toasting oats

[Jack]

According to Randy Mosher, you can toast rolled oats until they smell cookie-like and that flavor characteristic, when the oats are used as an adjunct, will carry over into a finished beer.

Anyway, I tried toasting some oats today at 350°F for about half an hour. They smelled cookie-like, so I took them out. Unfortuntately, I think they kept roasting after I took them out (I even transferred them to a shallow bowl at ambient temperature!) and now they taste like burnt popcorn.

Is this burnt flavor one of the temporary off-flavors of the roasting process that will disappear in two weeks' time or is it there to stay? How long should I toast oats to yield a better flavor? Would soaking them before I toast be better?

 

[s3n8]

How dark did you toast the oats? I just made a toasted oatmeal stout, and turned the oats often till most had a bit of color.

I read somewhere that you should let the oats rest at least overnight before brewing with them to let some of the volatile compounds go away. I put them in a brown paper bag (again something I read).

After 3 weeks in the bottle, the toasted flavor is subtle and there, the chemical fire smell that the oats had after taking them out of the oven is gone

 

[Jack]

They're a pale golden color.

I was planning on letting them sit for about two weeks before I brew with them to make sure the volatile badness has gone away.

 

[giligson]

yes let them sit - I use brown paper bags to keep them in until the volatiles have offed. Based on the colour (not dark brown) you probably have what you were looking for. If you take them to a dark brown colour you will get more of a chocolate malt effect in the wort.