eldernut
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Had a search but didn't find any recent discussions on this. I decided to enter the realm of beer brewing from scratch by malting barley at home as well. I was just curious on how to do it and it's helped me understand the difference between the various speciality and base malts. I'm new to this and have only malted a total of 5kgs of raw barley so far. I've produced pale malt, crystal malts and a biscuit malt (which was actually a failed crystal malt that happens to taste very nutty and toasty but dry not sweet).
Here's what I've been doing by reading this blog, and then adapting for what I have at home. The idea was to just play around without buying a heap of stuff and see what happens. Barley is cheap enough to have a play.
https://brewingbeerthehardway.wordpress.com/
Steeping - I just put my washed malt in a bucket and cover with 4 inches of water and leave it for 24hrs. I live subtropical and so the ambient temps are perfect for sprouting grain. I put the kettle in the coolest spot in the garden to keep the temps low with a lid on it. I tried a 48hr steep with aeration but this caused a lot of grain loss and uneven germination. I guess this is more important under cooler temperatures but in 27C ambient temps water uptake by the grain is much faster and suffocation can occur even with aeration periods. It really doesn't like being immersed in water again once the chemical process has started in earnest.
Germinating - I have plenty of animals and a rats/possums are pretty common in this area too so floor malting wasn't an option. Instead I put a kg in a clean pillowcase, hang it under my pergola in the shade. For the first two days of germination I spray these bags down with the hose to keep them wet. The prevailing winds pass through the bag and keep the seed cool like an evaporative cooler. With a decent quantity of wet malt (min 1kg) the seed does not dry out nor get hot. A couple of times a day I shake the bags to move the grains around so they don't mat. I pack the bag away in a lockable cabinet in a kettle overnight and in the morning can usually feel some slight heat to them. They cool off once strung up again.
Halting growth - My grain is usually fully converted early day four so I put it directly into a home food dehydrator on low. Usually about 35 C it dehydrates the grain pretty rapidly, within 12hrs it down to 10% moisture. Then I treat it however to create the various malt types.
Pale Malt - I dehydrate on lowest temp until around 4% moisture then cure on high in the dehydrator (around 75 C for three hours).
Crystal malt - instead of dehydrating and put the green sprouted grain directly into a rice cooker and put it on the warming function for several hours. Within 1 hr the temp is around 55C and then climbs 5C every hour. After 4hrs I check the grain and if it's fully liquified I then transfer it to the dehydrator on medium (40 C) until it reaches 10% moisture. After that cure in the oven at 80C for however many hours necessary to reach the desired colour and flavours. Usually between 2 to 5hrs at this temp. Creates a very sweet glassy kernel with various notes of caramel, toffee and burnt sugar notes.
Biscuit Malt - this was a crystal malt experiment that went wrong. I was attempting to stew the crystal grain in the dehydrator by adding a pool of water to the bottom and running it on high (75C). This dehydrator has a top motor and just an empty plastic well in the bottom. But it still dried the grain out too quickly and within 8hrs I was down to 4%. So I removed it, added 30gms of water to the grain in a pan, mixed it around to rehydrate a bit then put it in the oven on 95C for several hours. The result was a malt looking similar to pale malt but with a popcorn coloured kernel on the inside instead of white. Within a few days it started to smell of bread and crackers. So I steeped some of it and found it to be decidely nutty and sweet with a dry after taste. Labelled it biscuit malt L25 and am using it in my next brew.
Next stop? I'm planning to do an aromatic and brown malt so I can make some dark ales. Anyone else have some home malting adventures? I'm keen to learn from anyone.
Here's what I've been doing by reading this blog, and then adapting for what I have at home. The idea was to just play around without buying a heap of stuff and see what happens. Barley is cheap enough to have a play.
https://brewingbeerthehardway.wordpress.com/
Steeping - I just put my washed malt in a bucket and cover with 4 inches of water and leave it for 24hrs. I live subtropical and so the ambient temps are perfect for sprouting grain. I put the kettle in the coolest spot in the garden to keep the temps low with a lid on it. I tried a 48hr steep with aeration but this caused a lot of grain loss and uneven germination. I guess this is more important under cooler temperatures but in 27C ambient temps water uptake by the grain is much faster and suffocation can occur even with aeration periods. It really doesn't like being immersed in water again once the chemical process has started in earnest.
Germinating - I have plenty of animals and a rats/possums are pretty common in this area too so floor malting wasn't an option. Instead I put a kg in a clean pillowcase, hang it under my pergola in the shade. For the first two days of germination I spray these bags down with the hose to keep them wet. The prevailing winds pass through the bag and keep the seed cool like an evaporative cooler. With a decent quantity of wet malt (min 1kg) the seed does not dry out nor get hot. A couple of times a day I shake the bags to move the grains around so they don't mat. I pack the bag away in a lockable cabinet in a kettle overnight and in the morning can usually feel some slight heat to them. They cool off once strung up again.
Halting growth - My grain is usually fully converted early day four so I put it directly into a home food dehydrator on low. Usually about 35 C it dehydrates the grain pretty rapidly, within 12hrs it down to 10% moisture. Then I treat it however to create the various malt types.
Pale Malt - I dehydrate on lowest temp until around 4% moisture then cure on high in the dehydrator (around 75 C for three hours).
Crystal malt - instead of dehydrating and put the green sprouted grain directly into a rice cooker and put it on the warming function for several hours. Within 1 hr the temp is around 55C and then climbs 5C every hour. After 4hrs I check the grain and if it's fully liquified I then transfer it to the dehydrator on medium (40 C) until it reaches 10% moisture. After that cure in the oven at 80C for however many hours necessary to reach the desired colour and flavours. Usually between 2 to 5hrs at this temp. Creates a very sweet glassy kernel with various notes of caramel, toffee and burnt sugar notes.
Biscuit Malt - this was a crystal malt experiment that went wrong. I was attempting to stew the crystal grain in the dehydrator by adding a pool of water to the bottom and running it on high (75C). This dehydrator has a top motor and just an empty plastic well in the bottom. But it still dried the grain out too quickly and within 8hrs I was down to 4%. So I removed it, added 30gms of water to the grain in a pan, mixed it around to rehydrate a bit then put it in the oven on 95C for several hours. The result was a malt looking similar to pale malt but with a popcorn coloured kernel on the inside instead of white. Within a few days it started to smell of bread and crackers. So I steeped some of it and found it to be decidely nutty and sweet with a dry after taste. Labelled it biscuit malt L25 and am using it in my next brew.
Next stop? I'm planning to do an aromatic and brown malt so I can make some dark ales. Anyone else have some home malting adventures? I'm keen to learn from anyone.
