Teff for brewing

[charlesman4056]

Has anyone tried brewing with the grain teff? I recently used it in a Midas Touch style inspired beer. Only two days into primary fermentation though.

 

[ong]

How did you treat it? Was it malted or cereal mashed? I've always been interested in using it.

 

[buzzerj]

I always wanted to employ teff in a beer. The trick would be in malting it. It's so small and could be hard to work with. It's commonly thought of as the world's smallest grain. But most assuredly if you can figure out a good malting method, try it. I am encouraged since the Ethiopian Injera bread is made from fermented teff flour. Think of milling such a small grain even after malting it. Usually teff is used more as an unmalted adjunct at 10-20% of a grain bill because of the difficulty in malting. It does have a nutty flavor. Millet would be another grain you could use in a grain bill if it is malted. Teff and Millet are both gluten free so a beer made from there would be good for celiacs. The grains do have more fat in them than barley but I don't know how much difference that would make for brewing. Amaranth and quinoa have still more fat composition (like oats) than teff and millet. I'm interested because I like experimenting in non-barley alternatives. If you get a line on malting and milling teff, post it.

 

[charlesman4056]

I ended up making a crystal malt with the teff. I pretty much followed the hoptomology guide for making it. However, after soaking the teff for 24 hours in water, it was extremely difficult to get it to dry for roasting. This overall process took somewhere around 4 to 5 hours(drying and roasting). I stopped roasting it when it was a light amberish color. I also let the teff sit for about two weeks after roasting.

For the brew I kinda pulled and plugged into the Midas Touch recipe:

3.3 lbs. Briess light malt extract syrup
1.5 lbs. Briess light dry malt extract
3 lbs. honey (do not boil)
2 lbs. Alexander’s Muscat grape concentrate (do not boil)
0.5 teaspoon dry saffron (boil 15 minutes)
2.5 AAU Willamette hops (bittering hop)
2.5 AAU Willamette hops (flavorhop
1 tsp. Irish moss
White Labs WLP500 (Trappist)

What I actually used:

2 pounds of roasted teff (light amber)
2 cups of ethiopian oaks
3 pounds of honey
6 pounds of Briess Golden Light malt extract
0.5 Teasoopn of dry safforn (15 Minutes)
Northern Brewer Apla 8% Beta 4.4% (Bittering hop 60 minutes)
4 ounces of Gesho Entchet (15 minutes)
1 teaspoon irish malt (60 minutes)
49 ounces of Vintner's Harvest Fruit Puree - Raspberry
Wyeast Activator 3787

In regards to brewing, I steeped the oakes and teff at 170 degrees. I ended up steeping the two for about 50 minutes (I know this is an excessive amount of time, but I really wasn't getting much yield from the two.). Around 40 minutes was when I actually got coloration from the two. I added the malt when the boiled started and brought it back to a boil. Threw in the bitterning hops when the boil started again. Added the Gesho and saffron for the last 15 minutes of the boil. I added the honey and puree right after removing from heat (the reciepe said to not add the puree yet, but I have been burned once by not adding purees to my boil, with infiection.). The final gravity reading before pitching the yeast was 1.072.

If you randomly decide to try this, I highly reccomend using a blow off tube. The first three days of fermination were pretty intense. In the future, I believe I will try to get a darker roast from the teff. I am horrified that the boil time for the grains will yield a bitter beer, but I didn't want to have wasted that 5 hours of roasting. I guess time will tell.

 

[barristersbrew]

i just brewed a beer with teff, its fermenting right now. how did yours turn out? i mashed the grain at 30 mins 100, 60 mins 165, 10 mins 170.

 

[charlesman4056]

Turned out to be one of my favorite brews.

 

[Dolmetscher007]

What I actually used:

2 pounds of roasted teff (light amber)
2 cups of ethiopian oaks
3 pounds of honey
6 pounds of Briess Golden Light malt extract
0.5 Teasoopn of dry safforn (15 Minutes)
Northern Brewer Apla 8% Beta 4.4% (Bittering hop 60 minutes)
4 ounces of Gesho Entchet (15 minutes)
1 teaspoon irish malt (60 minutes)
49 ounces of Vintner's Harvest Fruit Puree - Raspberry
Wyeast Activator 3787

In regards to brewing, I steeped the oakes and teff at 170 degrees. I ended up steeping the two for about 50 minutes (I know this is an excessive amount of time, but I really wasn't getting much yield from the two.). Around 40 minutes was when I actually got coloration from the two. I added the malt when the boiled started and brought it back to a boil. Threw in the bitterning hops when the boil started again. Added the Gesho and saffron for the last 15 minutes of the boil. I added the honey and puree right after removing from heat (the reciepe said to not add the puree yet, but I have been burned once by not adding purees to my boil, with infiection.). The final gravity reading before pitching the yeast was 1.072.

If you randomly decide to try this, I highly reccomend using a blow off tube. The first three days of fermination were pretty intense. In the future, I believe I will try to get a darker roast from the teff. I am horrified that the boil time for the grains will yield a bitter beer, but I didn't want to have wasted that 5 hours of roasting. I guess time will tell.

Turned out to be one of my favorite brews.

This is incredibly interesting to me! I do not kid myself into thinking that I will be able to brew at home an IPA that is better than my local craft brewery Holy City Brewing. I still try, and I do really well. But... I am mostly into homebrewing for... 1.) The process 2.) The community 3.) The personal satisfaction 4.) To brew beers that are NOT available anywhere.

So, I have to ask...

1. What is Ethiopian Oaks. I Googled it, and found nothing.
2. You said you followed the hoptomology method for malting and kilning Teff into a Crystal Malt. I went to the Hoptomology site, and they have stuff on Malting and roasting barley into crystal malt, but I didn't see Teff. Did you just extrapolate and sub Teff for barley, but follow their same procedure? If so... since Teff is so small... how did you know when to stop letting it sprout?
3. You said you steeped the oaks and the Teff at 170. (Again see question 1) but isn't 170 already at a temperature that would kill diastatic enzyme action? Don't people tend to mash-out (meaning raise the temp to stop conversions) with 170 degree water? Would you not want to have that "Mash temp" be more like 155 or do like @bariristerbrew said and step mash through 100, 165, 170?
4. Can you describe how the beer turned out? Was the Teff apparent? I imagine that with saffron, gesho entchet, hops, raspberries, hops, honey... it all just turned out to be a... different... beverage. Sounds almost like a Mead or melomel.

Awesome post though man. I really appreciate it!