Day-old bread as adjunct

[Oberon67]

Hi.

A local in-store bakery has out-of-date bread that is available for free. I was wondering if this material could be used as an adjunct in brewing beer... I have hopes for the rye bread in particular.

Pumpernickel stout, anyone?

 

[lowtones84]

People definitely do it. I've been tempted but haven't ever. If you do traditional all grain brewing I could see if creating sparge problems.

 

[brwagur]

It's called a Kvass. Here's one of Oldsock's recipes: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2007/07/neo-kvass.html

 

[z-bob]

Someday I will try it. (not kvass, but using bread for maybe 15% of the grainbill in a pale ale) It should be even more interesting if you toast it.

I need to work on my all-grain technique with more traditional recipes first. Haven't quite got that down yet.

 

[Oberon67]

There were a couple of ways I was thinking of managing the bread during the sparge.

One, make croutons... hard little nuggets of bread that can stand up to some hot water for a while. It's not hard; you just cut them out of the bread and toast them until they become little bread rocks.

Two (and this is the more likely path I'll try), use an adjunct bag to keep most of the solids inside the bag. The rest can settle out with the trub in the primary.

 

[wilserbrewer]

There were a couple of ways I was thinking of managing the bread during the sparge.

One, make croutons... hard little nuggets of bread that can stand up to some hot water for a while. It's not hard; you just cut them out of the bread and toast them until they become little bread rocks.

Two (and this is the more likely path I'll try), use an adjunct bag to keep most of the solids inside the bag. The rest can settle out with the trub in the primary.

I think the crutons will absorb water and dissolve in the mash. I would just add 15-20 5 to the mash, add some rice hulls if you can. I think it will work fine. With enough rice hulls, just about anything can be sparged.

With only 15-20%, you may not even need rice hulls....famous last words haha. Try a small batch, see what happens.

 

[Wolfbayte]

I would make croutons for a side salad to be served with an appropriately paired meat entree once the beer was ready to drink.

 

[Oberon67]

I think this is something I'm going to try. I think I'll probably dose it with a bit of amylase, too, to boost the fermentables out of the bread.

 

[wilserbrewer]

I think this is something I'm going to try. I think I'll probably dose it with a bit of amylase, too, to boost the fermentables out of the bread.

I think 2 row base grain will have ample enzymes to convert the bread, easily at 30%, and likely more.

I would be careful adding enzymes, as they have a tendency to overdo it and thin the beer out making it too fermentable. Just my guess...

 

[wilserbrewer]

I think 2 row base grain will have ample enzymes to convert the bread, easily at 30%, and likely more.

I would be careful adding enzymes, as they have a tendency to overdo it and thin the beer out making it too fermentable. Just my guess...

I have heard the Aussies use regulator white flour as an adjunct, using bread should not be that difficult....toss it in the mash and mix It up good. IME the grain will convert it, break it down and make it sparge able.

I have mashed both cooked spaghetti and rice without much difficulty, I don't think bread will pose a problem. Ymmv

 

[Oberon67]

Looks like I found a potential source for local rye, then. Good deal... and thanks.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Looks like I found a potential source for local rye, then. Good deal... and thanks.

How much rye does rye bread contain? Is it only a fraction?

 

[Oberon67]

Yes, the bread wouldn't be all rye. I think I can live with that.

 

[fsr_racer]

Dogfish did something like this on an episode of Brewmasters. I got inspired and threw some leftover holiday pumpkin spice bread into a 1gal batch. It's pretty cloudy still, but I'm hoping it clears out a little.

 

[Oberon67]

Do you think that's starch haze, or protein, or something else?

 

[signpost]

If I have bread that starts to go a little moldy and throw it a the mash, would the boil end up killing the mold so the beer would be OK?

I'm not trying it currently, but I'm wondering if I might try tossing in whatever bread happens to be languishing in the bread box the next time I brew a batch. (no we don't have an actual bread box, but you know what I mean)

 

[ong]

I would not add moldy bread to your mash. I am not a fan of the flavor of mold.

 

[Oberon67]

I wouldn't add the ordinary grocery-store sandwich bread anyhow... too much stuff other than grain in that crap.

Only the locally-baked stuff that goes stale in a couple days (due to lack of preservative and conditioners and whatnot) would be brew-worthy.

 

[IslandLizard]

How much rye does rye bread contain? Is it only a fraction?

That totally depends on the country/continent. In the Netherlands (possibly in Scandinavia and even in Germany too) rye (rogge) bread is a very dense, moist bread that gets sliced thinly into 1/8" slices. 100% rye, no wheat, no BS. Often molasses is added, which makes it dark brown or almost black. I've seen it at Aldi's.

American Rye bread is nothing like that. And where did the idea come from to put Kümmel (caraway seeds) in it?

 

[Oberon67]

American Rye bread is nothing like that. And where did the idea come from to put Kümmel (caraway seeds) in it?

Not sure, but it's been done here for a long, long time.

There are quite a few different versions of rye bread here in the states, and not all of them have the seeds.

 

[Oberon67]

Yesterday I did my first experiment with mashing bread. I mashed the barley and the bread separately, so as to be able to discard the bread brew if need be without destroying the whole batch. I cut the bread into slices (it was a bakery sourdough) and put the pieces in a spaghetti pot with about a half-teaspoon of alpha amylase and about two quarts of water. I got the temp up to between 140 and 150 and kept it there while I proceed to mash the remainder of the beer, which was two pounds of two-row and about two ounces each of caramel 20 and 60. From time to time I would taste the liquid from the beer pot, and almost throughout the process it did not show any sign of sweetness; only near the end of a 90-minute mash did it start to show hints of extracted sugar.

The spaghetti pot's integral strainer made it easy to get the soggy bread out of the bread pot. What was left was white, cloudy, and tasted mostly like bread with just a little sweetness. My barley mash had come out just as it should, so in the interest of science I crossed my fingers and poured the two worts together for the boil. Three additions of a half-ounce each of Goldings were spread evenly through the hour-long boil, and when I was done I actually had to add some water back to bring my volume up to a gallon. Oh... I wasn't happy with the flavor of the wort going in, so on the fly I added a half-cup of table sugar and two tablespoons of brown.

I pitched a half-pint starter of Nottingham, installed the airlock, and went to bed. By morning it was bubbling along purposefully. When I got it all into the fermenter, with starter and water to volume, OG was about 1.080.

 

[Oberon67]

I have to work on a methodology to mash the bread. To get better conversion I think I'm going to have to either up the quantity of amylase, extend the mashing time, or both. I may decide to soak the bread in an amylase solution for a day or more at room temperature before proceeding to mash grain.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Why not mash the bread with the barley malt, as you would with any adjunct?

 

[Oberon67]

I mashed the barley and the bread separately, so as to be able to discard the bread brew if need be without destroying the whole batch.

This.

Also, I wanted to be able to taste-test through the mashing process to see if I was actually getting a significant amount of fermentable sugar. The bread mash should have been perceptibly sweeter by the end of the process, and it was... only just.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Ok, I think your chances of success would be much greater mashing the adjunct starch with the barley. Jmo

 

[Oberon67]

Ok, I think your chances of success would be much greater mashing the adjunct starch with the barley. Jmo

Quite possibly. In order to find out, I'll have to make a batch with X amount of barley and another batch with X amount of barley plus bread, same amount of water in each batch, and compare the OGs of the two batches. And even then it won't tell me how much of the bread decoction is fermentable.

I want to know for sure that I'm actually getting something useful out of the bread... otherwise I won't mess with it; it would complicate the brewing process to no good purpose.

 

[z-bob]

[three years later] Just wondering if anything ever came of this? I saw 20 oz loaves of white bread at Aldi for 75¢ the other day, and thought that's a lot cheaper than buying flaked or torrified wheat and I wouldn't have to do a cereal mash like with flour or cracked wheat. Might be time to brew an ersatz witbier.

What I was really looking at when I noticed the bread was their house brand of Sugar Smacks cereal (Dig 'Em!) but that has way too much sugar and not enough puffed wheat. The Sugar Smacks might be a fine addition in a Belgian tripel, though...

 

[day_trippr]

Mmmmm! Sugar Smacks! A hard core vice from my earlier years, I could easily kill a full box in one sitting.
It was tough but I got over it...

Cheers!

 

[specharka]

[three years later] Just wondering if anything ever came of this? I saw 20 oz loaves of white bread at Aldi for 75¢ the other day, and thought that's a lot cheaper than buying flaked or torrified wheat and I wouldn't have to do a cereal mash like with flour or cracked wheat. Might be time to brew an ersatz witbier.

What I was really looking at when I noticed the bread was their house brand of Sugar Smacks cereal (Dig 'Em!) but that has way too much sugar and not enough puffed wheat. The Sugar Smacks might be a fine addition in a Belgian tripel, though...

The only thing that would compel me to steer clear is the salt and oil content in many breads. The starches will definitely convert and ferment, and the puffy texture should make it easier for extraction. But you’re probably going to kill some head and you might raise the salt content to noticeable levels. If you can find bread with low salt and no oil, it’s worth a shot.

People have been making beer from stale bread for millennia, so it can’t be that difficult.

 

[Amadeo38]

Came across this in a podcast or blog I was listening to a year or two ago and seems to be an interesting way to do what you’re asking of the necro thread.

https://www.toastale.com/toast-ale-recipe/