Rubber in Briess malt

I was helping a buddy brew last night, and as we were pouring in the malt (briess pilsner, 3.3 pounds) and a wierd clumpy thing poured out. We thought it was just a funny clump of the malt and ignored it. After pouring the wort in the fermenter there was a two inch long half inch wide piece of rubber in the bottom of the pot. 1st, has anyone else had this issue with briess malt. 2nd, what sort of icky chemicals do you think we leached into the wort and 3rd, would you drink it???

that's lame...hows it taste?

Taste it, if it's gross... pitch it.

Depends on the rubber honestly, if it can handle the temps then you might be fine.

Did it melt onto the pot? If so... I'd be wary.

Ew. I found a bolt in a piece of carrot cake once. Gotta love when pieces of manufacturing equipment end up in your food.

I wouldn't worry about it. It sounds like a belt or something from the malting line. They run the same belts when they malt at high temps so drink the beer

I would contact Breiss. They will likely compensate you for your batch.

If you still have the piece of rubber, the company will probably want to see it or at least a picture of it. I do quality assurance for a restaurant chain and it's procedure to get the foreign material to the manufacturer so they can find out what went wrong.

It is not uncommon for foreign material to get into food items since most companies are making thousands of pounds per day. They are always looking for ways to improve their procedures as well as insuring such things don't happen.

+1 I was going to suggest emailing them a picture, but he beat me to it. Help make something you already buy better- and probably get a free kit out of it. Win-win all around!