Corn beer

[mikerada6]

As a simple proof of concept my friend and I attempted to make a mostly corn beer. The idea of this beer was to use simple cheap ingredients to get the OG has high as possible and try to produce a beer with maximum ABV (BeerSmith said we could get upwards of 20%). We were not trying to create a good tasting beer but rather simply test our skills. The recipe we decided is as follows for what was supposed to be a 1 gallon batch.

7 lbs of flaked corn
.5 lbs honey malt

Mash at 153 fro 75 minutes in 10.6 qts of water.

This is where we ran into trouble. We attempted to try to brew it as a BIAB method. As there was a large amount of grain for only a small amount of water we decided to split the grain into two bags. At about 45 minutes we noticed that the water was not really getting any change in color and when taking a refractometer reading we measured 0 brix. Also both bags seemed to become has hard as rocks. In hopes of saving the experiment we decided to empty the the bags in hopes of doing a more traditional mash. It is at this point we went from bad to worse. It seems that very little of the water had been absorbed very little water and when all the grain was released it made up for lost time. We want from having something that looked like wort to home-style grits in no time. The mash was so think it was unusable. It was this time that we decided to call it a failed experiment and went and poured ourselves one of our successful homebrews and called it a day.

Sorry for the long post but i was wondering if anyone had any ideas of what we could have done differently to avoid having to scrap the whole thing.


Luckily the yeast was never pitched so now i have a wyeast saison 3711 and WLP099 Super High Gravity Ale Yeast to play around with

 

[jro238]

Phone freaked out and double posted...sorry

 

[jro238]

1) corn needs to be mashed with enough base malt as it does not possess the required diastatic power.
2) use more water then do a longer boil to compensate.

 

[SudsyPaul]

What jro said... if you wanna give it a go, try 50/50 with Pilsen and do a solid 90-120min boil. A longer boil will also, potentially, create more complex flavors by caramelizing a bit of the wort. No idea if this would work with corn flakes, though - but can't think of a reason why it wouldn't.

Not sure whether or not a strong corn-beer would have enough proteins and whatnot to fuel healthy yeast cells. Might be worth tossing in a bit of yeast nutrient. Again, not sure if that's needed with corn - never brewed with it, so my research on it is somewhat limited. :S

 

[jro238]

The nutrient is probably a very good idea if you are trying to push the abv up this far.

 

[charliehorse]

You can buy Alpha Amylase in powder form. This is the enzyme that Barley has that converts the carbohydrates to sugar. It's also found in your saliva, but I would advise against spitting into your mash (it would take a bunch anyway). With the powder, a teaspoon to 5 gallons will do ya.
http://www.midwestsupplies.com/amyl...184_a_7c7501&gclid=CK-I79ba3b4CFaZlOgodhQQATQ

 

[RmikeVT]

The December 2012 issue of BYO happens to have a Tesguino (tes-GWEE-no) Recipe in it. Tesguino is a native corn beer made by the Raramuri tribe in the Sierre Madre Mountains of Northern Mexico. They have been making it for a very long time.

They have an easy recipe and a more traditional recipe, the easy recipe is as follows:

Easy Tesguino
5g
OG up to 1.046
FG 1.006
ABV 3.3%
4.4 lbs. dry large kernal corn
11 cones piloncillo sugar (or 44oz can sugar)
ale yeast of your choice

Grind the corn and boil with 2-3 gallons of water and sugar, stirring to dissolve the sugar. You can add a few pieces of cinnamon if you wish. Cook over low heat for an hour; remove from heat, add 2-4 more sticks of cinnamon (optional), and let sit in pot for 20 minutes. Cool and transfer to fermentor, leaving behind as much of the corn solids as feasible. Top up to 5 gallons and ferment with all yeast for about 4 days. Throw a party and drink the entire batch immediately.

More traditional recipe substitutes 7lbs of malted corn, available in some latino speciality markets, for corn and sugar above. Heat mixture of 5 gallons of water and malted corn spending an hour ramping up from 140-162. Simmer for 3 hours. Cool and ferment. Serve slightly chilled uncarbonated and unfiltered. Your OG should be around 1.034, but will ferment very dry and leave you with a 4% brew.

The author also mentions the Raramuri inoculate the brew with wild yeast by stirring in a mixture of grass leaves laden w. wild yeast. I wouldn't recommend that.

 

[SudsyPaul]

That just sounds like the base for a distilled drink Isn't most moonshine a fermented-cornmeal base?

 

[Osedax]

Yup, you are basically making a corn whiskey wash. You will definitely need some base malt. Use 6 row so that you can use less. Check out some distilling forums for recipes. You would be surprised with how little 6 row you will need. Just don't use distiller's yeast. It will... be... gross. No other way around it. Good luck if you try again!