Mygrain
Active Member
Hi there! Allow me to re-introduce myself.
Last May I signed on to HBT from our organic farm with the news that we had researched and selected an organic 2 row malting barley and were planning to grow a small trial (maybe a third of an acre plot). Since then I've stayed quiet and spent time farming.
We planted our barley in May 2010 and we harvested in September. Not having a combine on our small farm, we hauled pickup truck loads of cut barley to a friend for threshing in his combine. We took maybe 150 pounds of barley seed home for the winter. We fed some to our animals and replanted this spring. Finally I have enough grain in the clear to begin a brew project. We have clean grain, a nice cool basement malting floor and I'm just gonna go for it. My aim is a simple brown ale. If it's drinkable I'll count it as a first try success. We proved that we can grow a crop. Now I'd like to prove that what we have grown is a useful organic malt barley. (At worst the spent grain will feed our chickens!)
I'm jumping in friends and hoping for your input as I go along. I made some kits a few years ago and have some basic tools and understanding of the process. I've seen some really fine material demonstrated here on simple tools and techniques. There's a brew store handy, 2 kinds of hops growing in our garden (which I harvested, dried and freeze packed in mason jars last fall) and we have pure well water that tests out with some nice natural mineral content. I'm short on experience but I've got some ability and I'm not afraid to try. So why not?
Looking forward to your coaching along the way and a tall ale (and a tall tale) when we're all done!
Regards,
- Mygrain
Last May I signed on to HBT from our organic farm with the news that we had researched and selected an organic 2 row malting barley and were planning to grow a small trial (maybe a third of an acre plot). Since then I've stayed quiet and spent time farming.
We planted our barley in May 2010 and we harvested in September. Not having a combine on our small farm, we hauled pickup truck loads of cut barley to a friend for threshing in his combine. We took maybe 150 pounds of barley seed home for the winter. We fed some to our animals and replanted this spring. Finally I have enough grain in the clear to begin a brew project. We have clean grain, a nice cool basement malting floor and I'm just gonna go for it. My aim is a simple brown ale. If it's drinkable I'll count it as a first try success. We proved that we can grow a crop. Now I'd like to prove that what we have grown is a useful organic malt barley. (At worst the spent grain will feed our chickens!)
I'm jumping in friends and hoping for your input as I go along. I made some kits a few years ago and have some basic tools and understanding of the process. I've seen some really fine material demonstrated here on simple tools and techniques. There's a brew store handy, 2 kinds of hops growing in our garden (which I harvested, dried and freeze packed in mason jars last fall) and we have pure well water that tests out with some nice natural mineral content. I'm short on experience but I've got some ability and I'm not afraid to try. So why not?
Looking forward to your coaching along the way and a tall ale (and a tall tale) when we're all done!
Regards,
- Mygrain