Dealing with spent grain

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Picobrew

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Up until recently, I had a nice way to deal with my spent grain. I would dump it into a homer bucket and give it to my sister, who would kindly take it off my hands and compost it. Now, her compost is full and she can't take any more, and I'm in a bit of a pickle.

For the last two brews, I have been dumping the grain into a giant heavy contractor garbage bag, tying it up, and locking that sweet stuff away for a million years in a plastic tomb. This does not seem right.

There are a few problems here:
1. This is a total waste of the grain
2. This is a waste of a giant plastic bag
3. This makes my garbage can bloody heavy
4. If this ever leaks, it is going to stink to high heaven.

Is there a better way?? I know Widmer has someone pickup all their grain and it gets turned into livestock feed, but I doubt those trucks will want to pull up to my spot. I have also heard some people say they put their grain in the yard debris container? This sounds fine to me but I don't want to do it until I know its ok. Any other tips? I can't make 500 loaves of spent grain bread every week. It has got me wondering what all the small microbreweries and the tons of local homebrewers do.
 
If you want to be all ecofriendly and whatnot if you have woods by your place or a forest preserve just dump it there for any woodland creature to feast on.
 
I throw it in the wife's garden although like you said not an option. I can't see why you could not put it in the yard debris thing. Do any of your neighbors have a garden or compost?
 
I can't imagine it being a problem in the yard debris container, but I would figure out some way to at least partially dry it first. If that thing gets too heavy they'll refuse to pick it up, I know from experience.

Cellardoor, in Oregon you would get strung up for dumping any kind of refuse in a forest or greenspace, regardless of how eco-friendly it might be.
 
You will continue to put only yard debris in the green cart, including weeds, leaves, vines, grass clippings, tree trimmings, fruit and vegetables from your garden, or pumpkins.

Spent grain is sort-of like grass clippings. Maybe you should give Trashco a call.
 
In the winter time I just dump the grain into the garden and mix it with used coffee grinds, that's the easiest (and most earth-friendly) way. Now, in the summer time, when the garden is full of tomatoes, basil, jalapenos and cilantro, I have to bury it in the backyard. Sometimes I wonder what my neighbours are thinking when they see me digging another hole in the ground late at night... :eek:
 
You could try putting an ad on craigslist for anyone to come pick it up. Someone else might want to compost it or feed it to their chickens or other livestock.
 
I have been using mine recently in all my beds, it makes a nice mulch, and smells good when you water.
 
I just dump it in the backyard with the raspberry & blueberry plants. A few weeks later it is gone.
 
Ok some good suggestions here but not quite applicable for me - I live in the middle of the city, no gardens. I don't even have a yard debris thing at my condos, but maybe I can use those brown bags? Don't really have a way to dry the stuff either. I am producing too much grain (10-30lbs/wk) to be posting on craigslist everytime. With all the brewers in portland, perhaps we should be pooling our spent grain at a local recycler and they could guide it to a better end.
 
Ok some good suggestions here but not quite applicable for me - I live in the middle of the city, no gardens. I don't even have a yard debris thing at my condos, but maybe I can use those brown bags? Don't really have a way to dry the stuff either. I am producing too much grain (10-30lbs/wk) to be posting on craigslist everytime. With all the brewers in portland, perhaps we should be pooling our spent grain at a local recycler and they could guide it to a better end.

Holy cats you brew a lot. I'm a bit jealous. Got no clue what to do with your grains. When Iw as an extract brewer, I could make bread with all of it, but now that I'm AG (and a renter), I throw it out, too, and wish I had a better option. Luckily the trash gets picked up on Fridays and I brew on the weekend, so that heavy-ass bag is at the bottom of the can, making sure it doesn't tip over.
 
You could find a local brewery (I don't know where in NW you are) that already gets rid of its spent grains and see if they'll take 'em. They probably get paid for it as is, and shouldn't be opposed to a little more.
 
Here on Long Island our local Township runs a compost facility that will accept organic matter. They compost it and make the compost free for all residents. I routinely drop off my grains and grass clipping off at the facility. The compost is really nice. You can't purchase compost this nice.
 
You could get worms....
It sounds like you brew a ton. Why not grow your own hops in containers? You can get a cheap plastic rubbermade and poke some holes in it and use the grain for worm composting and BAM you have your own hops, solve the grain problem and get to see the look on people's faces when you tell them you have worms.

And what about community gardens? we have one here around the corner that has an open compost heap. Maybe see if there's one close by and maybe you can get some produce from somebody out of it.
 
I have been using mine recently in all my beds, it makes a nice mulch, and smells good when you water.

That's what I do - awesome option for those with a garden.

Ok some good suggestions here but not quite applicable for me - I live in the middle of the city, no gardens. I don't even have a yard debris thing at my condos, but maybe I can use those brown bags? Don't really have a way to dry the stuff either. I am producing too much grain (10-30lbs/wk) to be posting on craigslist everytime. With all the brewers in portland, perhaps we should be pooling our spent grain at a local recycler and they could guide it to a better end.

Post a CL ad stating that you'll have grain once a week and how much - you almost certainly have a nearby gardner who'd love a source of awesome composting material.

You could get worms....
Seriously - awesome idea. You'll need to build the worms up to the volume you produce, but worms LOVE spent grain. You'd have NO problem SELLING the finished worm compost for a pretty penny.
 
How long will the grains stink? As a newb AG brewer I had no way to get rid of them so i tossed them in the flower bed and raked them smooth, it stinks to high heaven, you can be on the other side of my house and it still stinks. I think I'm going to have to bury them tomorrow or something.
 
I was wondering if the grains can be dried by putting them in a pan in the oven, though I don't know how long that would have to go for...
 
Portland's known for it's great curbside compost program. If you live in a condo or apt and don't have a city supplied rolltainer maybe you could talk a neighbor into letting you use theirs. Otherwise I'd put in a call to the city's solid waste division and ask where their commercial compost goes and if you can take it there yourself.
 
You could try putting an ad on craigslist for anyone to come pick it up. Someone else might want to compost it or feed it to their chickens or other livestock.

I've tried twice to put spent grain on craigslist and i only get emails back saying to effect, "screw the grain, how about the beer?" I don't do that anymore.
 
How long will the grains stink? As a newb AG brewer I had no way to get rid of them so i tossed them in the flower bed and raked them smooth, it stinks to high heaven, you can be on the other side of my house and it still stinks. I think I'm going to have to bury them tomorrow or something.

The birds having been feasting on 20lb of grain in my backyard. If they could talk they be saying thanks man! They dried out pretty quick and I don't smell anything bad at all.
 
How long will the grains stink? As a newb AG brewer I had no way to get rid of them so i tossed them in the flower bed and raked them smooth, it stinks to high heaven, you can be on the other side of my house and it still stinks. I think I'm going to have to bury them tomorrow or something.

Water the bed pretty well and it will rinse everything out of the grain, there's bacteria feasting on the left over sugar. Mine never smells too bad though, and I kinda like the sweetish smell I get when I water.
 
I finally have a solution to this problem! The nearest local brewery (5 blocks!) said I can dump my grains in their compost bins. They get sent to a pig farm. This is great and super easy. I just fill up a 5gal bucket, take it over there and I'm done.
 
Could you use a ton of left-over grain and make more beer with it? It might not be any good to you, but you could push it off on people or sell it cheap to your friends.
 
I used to dump mine in my garden until one day I saw my dag eating the dirt. He likes grain. Nice and sweet.

Horses and rodents can not digest the grain. Pigs LOVE it.

Most brewery's sell their spent grain to pig farms!
 
I used to dump mine in my garden until one day I saw my dag eating the dirt. He likes grain. Nice and sweet.

Horses and rodents can not digest the grain. Pigs LOVE it.

Most brewery's sell their spent grain to pig farms!

I feed spent grain to my horses. They love it. In fact, they have figured out when they smell the wort boiling, they start hanging around.
 
Their worry is that while barly is good, cooked crushed barly can be very bad

It should never be crushed to finely and when cooked, it's generally best to do so without crushing or rolling.

The result can be a gluggy mass of food that runs the risk of packing down in a horse's stomach and triggering a colic attack. Like many grains, it simply does not have the bulk that a forage diet provides - and that is bulk critical to the normal function of a horse's digestive tract.
 
personally i'm a big fan of just tossing the grain in the trash and letting the trash man take it away. it cant be any worse than whats already in there. but i do like globeboxxr's idea of making dog snacks out of it.
 
Portland Compost roll carts, they just show up and take it away for free. I just have to carry it all the way to the curb in the rare case that I brew too much and the neighbors chickens cannot eat it all.
 
Just eat it. If you're brewing that much, you must be piss drunk most of the time, and it'll taste fine. :cross:
 

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