pale ale malt substitute

Hi,

I'm just starting to research how to homebrew beer, so I apologize if this question sounds too obvious.

As I understand, malt plays a very important role on the final product. Most of the recipes available asks for 2-row pale malt, which is the most common (at least on north america and europe). However, down here (in Brazil) pale malt is a bit rare, maybe because the mega brewers just sell pilsner beer.

I'm trying to discover if there is a good substitute for pale malt as the base malt, which wont negatively impact the taste and aroma. The most common malt here is pilsner malt from Cargil, and another pilsner malt from a local maltser. There are also the munich and vienna malts from Weyermann, and some special malts like Cristal, Carared, Carahell, etc.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance, and I hope my english doesn't sound too terrible (I'm not a native speaker)

You're English is great! I didn't notice any problems, but I am a bit druck, so with that disclaimer:

Pilsner malt is going to be lighter and less malty. It is still a fine base malt. You can try to compensate by using a half pound of Vienna (or something like Victory/Biscuit if available) for more malty flavor. One thing about pilsner is that a longer boil, about 90 minutes, is recommended to drive off DMS.

It mostly depends on what you're making. If you need a bit of toasted character be sure to use some specialty malts to give you that, because you won't get it from the pilsner.

Also, pale malt and pale ale malt are not the same. I noticed you used both in your post. Pale Ale is usually a British variety that is more plump and kilned at a higher temperature. It has a more toasted, cracker-like taste than plain pale malt.

What are you planning on making? I'm sure we can help you get that profile you're looking for (well maybe not this noob, but others I'm sure!).

I'm sure your English is better that my intoxicated mumbling....

Your English is better than my Portuguese.

The Vienna malt will be slightly too dark to produce a true pilsner; the Munch, much too dark. You could still use the Vienna malt to produce some excellent lager, but it would be darker and more flavorful than a pilsner.

I would suggest that you start out by brewing with a high quality unhopped malt extract, unless there are legal restrictions or tariffs on it, because you will still get a high quality brew, with less work, and without the problems inherent in handling a large amount of grain.

Also, though it is unrelated to your question, you might want to consider starting with an ale unless you have an easy means of maintaining temperature control during fermentation.

Having-A-Homebrew said:

The Vienna malt will be slightly too dark to produce a true pilsner; the Munch, much too dark. You could still use the Vienna malt to produce some excellent lager, but it would be darker and more flavorful than a pilsner...
Also, though it is unrelated to your question, you might want to consider starting with an ale unless you have an easy means of maintaining temperature control during fermentation.

Click to expand...

He didn't really say he was going for a pilsner, or lager in general for that matter.

Thank you for the replies

hammacks is right on his observation, I'm not looking into lagers at all, at least not for a while as I'm not able to do temperature control yet.

I wasn't aware of this difference between pale malt and pale ale malt, I thought they were the same.

What I'm looking for is a way to get the closest possible to the pale ale style (american or english, both are good), something like Sierra Nevada Pale Ale or Old Speckeld Hen is the target. I've heard that the american pale ales are related to the cascade hops, which I can't find here also. I'm thinking about using columbus instead.

I see. I would think that the Vienna malt would be workable even if not ideal. The advice to start by using extract still applies however.

Having-A-Homebrew said:

I see. I would think that the Vienna malt would be workable even if not ideal. The advice to start by using extract still applies however.

Click to expand...

I see, sadly malt extracts are very rare here. I've heard about only one guy importing muntons extracts. The brazillian homebrewing community is too small for this kind of business I guess

Grains are easier to get directly from the producers.

Thanks for the advice

Check out Biermuncher's Centennial Blonde. It would still be pretty good with pilsner malt. Do a 90 minute boil. Let us know what other light specialty malts you have available.

You could try .75 lbs of vienna instead of .5

Using all columbus hops would be ok too.

If you want something a little closer to SN, I propose:

Brazilian Pale Ale
7.50 lb Pilsner
0.50 lb Carapils/Dextrine (If you can't get it just add .5 lb to the pilsner)
0.75 lb Munich 10L
0.50 lb Crystal 60L (40L is OK)

0.50 oz Columbus (60 min)
0.25 oz Columbus (20 min)
0.25 oz Columbus (5 min)

Yeast: S-05 or WLP 001 or Wyeast 1056

OG: 1.049
IBU: 39.2

The Munich here may make up for what the Pilsner lacks. Post if you have more questions.

EDIT: One last thing, do you have Simcoe and Amarillo hops available? Those make a great combination in a pale ale. You could replace the above hop schedule with:
0.60 oz Simcoe (60 min)
1.25 oz Amarillo (15 min)
0.50 oz Amarillo (5 min)

And you could dry hop (optional of course) with
0.25 oz Amarillo
0.25 oz Simcoe

hammacks said:

Check out Biermuncher's Centennial Blonde. It would still be pretty good with pilsner malt. Do a 90 minute boil. Let us know what other light specialty malts you have available.

You could try .75 lbs of vienna instead of .5

Using all columbus hops would be ok too.

If you want something a little closer to SN, I propose:

Brazilian Pale Ale
7.50 lb Pilsner
0.50 lb Carapils/Dextrine (If you can't get it just add .5 lb to the pilsner)
0.75 lb Munich 10L
0.50 lb Crystal 60L (40L is OK)

0.50 oz Columbus (60 min)
0.25 oz Columbus (20 min)
0.25 oz Columbus (5 min)

Yeast: S-05 or WLP 001 or Wyeast 1056

OG: 1.049
IBU: 39.2

The Munich here may make up for what the Pilsner lacks. Post if you have more questions.

EDIT: One last thing, do you have Simcoe and Amarillo hops available? Those make a great combination in a pale ale. You could replace the above hop schedule with:
0.60 oz Simcoe (60 min)
1.25 oz Amarillo (15 min)
0.50 oz Amarillo (5 min)

And you could dry hop (optional of course) with
0.25 oz Amarillo
0.25 oz Simcoe

Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestions Hammacks. The local maltser advertises the following as "specialty" malts: Vienna, Munich, Organic Pilsner, Melanoidin, Acidulated (ph 3,4-3,6), Smoked, Wheat malt, Wheat malt dark, Carawheat, Organic wheat malt, Rye malt, Roasted wheat malt, Roasted spel malt, Carafa type III, Carafa special type I, Carafa special type III, Carahell, Carared, Caramünch type I, Caramünch type II, Caraaroma, Caraamber, Carapils.

It seems that Caraamber may be the crystal malt 60L. Sadly I can't find Amarillo and Simcoe here, this are the hops available (all in pellets form): Nugget, Hallertau Magnum, Columbus, Northen Brewer, Cluster, Galena, Premiant, MT Hood, Tettnang Tettnager, Hallertau Mittelfrüh, Hallertau Spalt Select, Hallertau Tradition, Saaz, Sladek, Fuggle, Styrian Goldnig, Hallertau Perle.

I think I'll go with the US-05 dry yeast (there's no liquid yeast available).

It will take sometime until I order and receive the ingredients, but I'll be glad to report back as soon as I make this one

Again thanks a lot for the info.

hammacks said:

0.50 lb Crystal 60L (40L is OK)

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Would it be OK to use caraaroma as a substitute for crystal 60L? I've read somewhere that it is like crystal 120L, so I thought that maybe if I use just 0.25 lb it would do the trick. However, I'm not acquainted with all these malt varieties, I'm afraid that caraaroma may impart a different flavor, not bad, just different...

oh well, sometimes I feel like I'm worrying too much about details

A 120L crystal malt is way WAAAYYY different than a 60L crystal malt, so no, you can't simply sub half as much, you won't get the same character.

Instead of 60L if you can't get 60L I would recommend using caramunich which is around 40L. It'll be a little bit lighter but it will come out much closer than if you tried to use something 120L.

Does the maltster publish lovibond ratings for their cara* malts? (as I understand it, these are basically just the Belgian versions of what in England or the US would be called crystal malts).

I think you could use pretty much any recipe that calls for pale malt and substitute Pilsner malt. That will give you a somewhat lighter, less malty result, so you might want to swap somewhere between half and one pound of the Pilsner for Vienna to compensate, or include a little more crystal.

Shawn Hargreaves said:

Does the maltster publish lovibond ratings for their cara* malts? (as I understand it, these are basically just the Belgian versions of what in England or the US would be called crystal malts).

I think you could use pretty much any recipe that calls for pale malt and substitute Pilsner malt. That will give you a somewhat lighter, less malty result, so you might want to swap somewhere between half and one pound of the Pilsner for Vienna to compensate, or include a little more crystal.

Click to expand...

Well, Weyermann does publish some info on their cara* malts. I think the better substitute would be the caramunich III, but I can't find this here. I have to choose between a lighter caramel malt (20~30L) or a darker (120L), there's no in between