frankvw
Well-Known Member
Friends, brewers, barmen, lend me your beers.
Many English and American fullgrain beers contain ingredients such as flaked wheat, flaked maize and flaked barley. Discussions in this forum tell me that these adjuncts have had their starches gelatinized by the flaking process, which involves crushing the grain between rollers under high pressure, which raises the temperature, thus gelatinizing the starches, which makes them water-soluble.
Here in South Africa these flaked grains are difficult to find and expensive when found, having had to be imported from Europe or the US. So I have looked for alternatives.
Posters in these forums tell me that I cannot use pearled barley as a substitute for flaked barley, because the ungelatinized starch is not water-soluble and will just end up in my beer unconverted, with starch haze as the only result.
However, literature tells me that the gelatinization temperature of unmalted barley is well below the conversion temperature of malted barley.
So. Confused as usual, I have the following questions.
1. Is the brief heat generated by rolling the grains (converting them into flaked products) actually sufficient to fully gelatinize the starches? It seems a bit quick to me.
2. Seeing as the gelatinization temperature of unmalted barley is lower than that of malted barley, why doesn't the unmalted barley simply gelatinize during the mash?
3. Shouldn't steeping unmalted barley (e.g. pearl barley) in water at say, 60-62C / 140-142F, be enough to gelatinize it and turn it into a viable alternative for flaked barley?
Your opinion on the above would be appreciated. Tnx!
// FvW
Many English and American fullgrain beers contain ingredients such as flaked wheat, flaked maize and flaked barley. Discussions in this forum tell me that these adjuncts have had their starches gelatinized by the flaking process, which involves crushing the grain between rollers under high pressure, which raises the temperature, thus gelatinizing the starches, which makes them water-soluble.
Here in South Africa these flaked grains are difficult to find and expensive when found, having had to be imported from Europe or the US. So I have looked for alternatives.
Posters in these forums tell me that I cannot use pearled barley as a substitute for flaked barley, because the ungelatinized starch is not water-soluble and will just end up in my beer unconverted, with starch haze as the only result.
However, literature tells me that the gelatinization temperature of unmalted barley is well below the conversion temperature of malted barley.
So. Confused as usual, I have the following questions.
1. Is the brief heat generated by rolling the grains (converting them into flaked products) actually sufficient to fully gelatinize the starches? It seems a bit quick to me.
2. Seeing as the gelatinization temperature of unmalted barley is lower than that of malted barley, why doesn't the unmalted barley simply gelatinize during the mash?
3. Shouldn't steeping unmalted barley (e.g. pearl barley) in water at say, 60-62C / 140-142F, be enough to gelatinize it and turn it into a viable alternative for flaked barley?
Your opinion on the above would be appreciated. Tnx!
// FvW