GF bread beer?

I'm fairly new to brewing and also new to the gluten free way of life. I just brewed up my first GF and also first experimental beer today. It got me thinking about my next brew and I was wondering if there was a way to make a GF beer that tasted like bread? I was reading threw the forum and I found a post of someone looking to make a bread beer but it wasn't GF. I'm thinking it probably wont be possible but I'm still hoping.

T

Nonsense, it's totally possible! You just need to choose your grains, hops, and yeast appropriately. I've gotten some quite "bready" notes out of S-33. I'd say you'd want lots of medium-roasted oats, millet, and corn, and go real light on the hops; shoot for medium gravity, maybe about 1.045 so that there's not too much residual sweetness.

Yeah, just get some residual yeastiness and get plenty of grainy flavor. Doesn't sound all that hard, though I expect it might take a few tries. Honestly probly easier than making GF bread, because beer doesn't need to stick together while you spread jelly on it!

Well good to know its possible. Should I start with a sorghum base and steep the grains? Igliashon you said light on the hops, any thoughts on type and how much? Also I was envisioning a hefeweizen look, could I get that from just not transferring to secondary?

Thanks for all the help so far I'm getting excited about trying this out.

I would start with a rice syrup base, not a sorghum one. Steeping the grains is fine, just make sure to use at least 1 lb of grain per gallon of water in the finished brew. For hops, I'd say something British, maybe Goldings or Challenger, early addition only, enough to hit about 25 IBUs. To get a cloudy appearance...just give your bottles a few gentle swirls as you pour!

I've always found if I just pour the entire beer bottle out into my glass (instead of leaving about 1/4inch in the bottom) the entire beer tastes like yeast. You could do that and then you'd have bread beer?

What about something like Oregon? I was reading a post that someone steeped it in there beer and it came out great. The only thing I'm worried about is the flavors not coming out the same as in cooking. I'm new so I don't really know whats going to turn out well in the final product. What about garlic powder?

??? Someone steeped the state of Oregon in their beer??? I presume you meant "oregano" and got auto-corrected. Well, I've brewed with plenty of herbs, and I'd say if this is your first GF beer, don't go too crazy. Oregano never struck me as a good idea. And garlic powder??? Noooooooo...forget it! Terrible terrible terrible idea. If you're hell-bent on throwing some herbs in it to make it taste like foccacia or something, a wee bit of sage, rosemary, and/or basil in secondary would be the ticket. But please, take it from someone whose first three GF beers were gruits: there's something to be said for playing it safe. I ended up with two undrinkable batches and one that only reached drinkability after many many months. To this day I've tried many times to brew with herbs, and the only ones that have yielded good beer are wormwood, juniper, yarrow, sarsaparilla, coriander, and chamomile. I'm optimistic about rosemary and sage, I just haven't given them a second try yet. But herbs just add in another variable that can screw up your beer, on top of variables like yeast health, ambient temperature, hop choice, and brewhouse efficiency. And to date, I've never had an herbbed beer that I thought would have been terrible without the herbs.

Yep damn that auto correct! Ok thats kinda what I was thinking about the herbs. Maybe if the first batch of this stuff comes out good but yet lacking some flavor i'll add rosemary. Another Idea maybe this is crazy too but what about cooking the grains on the charcoal grill to get a rustic smoky taste to them. My grilling skills are good, I think I can keep the temp constant and low enough so they don't burn.

Thanks for all the help

I'd say it's definitely worth experimenting with smoked herbs at some point, I really want to do a smoked sage and habanero beer some day, but it seems like it would be REALLY easy to mess up. I wouldn't do it with this batch, I'd wait until you get a real feel for what you can do flavor-wise with just hops, malt, and yeast, and that way you can use the herbs to accentuate flavors rather than going crazy with them. I'd think smoked herbs could go well in a big malty "millet wine" on top of a truckload of noble or British hops, but I think I'm a few years away from actually giving that a go.