Bairds malt. Low extract

[WishboneBrewery]

very well put Shane.

Our Bairds malt at work has gone from being bloody Fantastic to being worse than Fawcetts malt was when we changed, It is gradually getting better again.

[unclepumble]

The new season stuff will be starting to show its face in a month or so Ade, so it will be all change again, who knows whether that will be better or worse though?

That's malt for you, it changes each batch being slightly different from the one before it, It surprises me how consistent the maltster's get the finished goods, there's plenty that can go wrong, & the sign of a good brewer is being able to make a consistent beer with it.


UP

[Piscator]

I have made 2 brews with my sack of Bairds so far....................

Brew #1 using my established mashing temperatures and sparging practices gave a dissapointing 70% mash efficiency

Looking at the grain I noticed it was a much coarser crush ie the husks seemed more intact than the Warminster I had been using. I thought it would probably make it harder to rinse the sugars out of the more intact husks so I made a slight change of technique.

For brew #2 I sparged slightly slower with slightly hotter liquor and bingo, mash efficiency jumped up to 90%

Happy days, cheap malt and good efficiency.

[alfie09]

i have just finished a 25kg bag first lot was good 80%. end of bag went tits up. i have noticed my self its a very coarse crush. i asked worcestor hop shop if they crushed the grain but they dont its done in the place were they malt it. and they said the date on the side is the day it was crushed. maybe you lot knew that and i was just being THICK again!

[vacant]

Watching this and the WHS thread, I've emailed Bairds and asked if they wish to comment.

[RichardG]

Would it help to mash for longer? May be a daft question, but.....

[Brotherton Lad]

I posted on the other thread that I seemed to be getting slightly less from my sack of Baird's as opposed to Simpson's malt (though still hitting the target OG) and that the crush appears to be coarser. Well, I've just brewed this below (mash was about 1:40 at 66 - 65 C, with a slow fly sparge at about 78 C). The runnings kept coming out at over 1007, so I kept sparging and have ended up with over 29 litres at 1048 after the boil. (I'm happy to have more of a slightly weaker brew).

I don't use brewing software but that seems a reasonable return from that grain bill. (MO31 dated 27 Jul 11)


RIGGWELTER Black Sheep Brewery Masham.

25 litre batch OG 1056 ABV5.9% 60 units of colour 39 EBU

MARIS OTTER PALE MALT 4553 gms
CRYSTAL MALT 365 gms
CHOCOLATE MALT 600 gms (I only had 330 gms, so that is what I used)
TORRIFIED WHEAT 544 gms
ROAST BARLEY 1gm

HOPS Boil time 90 minutes.

FUGGLES 26 gms
PROGRESS 27 gms
CHALLENGER 27 gms
Add 10 gms GOLDINGS last fifteen minutes.

[guypettigrew]

Approximately 82% overall efficiency. Pretty impressive!

Do you know the crush date of your pale malt?

Guy

[Brotherton Lad]

As in the post, 27 Jul.

[guypettigrew]

Thanks. Same date as mine, which continues to give low efficiency. Ho Hum!

Guy

[Brotherton Lad]

It's marginally lower than I'm used to, but still hitting the target, so I'm not disappointed by it.

Interestingly, that sack, and the one before it, had Maris Otter written on it in felt pen. My new bag, delivered on Thursday, has Maris Otter printed on it. Of course, the innocent explanation is that they may have run out of printed sacks during the summer.

I am, though, more than a little concerned that both Bairds and Worcester Hop Shop may suffer a loss of trade for what could well be a temporary phenomenom, given that malt is a naturally variable ingredient; especially as it seems, in my case today, that it still produces a decent OG.

[jimp2003]

It's marginally lower than I'm used to, but still hitting the target, so I'm not disappointed by it.

Interestingly, that sack, and the one before it, had Maris Otter written on it in felt pen. My new bag, delivered on Thursday, has Maris Otter printed on it. Of course, the innocent explanation is that they may have run out of printed sacks during the summer.

I am, though, more than a little concerned that both Bairds and Worcester Hop Shop may suffer a loss of trade for what could well be a temporary phenomenom, given that malt is a naturally variable ingredient; especially as it seems, in my case today, that it still produces a decent OG.

I would not worry about Bairds - if they miss out on a few sacks worth of sales to homebrewers I doubt they will notice it. For WHS it might be more of an issue but while they offer such a good price people should be happy. Maybe WHS should think about crushing the malt to order as other suppliers do - some people have mentioned the crush not being consistent with the Bairds malt...?

[techtone]

Received my first Bairds this week with a date of 14/10/2011 stamped on the back. (crush date?) My efficiency was in the low 60%'s a good 15% or more off my usual. I have always been consistent before. I was aware of these threads so made sure to allow more time, stirring well etc. to no avail. This was despite the maris otter only being 66% of the total grain bill.

[vacant]

At the moment I'm boiling my 3rd brew from this sack and adjusted by recipe for a 7 point drop in efficiency.

My scales pan holds just over 500g of grain so scooping out 9 and a bit times I do notice the variability. I can usually get very close to just below 500g by eye then expect to add a few fingerfuls when the pan is on the scales but one scoop was well over 500g even though the grain was further below the rim, although that did look a lot whiter, i.e. less husk.

Usually I'd expect to find more flour at the end of a sack which I guess is due to movement. I seem to be getting pockets of rich & poor.

[beer taster]

I brewed yesterday and like most people the efficiency was well down on normal. I normally use Simpson malt and fly sparge slowly approx 0.5L per min. Typically I get around 88% efficiency, yesterday using the Baird malt I achieved around 77%. No big deal just need to add more grain. This could my excuse to buy my own mill