Valmiermuižas alus
Spent brewing grain goes to local farmers as livestock feed.
SIA “Valmiermuižas alus” is a brewery founded in 2005 in the village of Valmiermuiža near Valmiera. Brewing began in 2009 and the brewery still makes live, natural beer from high-quality ingredients.
The first beer released, in 2009, was Valmiermuiža pale ale. A dark beer followed in 2010, a winter beer recipe in 2012, a porter in 2013 and the beer cocktail “Frišs” in 2014.
Estonia was the first country the brewery exported to and also the first to host a Valmiermuiža beer embassy outside Latvia, opened in 2021 in the Telliskivi creative quarter in Tallinn. Estonia is currently the brewery's largest export market as well.
Symbiosis at the brewery
The brewery makes natural, unpasteurised beer from just four ingredients: deep-well water from Valmiermuiža, barley malt, yeast and two kinds of hops, one for bitterness and one for aroma.
Brewing leaves a by-product, spent grain, which is the husk of the malted barley. Spent grain is essentially protein and fibre, a good source of micro and macro elements, rich in vitamins and in most essential amino acids.
After brewing, the spent grain goes into a collection tank. Every 2000 litres of wort yields about 500 kg of spent grain. Beer is brewed six to seven times a day and each batch leaves spent grain behind.
Spent grain as feed
To reduce the surplus, the brewery gives its spent grain to farmers: to the family farm “Zilūži” nearby in Valmiera, which feeds it to dairy cows. Milk yields rise on that feed, because spent grain is rich in malt protein.
Part of the spent grain is fed to the horses in the Valmiermuiža stable, set up in the old cattle yard that stood there already in the first half of the 19th century. For horses spent grain is a real treat, it makes their coat especially glossy and it supports the flora of the large intestine and the work of its microorganisms.
New products from by-products
Some years ago an original beer snack was created, “Drabiņu cepumi”, baked by the brewery's neighbours, the bakery “Liepkalni”. Rye flour, garlic, butter and cheese are added to the spent grain. Around 10 000 packs are now baked each year and sold in the two Valmiermuiža shops. Spent grain has also been used as an ingredient in “Grasbergs” ice cream.
During fermentation, yeast settles in the vats. One vat holds 6000 litres of beer and about 500 litres of yeast settles out of it. Part of the yeast is used for secondary fermentation and part goes to the “Zilūži” farm together with the spent grain.
Bottled beer that falls below the required fill level also becomes a by-product. It is distilled into a burnt beer spirit called Degals, sold as a digestif after a meal.
Social aspect
As the brewery grows, it also works on reducing production residues and environmental impact: it regularly looks for new ways to cut brewing by-products and the volume of wastewater sludge.
Valmiermuiža has also created a reusable plastic cup, a deposit cup for outdoor events, shaped like the classic Valmiermuiža glass. The reusable cup is environmentally friendly because it replaces single-use plastic cups and reduces their volume.