using alternative grains (other than wheat, barley and oats) that do not have any Gluten in them. These include sorghum, buckwheat, millet, quinoa, and rice. These can produce great tasting beers, but due to the change in grain, they can sometimes taste a bit different to beer brewed with malted barley.

The second way is...using some pretty nifty enzymes which break down gluten. This is the method we use. We use Brewer's Clarex. Get ready for some science!

Brewers Clarex is an enzyme which contains a proline-specific endo-protease that hydrolysises proteins in the beverage. In this way, the epitopes (which causes the immune response known as Celiac disease) on the antigen are degraded. 

Makes total sense right? Funnily enough we were thinking of calling our next beer "proline-specific endo-protease"!

Or in another analogy, consider a sea urchin. Now think of the sea urchin as an antigen and the spikes of the urchin to be the epitope. The "proline-specific endo-protease" (Brewer’s Clarex) melts the spikes off of the urchin turning it into a simple, harmless tasty delicacy. Now the body is able to digest the antigen without harm.

If you've made it this far in the in the text, well done. I appreciate (the science) is not not the easiest to digest (excuse the pun)! But at least now you have some good material next time you're trying to impress someone on a date or at a party.

Hope you've found this interesting - and if you know anyone who is Gluten intolerant and likes beer - you know where to point them!