test the gluten content of your beer

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Author: Steffen Page 3 of 11

Vote on professional gluten tests

I recently had a chat with Karlo, a gluten intolerant visitor of my website from the Netherlands, who came up with the idea of testing beers in professional laboratories with professional methods, like the Competitive or Sandwich ELISA test. Compared to the home test kits we use there could benefits in getting certified results and have comparable results to the tests we made already. There is of course controversy which test method (e.g. Competitive vs. Sandwich vs. Lateral Flow Trough) or antibody (Skerritt vs. R5 vs. G12) is the best. However, the more and the more professional we test the better results we get. And now the downside: the costs are very high: between 100-110 USD (85-95 EUR) per beer per test. Nutrilab in the NL offer such services: https://www.nutrilab.nl/en

Below you find a vote on whether you would be willing to donate money for tests and what would be your limits.

In case of a positive result of the vote we can start some sort of crowdfunding and collect a certain amount of money to be used for the tests. We don’t know yet how to decide on the beer to be tested – most likely per vote again.

Please note, this is a non-profit site and non-profit idea. All the money would be used for tests. Use the comment function for discussions.

How much money would you donate for professional beer tests on gluten?

  • Between 10 and 25 USD (38%, 25 Votes)
  • Less than 10 USD (20%, 13 Votes)
  • Nothing (17%, 11 Votes)
  • More than 50 USD (14%, 9 Votes)
  • Between 25 and 50 USD (11%, 7 Votes)

Total Voters: 65

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Poll closed

Snow Gluten Test

I owed you the test result from the Chinese beer poll back in December last year. I haven’t posted the result as we had other test results with higher priority – like the tests from Adam and Joe M. And I have to apologise as I wasn’t able to get the winning beer (Yanjing) and not even the runner-up (Zhujiang). Finally I found Snow (3rd in the poll) in a small shop in Shanghai. If you don’t know where to go in Shanghai you are lost. Mainly Western beer brands are available beside the most famous Tsingtao which I already tested in 2014.

And I wanted to explore the city and not only look for beer. Actually I found a good shop with a lot of beers but I wasn’t able to buy them as the only accepted way to pay was Alipay. China really lives the digitalisation. Almost everything can be paid with mobile phones using WeChat for instance. Anyway, I tested Snow then. A very light, American lager style beer with low alcohol and not much taste.

Beer: Snow / 雪花啤酒
Producer: China Resources Snow Breweries Ltd.
Originating country: China
Brewing location: China
Bottle size: 500 ml
Alcohol by volume: 3.3%
Ingredients: Water, Malt Extract (9%), Starch, Corn, Hop Extract, Yeast according to internet research
Miscellaneous:

Snow Gluten Test Snow Gluten Test Snow Gluten Test

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: The test result is negative. According to the instructions there should appear a clearly visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) to indicate the presence of gluten. The pink spot on the right test area ( C ) is a control spot and indicates that the extract/sample is suitable, the test has been performed correctly and all reagents are active. Even though the detection limit in this kit is very low (1-2 ppm) and the test is negative please note this is not a medical advice – please see also my facts page.

Snow Gluten Test

5 Years lowgluten.org

5 Years lowgluten.org

5 years ago I started this blog without knowing what it’s going to be, whether it will be accepted by people with Celiac Disease or Gluten Sensitivity or if it makes sense at all to run a website which focuses on (low) gluten in beer. Considering the feedback, the questions and opinions I received via contact form, email and in the post comments I think, yes it was a good decision.

We have conducted more than 80 gluten tests on beer with different test kits, with different thresholds in different regions of the world. Due to job and family time is limited and the more important was the contribution from all of you, especially authors Adam, big in japan, Joe M and Thomas – big THANK YOU to you guys. But also every comment with feedback on the test results, reactions on gluten, discussions on the test kits and its antibodies was useful and can help others to identify if regular beer with no or low gluten could be an option.

We have 20.000 visitors per month on the website (real visitors, no spiders, bots, crawlers etc.). This makes me some sort of proud as I didn’t expect this at all. And it’s still growing. I also thank the people who donated – this helps to keep the site ad-free.

Five years is a long time and I will not promise to run this site another five years but I will not stop before we have achieved 100 tests!

Cheers Steffen

Radeberger Gluten Test

Radeberger is not the best selling but probably the most popular beer in Germany. I found this survey which is almost 5 years old but things haven’t changed since then a lot I guess. Only mainstream beers were considered but Germany has so much beer and so many breweries. Look at this fantastic map which shows all German breweries (be patient it takes a while to load all pins).

Anyway, I like Radeberger and it is available almost everywhere in Germany.

Beer: Radeberger
Producer: Radeberger Exportbierbrauerei
Originating country: Germany
Brewing location: Germany
Bottle size: 0.5 l
Alcohol by volume: 4.8%
Ingredients: water, barley malt, hops
Miscellaneous:

Radeberger Gluten Test Radeberger Gluten Test

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: The test result is negative. According to the instructions there should appear a clearly visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) to indicate the presence of gluten. The pink spot on the right test area ( C ) is a control spot and indicates that the extract/sample is suitable, the test has been performed correctly and all reagents are active. Even though the detection limit in this kit is very low (1-2 ppm) and the test is negative please note this is not a medical advice – please see also my facts page.

Radeberger Gluten Test

Petoskey Sparkle Gluten Test

During my last trip to Detroit I wanted to try some local beer – Michigan beer. The most famous local beer seems to be Badass – the beer launched by Kid Rock. It is available in many locations. I have only seen this from tap and found it quite OK. Next time I will try to get a bottle to test it on gluten.

I was surprised how far Michigan is with gluten free options. In Clarkston in the outskirts of Detroit I was able to get gluten free food without problems. E.g. at the  Clarkston Union restaurant I was able to get my burger with gluten free buns. The Woodshop next door even offers gf Mac & Cheese – both of course serve Badass beer.

I had not much time to look for Badass in shops so the only local beer I found was Petoskey Sparkle American Lager and Rochester Mills Pine Knob Pilsner. I decided for Petoskey as I didn’t want a Pilsner but only found out later that it contains wheat which is according to my experience always a bad sign for the gluten concentration.

Beer: Petoskey Sparkle
Producer: Petoskey Brewing Company
Originating country: USA
Brewing location: USA
Bottle size: 1 Pint can
Alcohol by volume: 4.1%
Ingredients: not stated, back side lists wheat and 4 malts and 3 different types of hops
Miscellaneous:

Petoskey Sparkle Gluten Test Petoskey Sparkle Gluten Test Petoskey Sparkle Gluten Test

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: There is a clearly visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) which indicates the presence of gluten. According to the instructions a “very low gluten” level of 20 to 100 ppm should give a test spot which is weaker or similar in intensity to that of the control spot ( C ). Please find some more information here.

Petoskey Sparkle Gluten Test

On a scale from 1 to 20 I would rate the test spot intensity 4. As Imutest uses the R5 antibody since a while it is difficult to estimate the gluten level in ppm in comparison to Skerritt antibody they used earlier, hence I will mark the test just positive. Even though this test is positive please note it is not a medical advice – see my facts page.

Which Chinese beer do you want me to test next?

Soon I will be travelling to China and as usual I will test some local beer. And I will not only test how they taste but also what gluten concentration they have. As I am little short in test kits at the moment I will test one Chinese beer and you can vote which one it should be.

No guarantee that I will get the winning beer but I will try my best. I have picked mainstream beers which should be available somewhere in Shanghai so it should work out. I excluded Tsingtao which I tested back in 2014 already. Find some useful information about the top Chinese brands here.

Please vote for the Chinese beer you want me to test next: Harbin, Snow, Yanjing, or Zhujiang

Which Chinese beer do you want me to test next?

  • Yanjing (35%, 15 Votes)
  • Zhujiang (26%, 11 Votes)
  • Snow (23%, 10 Votes)
  • Harbin (16%, 7 Votes)

Total Voters: 43

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Poll ends on 25th of January 2018.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Christmas Xmas 2017

Mythos Gluten Test

As announced in my previous post this is the first test of Greek beer. Not much to say about this beer, average taste, easy to drink but not really my thing. But the purpose of this site is to test the gluten level and here you go:

Beer: Mythos
Producer: Mythos Brewery
Originating country: Greece
Brewing location: Greece
Bottle size: 0.33 l
Alcohol by volume: 5.0%
Ingredients: water, barley malt, hops, yeast (internet research as ingredients are listed in Greek on the bottle)
Miscellaneous:

Mythos Gluten Test Mythos Gluten Test

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: The test result is negative. According to the instructions there should appear a clearly visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) to indicate the presence of gluten. The pink spot on the right test area ( C ) is a control spot and indicates that the extract/sample is suitable, the test has been performed correctly and all reagents are active. Even though the detection limit in this kit is very low (1-2 ppm) and the test is negative please note this is not a medical advice – please see also my facts page.

Mythos Gluten Test

Amstel Gluten Test

I spent my last holiday on the island of Crete. Crete is the biggest of the Greek islands and fifth largest in the Mediterranean Sea. As usual I take the chance to test some local beers. But Greece is very much influenced by Dutch breweries. You get Heineken, Amstel and other Dutch brands easily and also some local brands like Alfa are owned by Heineken. So I decided to first test Amstel as I was currious but don’t worry I also tested a Greek beer called Mythos and will post the result soon.

In my hotel a cheap mass-produced beer called ‘Cretan Beer’ was served which tasted horrible. The barrel though was labelled with ‘Heineken’ so it seems the god and the rubbish beer is produced in the same brewery and all its somehow Dutch. But the bottled Amstel tasted quite OK – crisp and refreshing, good carbonation.

Beer: Amstel
Producer: Amstel Brouwerij/Heineken
Originating country: Netherlands
Brewing location: Greece
Bottle size: 0.33 l
Alcohol by volume: 5.0%
Ingredients: water, barley malt, hops (internet research as ingredients are listed in Greek on the bottle)
Miscellaneous:

Amstel Lager Gluten Test Amstel Lager Gluten Test Cretan Beer Cretan Beer Heineken Barrel

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: The test result is negative. According to the instructions there should appear a clearly visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) to indicate the presence of gluten. The pink spot on the right test area ( C ) is a control spot and indicates that the extract/sample is suitable, the test has been performed correctly and all reagents are active. Even though the detection limit in this kit is very low (1-2 ppm) and the test is negative please note this is not a medical advice – please see also my facts page.

Amstel Lager Gluten Test

Hofbräu Sommerzwickl Gluten Test

Zwickelbier or Kellerbier is a special type of beer which is unfiltered/naturally cloudy and not pasteurised. The term Zwickl or Zwickel comes from the sample of the beer the brewmaster was taken from the barrel with a special tap in earlier times. Zwicklbier is refreshing, less bitter and very quaffable. It’s a seasonal beer and best enjoyed in summer fresh from the barrel in a German Biergarten.

As the beer is not filtered I assumed already that it could contain higher gluten concentration than filtered beers and yes the gluten test was positive. Low positive but still positive. Although the beer was quite  nice.

Beer: Hofbrau Sommerzwickl
Producer: Hofbrau Munich
Originating country: Germany
Brewing location: Germany
Bottle size: 0.5 l
Alcohol by volume: 5.1%
Ingredients: water, barley malt, hops, yeast
Miscellaneous:

Hofbrau Sommerzwickl Gluten Test Hofbrau Sommerzwickl Gluten Test Hofbrau Sommerzwickl Gluten Test

Test Kit: Imutest Gluten-in-Food Kit

Test result: There is a visible pink test spot on the left of the test area ( T ) which indicates the presence of gluten. According to the instructions a “very low gluten” level of 20 to 100 ppm should give a test spot which is weaker or similar in intensity to that of the control spot ( C ). Please find some more information here. The test spot is quite faint.

Hofbrau Sommerzwickl Gluten Test

On a scale from 1 to 20 I would rate the test spot intensity 1/2 so in this test the level is below 20 ppm. Even though this test is positive please note it is not a medical advice – see my facts page.

 

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