From field to fermentation: impact of local wheat landraces on traditional lambic beer productions

Lambic beer is one of the oldest beer styles produced today. Over time, many changes concerning the production method and raw materials were introduced. Where brewers nowadays use modern wheat varieties, originating from all over the world, brewers in the past depended more on wheat offered by the local farmers. These wheat landraces however disappeared over time due to the selection for more performing wheat varieties or varieties with other desired properties, mainly for the use in baking. In this research, lambic beer was produced in a traditional way with two old local wheat landraces, being Witte van Vlaanderen and Limburgse Rode, together with a control brew which was produced with commercially available wheat. These three brews were followed over time on a microbiological as well as a biochemical level to investigate the impact of the wheat landrace on the beer.