Many Riverbend customers are brewing with our Rye malt— Carolina Rye and Munich Rye— so we asked our Customer Success Representative, Tina Hoffert, to school us on best utilization of this grain in the brewing process. Tina is a graduate of AB Tech Asheville and she was brewing professionally before joining the Riverbend team.

Below, she runs us through Rye 101 with recommendations to combat issues with high-viscosity, and some of her favorite rye beer styles. 

Rye 101 

Rye (Secale cereale) is a cereal that has been cultivated and grown since ancient times that belongs to the grass family, Gramineae. It is a part of the Triticaea tribe, which also includes wheat and barley. Modern rye varieties are said to have originated from its ancestor Secale montanum. This is a wild rye species found in Mediterranean and Middle Eastern regions along the Black and Caspian Sea. The exact origin of rye is unknown, but some speculate that rye and oats originated as weeds in wheat and barley crops and were later cultivated by farmers. 

The majority of rye crops are sown in the fall and harvested in the spring, nicknaming it “winter rye” since it will grow over the winter months. Rye can grow in areas that are too harsh for other winter crops and can survive low temperatures of -31℉, droughts, and nutrient deficiencies. Rye is more resistant to pests and diseases, with the exception of ergot where it is more susceptible. Since rye can grow where other crops fail, it is used as a pioneer crop to improve soils that are considered wasteland or sterile. Rye can also compete well against other unwanted species, so it is used for crop rotation after a harvest to improve overall soil health. 

The structure of the rye kernel is made up of three parts- the bran, endosperm, and germ. The endosperm composes the majority of the kernel and contains the starch and protein granules used in the brewing and distilling process. Although rye has 𝛃-glucans present which are commonly attributed to gummy mashes, the characteristic high-viscosity of rye is also attributed to the large amounts of arabinoxylans found in the cereal. The arabinoxylans are water-extractable, and will combine with water to create highly viscous solutions. Unlike barley, rye does not have a husk for use in the lautering process and is usually thinner and smaller than other grains. In comparison to barley, rye has higher concentrations of enzymes (primarily 𝛂-amylase) and can be added to grist bills to increase fermentable extract. 

Troubleshooting

Rye malt is known to be problematic in the brewhouse. This is due to its beta-glucan and arabinoxylans content causing the mash to become “gummy” or “sticky” along with its lack of husk for lautering. Here are a few suggestions for managing this grain in the brewhouse… 

1. Extend the germination times to increase enzyme content during the malting process
2. Adding a beta-glucan rest between 100-120℉ in the mash
3. Increasing the liquor-to-grist ratio in the brew
4. Add rice hulls to improve lautering
5. Fine tune your mill gap to compensate for the smaller grain size. The most common mill gap range for commercial brewing lies between 0.35-0.65mm, depending on mill type and size. Brewers may need to adjust to a smaller mill gap than normal to compensate for the smaller rye grains. 
6. Keep the rye content in the grist bill to 20 percent or less, so that there is enough barley husks to help lauter the rye

Producers love rye malt for its pleasant flavor and aroma characteristics that are commonly spicey, nutty, and earthy. It is often described as having a peppery or clove-like sensory character and astringency to the mouthfeel. Rye malt can also add tanginess to the product, which works very well in farmhouse ales like Sahti or wild fermented beverages such as Kvass. Depending on how the rye is malted and the percentage used in the grist, rye can give color ranging between light straw to dark brown. It can also add a fuller body and good head retention to beers. Over the years we’ve enjoyed many a rye IPA and pale ale, Roggenbier, stouts, porters and farmhouse ales— all with made with Riverbend rye malt.

Let’s dive into these beer styles: 

Roggenbier 

Roggenbier originated in Bavaria and was popular during the medieval period until the Reinheitsgebot law declared that rye was to only be used for baking bread due to crop failures. This style consists of a grist bill of greater than 50 percent malted rye. It’s darker in color, has strong grain sensory characteristics, with a full-body mouthfeel and rich flavor. Roggenbier is similar to Dunkelweizen in how it is brewed and fermented, but substitutes the wheat for rye. 

Rye Pale Ale & Rye IPA

Rye is also commonly used in IPA and Pale Ale beer styles. Rye malt is generally used between 5-30 percent of the grain bill to give beers its characteristic spice and peppery flavors. It creates beers that are light straw to dark brown in color, with good foam and full-bodied mouthfeel. Rya can be found in Belgian-style pale ales such as Tripel.

Farmhouse Ales & Table Beers

Rye malt is a common addition to farmhouse ales and traditional table beers. Styles can include rye saison, Sahti (seen below), mixed-culture beers, and raw beers (beers that have not been boiled). Less common styles include Setomaa koduõlu and Karelian-Baltic taari. The use of rye in these beers are variable and often depends on traditions, brewing region, and desired outcome of the beer.

Kvass

Originating from Northern Europe, the name translates to “bread drink”. This beverage is generally made from stale rye bread, rye flour, and rye malt. It is generally considered to be a non-alcoholic, cereal-based beverage due to its low alcohol content of 2 percent v/v or less. Bread is soaked in water then later fermented with a mixed culture of yeast and lactic acid producing bacteria (LAB). There are many commercially available Kvass products with recipes that can include any combination of mint, raisins, juniper berries, and sugar. It is naturally carbonated and is said to have positive nutritional properties and helps digestive health. The end result should be low-alcohol, slightly sour and sweet, low carbonated drink with bready and rye flavor profiles. 

Sahti

This is a traditional farmhouse-style beer found in Finland which includes malted and unmalted rye in the recipe. The beer consists of around 10 percent rye in the grain bill, along with wheat or oats. The style is generally unhopped since it predates the use of hops as a preserving and bittering agent in beer. Traditionally, production was carried out in domestic saunas and wort was made through infusion mashing by adding heated water to the mash. In some cases, the addition of heated stones (similar to steinbier) are added to create kivisaht or “stone sahti”. The wort is generally not boiled and involves juniper branches to filter through. The branches would sit on a filter bed of rye straw in a trough-shaped vessel called a kuurna where wort was filtered then fermented with bakers yeast. The end result is a spiced, 7-8 percent v/v alcohol beer table beer. 

Want to add some spice to your next recipe? Our rye malt products are 25 percent off in celebration of #RyeJanuary! ORDER HERE and mention Rye January.  

Tell us about your (rye) beers #madewithRiverbend here. 

Sources:

Arendt, E.K. and Zannini, E. (2013) Cereal grains for the food and beverage industries. Woodhead Pub. Available at DOI: 10.1533/9780857098924.220

Boulton, C. (2013) Encyclopaedia of brewing. 1st edn. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

Brewers Association (2024) Brewers Association 2024 Beer Style Guidelines. Available at: https://cdn.brewersassociation.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/12144941/2024_BA_Beer_Style_Guidelines.pdf (Accessed: 04Dec2025).

Brzozowski, L.J., Szuleta, E., Phillips, T.D., Van Sanford, D.A. and Clark, A.J. (2023) ‘Breeding cereal rye (Secale cereale) for quality traits’, Crop science, 63(4), pp. 1964–1987. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/csc2.21022.

Cadenas, R., Caballero, I., Nimubona, D. and Blanco, C.A. (2021) ‘Brewing with Starchy Adjuncts: Its Influence on the Sensory and Nutritional Properties of Beer’, Foods, 10(8), p. 1726. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10081726.

Ekberg, J., Gibson, B., Joensuu, J.J., Krogerus, K., Magalhães, F., Mikkelson, A., Seppänen-Laakso, T. and Wilpola, A. (2015) ‘Physicochemical characterization of sahti, an “ancient” beer style indigenous to Finland’, Journal of the Institute of Brewing, 121(4), pp. 464–473. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/jib.246.

Galanakis, C.M. (2020) Trends in non-alcoholic beverages /. 1st ed.

Rani, M., Singh, G., Siddiqi, R.A., Gill, B.S., Sogi, D.S. and Bhat, M.A. (2021) ‘Comparative Quality Evaluation of Physicochemical, Technological, and Protein Profiling of Wheat, Rye, and Barley Cereals’, Frontiers in nutrition (Lausanne), 8, p. 694679. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3389/fnut.2021.694679.

Wood, P.J. (2010) ‘Oat and Rye β-Glucan: Properties and Function’, Cereal chemistry, 87(4), pp. 315–330. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1094/CCHEM-87-4-0315.

Weikert, J. (2022) Craft Beer and Brewing. Available at: https://www.beerandbrewing.com/demystify-rye (Accessed: 03Dec2025). 

Every year, we take time to identify some of our favorite beers we tried and why they stood out to us. In 2025, breweries across the Southeast collaborated on fundraiser beers made with Riverbend malt for causes they cared about. We were inspired to see so many of these initiatives, and delighted to support at brew days and with malt donations. Thank y’all for inviting us to be a part of these awareness and fundraising efforts. 

Beers For Helene Relief

Hurricane relief is still ongoing across Western North Carolina. To do our part, we worked with our friends at Big Pillow Brewing, Whaley Farm Brewery, and Leveller Brewing on beers that raised needed funds for disaster recovery. 

We were happy to donate Czech-Style Pilsner and Double Kilned Munich malts for a collaboration by Big Pillow Brewing and Black Mountain Brewing when Big Pillow was able to re-open after Hurricane Helene with this Czech Amber was pouring on their first night. 

Whaley Farm Brewery was able to re-open with small batch beers on draft in June of this year. We were more than happy to send some malt to help restart their operation and are huge fans of Chris’s American Bitter recipe that was made with Riverbend Southern Select.

Leveller Brewing Co. Pearletta, a Saison made with an array of Riverbend malts including Honey Malt and Munich Rye, was released at a benefit for ReString Appalachia. This thoughtful group raised money to put quality instruments back in the hands of those who lost them in Hurricane Helene.

Beers For Soil Health

Props to our friends at Fullsteam Brewery, who became the world’s first Certified Regenified™ brewery this year! Their investment in soil health and conscious farming practices has been a part of their plow to pint ethos from their start. In 2025, Fullsteam crafted their Reset: ESB and Reset: Oktoberfest with our Certified Regenified Southern Select malt. The Reset series is a line of classic, true-to-style beers brewed with 100% North Carolina malt.

More Beers For Good 

We collaborated with Greenville, South Carolina’s new Wild Yarrow Brewing Co. on Spirit Moves crafted in support of the Michael Jackson Foundation for Brewing and Distilling. It’s a Hazy IPA made with Riverbend Southern Select, Hull & Oats, and Appalachian Wheat rich with notes of peach rings, raspberry, watermelon candy, and mango. 

The second annual Craft Malt Month inspired festbier collaborations with Printshop Beer Co. and Lookout Brewing. Printshop channeled the spirit of traditional German brewing with old-school production techniques! Fermented with the traditional 3470 German lager strain, naturally carbonated to retain more malt flavor, and then lagered to craft a smooth, clean brew, this festbier balances flavor and drinkability.⁠ Lookout’s expression of the season had hop additions that give it a refreshing, tropical twist. Proceeds from both beers were donated to the Craft Maltsters Guild.⁠

Veteran owned breweries from across the Southeast— Wild Heart Brewing, Scuffle Hill Brewing, Over The Horizon Brewing, Forgotten Road Ales, Seminar Brewing, and Surf City Brew Co. — created a Veteran’s Day collaboration double dry hopped hazy called ‘DDH-214’, a play on the term DD-214 that indicates a Veteran has departed from service. ⁠The grist on this collaboration was made with Riverbend Avalon Pilsner, Base Camp, Appalachian Wheat, Hull & Oats, and some Great Chit malt, and all proceeds will be donated to Fisher House Charleston.

What were your standout beers of 2025 that were made with Riverbend malt? Submit them here to be featured.

Each Single Barrel in this release delivers its own distinct flavor profile, showcasing the unique character of the barrel it came from. As a collection, this release generally presents a bold and layered experience:

Nose: Clove, cinnamon, caramel, and a warm, woody cereal.
Taste: Rich honey and toffee intertwined with oak.
Finish: Lingering wood spice and cereal sweetness of frosted flakes and a hint of cinnamon.

Each Single Barrel in this release delivers its own distinct flavor profile, showcasing the unique character of the barrel it came from. As a collection, this release generally presents a bold and layered experience:

Nose: Clove, cinnamon, caramel, and a warm, woody cereal.
Taste: Rich honey and toffee intertwined with oak.
Finish: Lingering wood spice and cereal sweetness of frosted flakes and a hint of cinnamon.

Meet Grain & Glory Coffee

Inspired by some of our favorite specialty malts, the first blend we created with the Coffee Library delivered a creamy, sweet cup with rich notes of bakers chocolate, dark fruit, and just a hint of smoke in the finish. The mouthfeel really shines on this one— it’s full and satisfying without being overpowering. 

Southern Hops Murrells Inlet liked this coffee blend so much that they incorporated the coffee into a seasonal-infused version of their flagship Goldilocks Golden Ale. This beer is brewed exclusively with Riverbend malts: Southern Select for the base malt, with Light Munich and a touch of Great Chit to provide the perfect clean blonde canvas for pumpkin spice, vanilla bean, and Grain & Glory coffee additions. “We see Goldilocks as the “Crust”,if you will, for this delicious fall inspired pumpkin ale, which married perfectly with Coffee Library’s Grain & Glory selection,” says the Southern Hops team. 

What’s Brewing: Mash In Blend

⁠

The initial idea for this blend was to start with something more robust and bold. Cold winter mornings will be here soon enough and I was looking for something with a bit more “campfire” character to get things going. Not necessarily smokey, but like the flavor and body you get from using that old moka pot on your grandpa’s Coleman stove. Walking the line between espresso and drip production methods.

We tasted through six different coffee varietals utilizing the traditional cupping process in the “red” room at Coffee Library in Asheville. This light setting is meant to remove any bias on roast color. As with beer, drinkers think very dark colors (incorrectly) correspond to stronger, bitter flavors. In addition to removing the color assessment component, we found that it helped narrow my focus by softening the other stimuli in the room.

The traditional coffee cupping process involves unfiltered grounds that form a crust on the top of the tasting vessel. This crust is punctured after steeping takes place, allowing the taster to experience the freshest aromas at high concentrations. The Narino roast from Columbia displayed some creamy, sweet notes with a touch of vanilla bean in the finish. A top contender by itself, but ultimately didn’t mesh well with the Cuban base. The Mexican roast profile surprised me with an assertive, oaky finish… which we knew my bourbon aficionados would appreciate. 

After the initial round we experimented with a few different blends of our favorites until we arrived at the perfect mix.⁠ These included a light roast from Guatemala that offered some excellent fruit and milk chocolate notes and some other interesting offerings from Indonesia.

⁠The varietals below complemented each other to create a robust, multi-layered cup of java that will kick start your brew day!⁠ 

Mash in Blend 2025⁠

Cuban – Bakers chocolate, brownie crust, with a touch of pipe tobacco⁠

Mexican – Citrus zest, baking spices, with an oaky finish⁠

Sulawesi – Dark Chocolate, toasted hazelnuts, and molasses ⁠⁠

If you were wondering, Sulawesi is an Indonesian Island located to the west of Papua New Guinea and north of Australia. Read more here. (We had to look it up.)

⁠

Look for bags of this to go out on your next full pallet order. And please, please someone brew a coffee-infused Porter for us (mostly Brent) to enjoy this holiday season. 

Be sure to follow The Coffee Library at @coffeelibraryroastery and use their website coffeelibrary.com to create your own custom blend.

One year ago, Hurricane Helene shook the communities of Western North Carolina with irrevocable damage. At Riverbend, we lost power in our facility and subsequently a great deal of malt product— but we were lucky. Our incredible team stayed safe from the storm, and showed up diligently to help us create a new normal. Once the lights were back on, we were able to donate this unusable malt to farmers for feed and compost. 

Hurricane Helene seemed to fall away from the 24-hour news cycle as quickly as it arrived. We think it’s important to note that for months afterwards, many of our customers worked tirelessly on repairing their facilities, rebuilding their income, and reconnecting with their teams. Everyone in the area felt the impact. To name just a few of the companies that have demonstrated this resilience, we tip our hats to Hillman Beer, who had significant damage at their Old Fort location; to Whaley Farm Brewery, who rebuilt their entire building in time to celebrate three years in business.

Many of our customers and partners— too many to name here without writing the world’s longest blog post— facilitated heroic relief efforts. The River Arts District Brewing Company offered hot meals and supplies to anyone in need for weeks; Oak & Grist Distilling Co. transformed into a potable water station to support their neighbors; Walnut Grove Farms and ASR Grain Company shipped truckload after truckload of supplies to Asheville and nearby areas. Cellarest Beer Project also offered supplies and meals to their neighbors, and now in gratitude for Blue Ridge Public Radio’s coverage and updates in Hurricane Helene’s aftermath will match 100% of station donations in their taproom throughout the month of September to help them recoup losses from federal funding cuts. 

Hurricane Helene Relief Beers 

Also in the wake of Hurricane Helene, we worked with many breweries to provide malt for beers to benefit our community. DSSOLVR’s Higher Calling project and North Carolina Brewers Guild’s Pouring for Neighbors provided the springboard to have those conversations. As the beers made their way to taprooms across the nation, we felt kinship with the broader community. 

Whether our customers crafted these relief beers, or simply just continued purchasing our malt— they made a tremendous difference in our ability to support our team and community over this past year. Again, we don’t have enough room to acknowledge everyone, but we’ll thank a few of them like Sierra Nevada, Lookout Brewing, and Riverside Rhapsody for their continued and consistent purchasing. 

Visit Asheville

Asheville and the greater WNC area are heavily reliant upon tourism, which has seen expected decline since Hurricane Helene. Billy Strings blessed us with a two week residency in February, providing a huge economic boost to the small businesses throughout downtown. The music community also fanned out to support those that had lost their instruments in the flood through the work of Restring Appalachia. These efforts help preserve the old time music that has been passed down for generations throughout the region.

As spring opened up, businesses slowly began to see increased foot traffic and sales. Local leaders arranged for outdoor art markets in the reclaimed spaces throughout the River Arts District and the residences responded. The Explore Asheville group has also been hard at work engaging media far and wide to help us convey the message that we are open for business, and could use your support now more than ever. Big thanks to journalists like Joshua Bernstein and Jenn Rice for lending their influential voices to this narrative. 

Now, the majority of the Blue Ridge Parkway has reopened and craft breweries in Asheville are celebrating Oktoberfest all across town. With a long and vibrant leaf season ahead, predicted to peak late in October, now is the perfect time to plan your trip to the area. If you’re headed this way, please give us a shout. We love malt house visitors!

Looking Ahead

No doubt the weeks ahead will bring tears for those we lost, but also continued hope for the future. Our community has rallied to support one another in so many powerful ways and has made great strides towards a recovery that we now know will take years to achieve. The people of Western NC are no strangers to carrying the weight of rebuilding on their backs. They responded after the Flood of 1916,  and more recently with Hurricane Ivan in 2004. The scars took years to heal, but the rebirth served to strengthen our commitment to the land and our neighbors. 

Hurricane Helene will be no different., We will rise again.

Please take a moment to learn about and support these organizations still working to rebuild WNC.

BeLoved Asheville

Samaritan’s Purse

North Carolina Craft Brewers Guild