Malted Oats

[FarmBrew]

Re: all oat brews....don't bother they are thin and bland. Historically they were seen as inferior to rye, wheat and barley brews. At least one well known US homebrewer has made some and confirmed the above.

[6470zzy]

At least one well known US homebrewer has made some and confirmed the above.

Do tell us more please

Cheers

[raiderman]

Re: all oat brews....don't bother they are thin and bland. Historically they were seen as inferior to rye, wheat and barley brews. At least one well known US homebrewer has made some and confirmed the above.

Accepting that oats can be thin an astringent does the flavour enable lesser amounts to improve a pale ale or add crispness say to a lager?

[FarmBrew]

[/quote]
Accepting that oats can be thin an astringent does the flavour enable lesser amounts to improve a pale ale or add crispness say to a lager?[/quote]

As the guys have said it tends to add mouthfeel to barleys brews whether its malted or not. The unmalted ones tend to be more "oaty" than the malted. For crispyness rye is a better choice.

[FarmBrew]

At least one well known US homebrewer has made some and confirmed the above.

Do tell us more please

Cheers

I'm sure it was Dan Listermann on one of the Jamil shows..."beyond barley". It should be downloadable from the brewing network.

F

[6470zzy]

I'm sure it was Dan Listermann on one of the Jamil shows..."beyond barley". It should be downloadable from the brewing network.

F

Cheers for that. I shall give it a listen and see if what they say jibes with my own experiences with malted oats. Curious to know if you have made a brew out of them youself? If not, then they are worth experimenting with if you have a good adjustable malt crusher as they can be a real bugger to crush well.

[FarmBrew]

I'm sure it was Dan Listermann on one of the Jamil shows..."beyond barley". It should be downloadable from the brewing network.

F

Cheers for that. I shall give it a listen and see if what they say jibes with my own experiences with malted oats. Curious to know if you have made a brew out of them youself? If not, then they are worth experimenting with if you have a good adjustable malt crusher as they can be a real bugger to crush well.

I tend to use them "traditionally"...flaked oats in witbier and the malted crystal oats in oatmeal stouts. Although I have seen raw and malted in stouts. If you toast the crystal oats slightly before mashing them they taste more "cookie" or was that "hobnob"...

[6470zzy]

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I tend to use them "traditionally"...flaked oats in witbier and the malted crystal oats in oatmeal stouts. Although I have seen raw and malted in stouts. If you toast the crystal oats slightly before mashing them they taste more "cookie" or was that "hobnob"...

By crystal oats are you referring to Simpson's Golden Naked Oats? If not, then do tell as I would hate to be missing out

Cheers

[FarmBrew]

Yes, they are the simpsons malted oats. Very tasty they are too!

[raiderman]

It always seemed to me that the point of homebrew is to have fun, try new things and combinations that go against tradition and within my fairly narrow confines of pale ales and bitters increasingly brewed with T58 the time for oats has come.

[TC2642]

I'm sure it was Dan Listermann on one of the Jamil shows..."beyond barley". It should be downloadable from the brewing network.

F

Cheers for that. I shall give it a listen and see if what they say jibes with my own experiences with malted oats. Curious to know if you have made a brew out of them youself? If not, then they are worth experimenting with if you have a good adjustable malt crusher as they can be a real bugger to crush well.

Interesting, Clive la Pensee in his 'The Historical Companion to House Brewing' has a recipe for an all oat beer where he uses cold water to mash the oats for three hours and then dry hops with 100gms of Goldings. He says the 'taste is like proper cider with a suspicion of hops.'

He also has another recipe where he step mashes them.

Something I may try later on in the year.

[raiderman]

actually. Some modern-day brewers seem scared to death to include any non-malt ingredients, and choose to spend more than double the money on malted oats versus supermarket porridge oats, but there's no benefit.

Aside from shredded wheat which I champion I'm a bit of a purist. But on reflection home brewers don't use adjuncts to save money but for their effect. I think I agree non malted adjuncts have their role. I'm own a kilo of malted oats but ill steal some of the daughters porridge and try that too

[seymour]

Re: all oat brews....don't bother they are thin and bland. Historically they were seen as inferior to rye, wheat and barley brews...

Well, I wouldn't brew a 100% oat beer, but if I did, I guarantee it wouldn't be thin. Like you went on to say, oats are delicious. They also provide a smooth, silky, and creamy mouthfeel, improve the body, increase head retention and lace, and thus ought to be considered a perfectly acceptable ingredient for practically any style of beer. I think you're mistaken about the historical opinion. In the source texts I've found, oats were considered interchangeable with other malted grains, in many cases superior, not simply used out of necessity as some say. See:

Quoted from Beer in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance by Richard W. Unger, p.160

TABLE 6. PROPORTIONS OF GRAINS FOR THE PRODUCTION OF BEER,
THIRTEENTH THROUGH SIXTEENTH CENTURY, IN PERCENTAGES

Town ......................Date.......Wheat.....Oats.......Barley
London.....................1286.......17..........66..........17
Nuremberg................1305.................................100
Ghent......................1300s......50.......................50
Lier (kuit).................1440.......43..........35..........22
Lier (hop)..................1440.......20..........60..........20
Brussels (wagebaard)....1447.......27..........46..........27
Hamburg...................1462.......10.......................90
Lille........................c.1500.....23..........45..........32
London.....................1502?......14..........14..........72*
Bavaria.....................1516................................100
Antwerp (kuit).............1518......73..........15..........12
Antwerp (klein)............1518......13..........47..........40
Lille.........................1546......12..........70..........18‡
Hannover...................1526......33.......................67†
Antwerp (kuit).............1536.......8...........49..........43
Antwerp (knol).............1536......18..........45...........37
Antwerp (half stuuyvers)..1536......18.........40...........42
Antwerp (cleyn bier).......1530s.....13.........47...........40
Antwerp (strong)...........1530s.....20.........40...........40
Lille..........................1546..................20...........80‡
Hamburg (Weissbier)......1500s.....10.......................90

Sources: Arnold, Chronicle (Customs of London), 247; Bing, Hamburgs Bierbrauerei, 254; Bracker, "Hopbier uit Hamburg," 29; Campbell et al., A Medieval Capital and Its Grain Supply, 205-6; DuPlessis, Lille and the Dutch Revolt, 124 n. 13; Lŏhdefink, Die Entwicklung der Brauergilde, 18; Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond, 440; Peeters, "Introduction," in combined facsimile edition of Lis and Buys; Soly, "De Brouwerijenonderneming van Gilbert van Schoonbeke," 340-44; Uytven, "Haarlemmer hop," 345.

*Called "malte" by Arnold and presumably barley malt
†Said to be in the Hamburg style.
‡Temporary restrictions to meet grain shortages.

Modern-day brewers have developed tunnel vision regarding their precious two-row barley. More food for thought from the same book, p.157:

"Though beer could be made from literally any grain, the usual components were oats, wheat, rye, and barley. The combination of the four could be and was adjusted according to availability, price, season, and the desired results. By the late thirteenth century, the food grains the canons of St. Paul's Cathedral in London got from their manors were by volume 46 percent wheat, 46 percent oats, and 9 percent barley. Most of the wheat went to make bread and any left over, along with virtually all the oats and barley, was malted for making ale. Monks at Westminster Abbey, on the other hand, consumed by volume 31 percent wheat, 44 percent oats, 24 percent barley, and 2 percent dredge; the barley, dredge, and much of the oats went for brewing. Dredge was a mixture of barley and oats. In 1289 before Christmas, the household of an English bishop used wheat, oats, and barley together, but in the following March it was wheat and oats only. From 1412 to 1413 the household of an English noblewoman used equal parts of barley and dredge except in January and February when barley malt was the sole ingredient. Placotomus in 1549 called beer made with wheat "white beer" and that with barley "red beer." The latter, he claimed, did not remain sweet as long as the former. In 1588 Tabernaemontanus said any two- or three-part combination of wheat, spelt, rye, or oats was best but conceded that any one alone would be fine. The results from different parts of northern Europe for the Middle Ages and Renaissance show the consistency of diversity, of prominent roles for wheat and oats and the slow move toward barley. Rye did not disappear entirely. It was used more in the north and east and even survived in Estonia as a raw material for beer into the nineteenth century.

Another couple revelations from History of Beer and Brewing by Ian S. Hornsey, Chapter 5, The British Isles and Europe, Anglo-Saxon Britian, p. 244-245:

"…The percentage of early Saxon sites at which both bread wheat and barley are found is more than double that of wheat-only sites. The percentage of late Saxon sites at which bread wheat alone is found, declines by one half, but there are no sites of either period on which barley is found alone…One conclusion is that archeological evidence does not support the view that barley was the staple crop in Anglo-Saxon England, the balance suggesting larger quantities of wheat. However, Hagan records hulled, six-rowed barley in the highest percentages throughout the Saxon period…

Oats were quite widely grown in Anglo-Saxon England, being recorded from the late 8th century, and were almost certainly used for human consumption…for brewing, and Renfrew reports that in the Orkneys oats were added on special occasions to make beer more intoxicating…Overall, there is evidence that the frequency of cultivation of oats increased over the period of time that the Saxons ruled."

[zgoda]

Until early 17c most of so called "noble beer" brewed in southern Poland was 100% wheat. Then was "ordinary beer", brewed from varied amounts of wheat and barley. In highlands area malted oats was used to brew "poor people's beer", which was regarded as much inferior to any other beers. Swedish troops invading Poland in 17c reported it was so poor they preferred water over such beer.

[raiderman]

Off to Brugge this weekend - its a watch the film visit the place thing, then a few days off and my first oat brew. If malted oats give graininess i'm thinking of 200g in a 23l length. I see my previous post was only thinking 100g, but who cares for half measures! The line of thought I'm having now is on hops, both schedule and type, any thoughts anyone on whats appropriate?