Does gluten free beer wort it?

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TLProulx

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Hello,

so I was at my local homebrew store for buying grains for a 2.0 Black IPA (BYO recipe) and they didn't had dried rice extract. They sold me liquid rice extract.
After brewing, I had some extract left. They told me that it is used by gluten-free brewer. So that leave me wondering what does gluten free beer taste like vs standard beer.

Is it wort it to make a gluten free beer (only for "fun") or it isn't as good as ordinary beer so I shouldn't trouble myself?

Thanks,
 
Some gluten-free beers taste like dirt, and not as a euphemism, they taste earthy, which is not necessarily bad. Others are a nice balance between the earthy sorghum and the slightly malty brown rice extract and are delicious.

There is a thread on here for a gluten free light lager using sorghum, rice extract, and honey and it is just amazing.

Give it a shot, you might like it. It is not worth trying to compare the taste of a grain based beer to a gluten free beer. While some characteristics are comparable, it is really a different animal. It is probably unfair to the gluten-free beer to compare it to a grain-based beer.
 
Just a slight correction, you keep saying "grain based beer" in reference to barley/wheat/rye beer, inferring that there are no grains in gf beer. Gluten free beer is grain based, just not barley/wheat/rye.
 
BrewCanuck said:
Just a slight correction, you keep saying "grain based beer" in reference to barley/wheat/rye beer, inferring that there are no grains in gf beer. Gluten free beer is grain based, just not barley/wheat/rye.
Click to expand...

Indeed sir, thanks for pointing that out.
 
ColoHox said:
Some gluten-free beers taste like dirt, and not as a euphemism, they taste earthy, which is not necessarily bad. Others are a nice balance between the earthy sorghum and the slightly malty brown rice extract and are delicious.

There is a thread on here for a gluten free light lager using sorghum, rice extract, and honey and it is just amazing.

Give it a shot, you might like it. It is not worth trying to compare the taste of a grain based beer to a gluten free beer. While some characteristics are comparable, it is really a different animal. It is probably unfair to the gluten-free beer to compare it to a grain-based beer.
Click to expand...

I guest you are talking about this recipe:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f164/gluten-free-light-lager-328901/

the only problem is i'm not equipped for lager ... maybe I could try a "steam lager" version or ferment @ 13-15°C

But most of recipe I saw are lager, hefe or light beer ... dark GF are to earthy?
 
TLProulx said:
I guest you are talking about this recipe:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f164/gluten-free-light-lager-328901/

the only problem is i'm not equipped for lager ... maybe I could try a "steam lager" version or ferment @ 13-15°C

But most of recipe I saw are lager, hefe or light beer ... dark GF are to earthy?
Click to expand...

Thats the one! The color and character of the gluten free extract means it is best suited for those styles. There is a way to darken the beer (a GF option that I can't recall atm), but you miss out on the roasted-type flavor you get from using dark grains. I think a GF brown ale would be delicious, and I have tried a commercial example, but I don't recall their recipe.
 
You can roast a lot of gluten-free grains to get color and roasted flavor; the darker the roast, the better (usually). Millet, buckwheat, rice, milo, quinoa...they can all work wonderfully. You can also use candi syrup to very good effect to make dark beers. Roasting things like bananas and sweet-potatoes can also be very nice, and you can also caramelize/burn honey to get some nice roasty flavor. Often the effect is more convincing than doing a light GF beer, at least in my experience.
 

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