Malt flavour

[Sunter0100]

I have been all grain brewing for a while now. My beers taste good. However, I struggle to get the malt flavour in commercial beers.

Even in pale hoppy beers such as Oakham Citra there is a good grainy aroma and you can taste the malt in the finished beer.

My beers (which are normally pale, hoppy beers) get the hop aroma and taste but always seem to lack malt flavour and aroma. I have tried adding different malts, trying different yeasts etc but it does not make much difference.

I am thinking it might be my water. I add DLS based on Murphy and son suggestions.

Any ideas?

[Eric]

Water could be part of the cause. DLS is not the best choice for malty beers. Do you know what your water contains? Chloride content will influence malt flavours.
Yeast can play an important part as you say. Did you try WLP002?
Mash temperature and duration play a part too, low and long producing a thinner beer than one that is warmer and short from just pale malts.

[Sunter0100]

My water has next to nothing in it. Very low alkalinity and mineral content.

Not tried WLP002, but will do.

In terms of mash schedule I am using the standard settings on Braumeister. Might experiment with different step schedules.

[DeGarre]

Braumeister and malty beers wanted...what's your mash schedule? My beers were malty with the Hochkurz mash schedule, and in the end I just used this for all my beers.

mash in 5 mins at 55
40 mins at 63
50 mins at 70
mash out 15 mins at 77

Yes, it's long...but gave me 92-94% efficiency....and malty beer.

[charliemartin]

You say your water has very low alkalinity, but you add DLS. Is that not designed to reduce alkalinity? I have low alkalinity water and just add DWB from Murphy's for pale ales. For darker ales I use Graham Wheeler's water calculator.

[Eric]

DLS and DWB are the same, aimed towards producing more hoppy than malty beers. You might think of trying equal quantities of DLS and calcium chloride flake. Try to have the calcium level at 100ppm or more.
CRS or AMS are products for reducing alkalinity.

[Sunter0100]

I was thinking that I might add some calcium chloride next time. Thanks for the suggestion.

I am also going to experiment with different mash schedules. Any other recommended schedules for the Braumeister?