The U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) has added 24 ingredients to its list of those exempt from formula-reporting requirements for beer and other malt beverages.
The TTB issued the updated list of exemptions on December 5. It expands on a 2015 list that the TTB published with input from the Brewers Association, replacing one the agency had issued the previous year.
Broadly, an exemption does not include any essential oil, extract, or syrup made from that particular ingredient. However, in the case of fruits and vegetables, it does include concentrate, juice, and puree forms, as well as whole.
The ingredients marked as new are almonds, bananas, beets, cantaloupe, carrots, cucumbers, dandelion greens, dill, dragon fruit, elderberries, guava, hazelnuts, lavender, lychee, papaya, peanuts, pecans, pistachios, prickly pear, rhubarb, rose hip, spruce (needles, tips, or twigs), tea leaves, and walnuts.
The Alcohol Administration Act requires a certificate of label approval, or COLA—administered by the TTB—for beer and other malt beverages packaged and sold in the United States. To get approval, breweries must file formulas for any ingredients not recognized as traditional to the brewing process. The expansion of exemptions represents the government’s recognition that modern brewers are safely using a wider range of ingredients than they have in the past, streamlining the approval process for brewing businesses.
For the complete list of exemptions, and more specifics on each ingredient, see TTB Ruling 2015-1, Attachment 1.