Alcohol - use of animal

The use of animal derived products in the production of alcoholic beverages is fairly widespread not because no alternatives exist, but because they always have been used and there is little demand from the consumer for an alternative.

The main obstacle when trying to judge the acceptability to vegetarians of any given product is a clause in the 1984 Food Labelling Regulations (UK) which exclude from the 1984 Food Act all drinks with an alcohol content exceeding 1.2% by volume (ABV), leaving only very low or non-alcoholic beers, wines and ciders being required to list all ingredients.

The main appearance of animal derived products is in the fining or clearing process, though others may be used as colorants or anti-foaming agents.

It must be pointed out that alcohol is routinely tested on thousands of animals each year (though this is not usually done directly by any individual company).

BEER
Cask-conditioned ales need fining to clear the material (especially the yeast) held in suspension in the liquid. This is invariably done by adding isinglass, derived from the swim bladders of certain tropical fish especially the Chinese sturgeon, which acts as a falling suspension. If you were to hold a pint of real ale up to the light and see cloudy lumps swirling around that would suggest that the cask had been recently disturbed and the isinglass shaken up from the bottom. Bottled naturally conditioned beers will not always have been treated with isinglass. Keg Beers and Lagers are pasteurised and usually passed through Chill Filters, as are canned beers and some bottled beers, however a considerable number of breweries still use isinglass to clear their pasturised beers, though sometimes only to rescue selected batches which are considered too hazey. Also occasionally the sometimes animal derived additive Glyceryl Monostearate is used in place of 900 Dimethylpolysiloxane as a foam-control agent in the production of keg beers.

It is sometimes possible to buy barrels of cask-conditioned beer from a brewery before it has been fined. The beer would then have to be left for a considerable time to stand before consumption. To our knowledge, only one pub in England sells unfined real ale on draught: The Cumberland Arms in Byker, Newcastle on Tyne.

Please copy and paste the following link where is the complete article:
http://www.vegsoc.org/info/alcohol.html#beer