Favorite Pilsner?

[couchsending]

Used just about every base malt from Weyermann. Barke, Ereclea, standard Pils, floor malted, etc etc over the last 5 years. Probably 50-60 different lager, Kolsch, Alt brews within that time.

I’ll be using Ireks from now on. Amazing depth of flavor and character. Hard to find on the Homebrew scale. I think there’s only one vendor online. Use a bunch of Ireks malt in almost every commercial batch at my brewery now.

Needed a bag of Avangard Vienna for a beer and tasting it next to the Ireks Vienna was pretty mind blowing The difference. Was bummed we even had to use the Avangard in the beer.

 

[AlexKay]

I’ll be using Ireks from now on. Amazing depth of flavor and character. Hard to find on the Homebrew scale. I think there’s only one vendor online. Use a bunch of Ireks malt in almost every commercial batch at my brewery now.

Thanks for the tip. Texas Brewing sells Ireks in pound quantities. I just put in an order.

 

[AlexKay]

I have now eaten too much raw pilsner malt.

I tasted 19 different malts blind, ranking each one best (3), good (2), or meh (1). I recorded the score for each malt, and then repeated the tasting for a total of 3 times. Scores were:

9: Epiphany (0.5)
8: Avangard (1.3)
7: Prostejov, Weyermann Eraclea (3.4)
6: BestMalz, Briess, Dingemans, Franco-Belges, Leopold Bros, Weyermann Barke, Weyermann floor-malted (4.2)
5: Admiral, Rahr, Sugar Creek, Viking (5)
4: Great Western, Mecca Grade (2.9)
3: MaltWerks, Rahr North Star (1.6)

The number in parentheses is the number of malts you'd expect at that score if selection was completely random. (These numbers are adjusted by the fact that I turned out to be more likely to rate something as "meh" than as "best.")

In other words, I have not disproved the statement, "I can not tell the difference between maltsters just by tasting raw malt."

I'm set up to make 6 batches of SMaSH lager. Have to figure out how to select the competitors; I'm thinking that if someone's mentioned it in this thread I'll include it.

 

[dirty_martini]

I’m a big fan of bestmalz. Nothing wrong with weyermann, considering it’s what so many of the top US lager makers use, which is probably why I like bestmalz because I don’t want to do what everyone else is doing. I’m curious how the American craft malts come through. I like the idea of helping support them and grow craft malt to a point is can compete better with the big guys.

 

[Tobor_8thMan]

Was Pils Urquell, but now my own homebrewed Pils.

 

[AlexKay]

Ok, here's an update. I brewed five 12-oz batches using BestMalz, Ireks, Weyermann floor-malted Bohemian, Weyermann Barke, and Epiphany. The recipe was:

0.25 lb. Pilsner malt
0.25 g Magnum @ 60 minutes
2.3 g W34/70

The Barke fermenter smashed on the floor before I could bottle it.

The remaining four have finished bottle conditioning, and I just tasted them side-by-side. They taste identical. I know I don't have the most sensitive palate, but maybe this is the point: as far as I can taste, for my own beer, the maltster just doesn't matter that much for Pilsner malt.

So my plan is to mix up all 20+ pounds of malt I ordered for this taste test, and use that until it's done. And then I can order anything I want, with the assurance that it's not going to affect the outcome in a way I can taste. I will probably support a small, craft maltster, unless it's prohibitively expensive to do so.

 

[Beermeister32]

Five 12 oz batches of Pilsners in 30 days? Ummm.. I think I'd re-do that test with maybe 1-2 gallon batches, and let these things age out a bit. I lager my Pilsners 90 days. If it were me I wouldn't put that much confidence in a 12 oz batch. Just saying........

 

[Dr_Jeff]

I prefer Belgian beers and one day thought, "What would the Belgians use?", and decided on Franco-Belges Pilsen and ordered a sack of it.
It may be all in my mind, but I thought that the beers brewed with it were better.