EcuBrew

Recipes 

Potato beer # 2

Date: 27/04/94

11kg small potatoes (culls), pressure cooked

12kg Pale Malt Cosyns

2kg Wheat (probably soft, white)

Mash water: ~35L. Thin mash.

19:30: After adding grain: mash temp: 58C

Put steamed potatoes through foodmill and dropped them straight from the food mill in the mash. Temp: 63C @20:30hrs
20:40: 72C starch almost completely converted!!!
21:20: 68C
21:40: 77C

Started lautering:22:10 until ~00:15. False bottom, fly-sparged with rotating arm.

22:45: stuck mash, had to cut the grain bed several times. This was different from previous potato beer, had no problems then. This time there was even a higher % of grains in the bill...

First wort: ~45-50L and SG: 1042 before boiling.
60 grams of hops and 50 grams of coriander added at the beginning of the boil.
Boiled for 60 mins
SG after boiling: 1050 and ~ 35-40L

Second wort: 65-70L before boiling SG: 1023
60 grams of hops and 70 grams of coriander (probably from beginning of boil).
Boiled for 60 mins
SG after boiling: 1031 and ~ 60-65L

Fermentation almost completed within 24hrs after pitching

Lcasanova

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Those recipes are nice and detailed and everything, but what good will they do for a gluten free brewer?

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Lucky 13 Brewing Company
Est. 2009

DKershner

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Well, just because there is barley and wheat in the beers doesn't mean there isn't anything to learn.

My concern stems from the fact that it doesn't look like the potato is adding much in terms of sugars. You didn't post your batch volumes, but I am going to assume it is around 10gal for the first partigyle. In this case, the potatoes seem to add almost nothing, which does not make them a good candidate for a GF base, but could potentially be utilized in other ways, building up body for example. Of course, this all goes out the window if he is making 15gal with a 2nd smaller partigyle.

Also, the fact that they had to be mashed with barley makes it a bit tougher as well.

It is an interesting idea Ecu, and I know potatoes do have sugar in there, but I would just wonder how this could be applied to GF beer.

It would be interesting nonetheless to try and make something from potatoes, I know they have been used in wine with success.

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KevinM

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A few weeks ago I was reading this article http://brewery.org/library/Potato.html regarding a potato based brew. It was from 1987, so it was still using the malted barley enzyme in the mash. Reportedly, it gives more of a taste and aroma difference, but there was nothing about the body. I've been curious about how other vegetative items would work as well, but I'm still in the early stages of finding recipes for standard that I like before testing potato, sweet potato, or carrot. (Seems that there was a carrot beer thread on the hbt forum as well)

EcuBrew

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I knew the gluten-free question would come, that's a good sign: you're all awake (lol).

I brewed these beers in 1992 and 1994, earlier in my brewing career. My equipment wasn't as good as it is today (still open for improvement). Until this day I haven't worried about gluten in beer, although I can't eat wheat and spelt anymore. I am eating barley, oats and millet instead (mainly in the cooler season, I switched from vegetarian to nearly 100% raw diet last spring). The (unhulled) barley is extremely enzymatic.

I am not concerned with efficiency that much: I make my own organic malt from barley that I buy directly from a local farmer. I also use very little hops (probably none in the future), so cost is minimal.
All you need to do is substitute the barley malt for a gluten free malt. I would experiment with 100% of that alternative malt first before adding anything else. As you can see I had no problems lautering the first batch, but the second batch got stuck several times and I had to cut the grainbed, although there was a higher percentage of grains. I don't know if I lautered in a pot with a smaller diameter, which would have meant that the grainbed would have been thicker. It was also April, so the potatoes were getting older and that causes some changes.
I recommend the small potatoes: if you are lucky you can get them for free or cheap and they add more flavour than those that are very big and that cost you money. Growing them yourself is best of course. The variety makes a difference as well.

Are some of you guys completely allergic to gluten, or you just have some problems digesting them, like me? When I eat too many gluten or the wrong combination with gluten containing foods I get a heartburn (find that a strange name, because it comes from my stomach) .

BTW: I have added buckwheat to my mash before as well.

DKershner

Recipes 

The fact that barley is extremely enzymatic is why beer is made with it, and why you can stick damn near anything in a barley-based beer. This is also why we cannot just sub in a different grain, because the enzymes are not there. You can read a bit more about it around this forum, LOTS of info.

Most people here are, or are brewing for people with celiac disease, which functions somewhat similarly to an allergy, but is more serious, and the food that causes it is gluten, not wheat.

Anyway, your experiments with potatoes are interesting, but potatoes have a lot of starches and few sugars. Without enzymes to break it down, your beer would be a starchy mess. I think a different fruit or veggie with more sugars is more in line with gluten free brewing unless someone has an enzyme idea.

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EcuBrew

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A quote from the above article:
Charlie Papazian writes in "The Complete Joy of Home Brewing" that 'Fermentables produced from potato starch do not contribute significantly to the character or flavor of beer, other than providing fermentables to be converted to alcohol.' He further writes that '[the] use [of potatoes as an adjunct] is discouraged by beer drinkers justifiably or unjustifiably against "potato beer".'
I don't know how to interpret that, although it looks more like Papazian was talking about potato starch, which could mean the powder version, not the potato itself. The fact that the author (Cary Jensen) added his own text in brackets seems to confirm that.

I challenge the above, because my potato beers where neither lacking in flavour nor in body. And they were not high gravity, the second wort batches in fact very low gravity.

Ever tried to add cane sugar or honey when refermenting in the bottle? Those minimal 5g/L (adding only about 0.25% alc. to the beer) make a significant difference in flavour compared to the addition of white sugar.
If it was powder potato starch in the above article, then I would have been surprised if it would have added anything but more starch > sugar >alcohol to the beer.

Upon further reading the article, I found this:

"One or two caveats are in order here. First, contrary to Charlie Papazian's description, beer made from potatoes does have a unique character. Although this may derive from the fact that I do not peel the little spuds before I shred them, I seriously doubt it. After having made 3 batches of the stuff over a several year period, I have come to notice a distinctly 'potato' aroma and taste. I'm not implying that this sensation is unpleasant, just that it exists."

There you have it, I think I may suspect that not everybody read that far or overlooked that part of the article.

As those poor potatoes cannot defend themselves verbally, I felt called to do it for them...they are suggesting to try a good variety such as Yukon Gold.
I'm only the messenger, don't shoot me!

EcuBrew

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DKershner,
thanks for your insights.
Have you ever found a table with the enzymatic values for different grains and other adjuncts?
It would be worth looking for.

DKershner

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We do not know the enzymatic values for grains, but I do have a table explaining why it doesn't matter. It is in the first post of this thread, here is a link: http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f164/gluten-free-beer-ingredient-list-172558/#post1997163

If you click on the 'gelatinization' table at the bottom, you will see what temperatures each grain mashes best at. You will also notice all the GF grains have little asterisks next to them. This stands for grains that need to be boiled pre mash to be mashed. The boiling process kills or denatures all enzymes on the grain.

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EcuBrew

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I found a bit of info in my old malt and brew bible:
Green (=not dried malt) from maize seems to have about 50% of the enzymatic power of regular barley malt.
White Persian Dari (= sorghum) is almost as enzymatic as regular barley malt.

Hope this helps you guys.