Cicerone Certified Beer Server Practice Test

What is the purpose of sparging during brewing?

1. To boil the wort

2. To transfer beer to the fermentation vessel

3. To rinse grains and extract additional sugars

4. To cool the beer before bottling

The correct answer is: To rinse grains and extract additional sugars

Sparging is a crucial step in the brewing process that involves rinsing the grain bed with water after mashing. The primary purpose of sparging is to extract as much fermentable sugar as possible from the grains. During mashing, enzymes break down starches into sugars, but not all of these sugars are immediately dissolved in the wort. By conducting sparging, brewers wash the grains with hot water, which helps to dissolve and carry away these residual sugars into the collected wort. This process increases the overall efficiency of sugar extraction, leading to a higher yield of fermentable sugars for the beer. The other options do not accurately describe sparging: boiling wort occurs in a separate stage of brewing, transferring beer to the fermentation vessel happens at a different point in the process, and cooling the beer before bottling is a later step that ensures the beer is at the correct temperature for packaging. Each of these actions serves different purposes within the brewing process and does not encompass the specific function of sparging.