Roast your own

[BritishBelgianTwst]

Hi,
As I've still not got my grain mill I've got time on my hands before my first AG brew and so whilst trawling through the internet I came across an Aussie that roasts his own malt.
The fella uses pale ale malt to make all his base malts and a dark crystal to make his caramel malts.

Have any of you tried this and what were your results? I was thinking of giving it a whirl as I've only got pale ale and crystal at home and the HBS is over an hour away (Belgium isn't big but HBS are few and far between).

Cheers,
Paul

[Aleman]

Many of the recipes in the Durden Park book specify Pale Amber Malt which is not available in the shops (Even the one that is sold as pale amber is not all that pale, and isn't diastatic), so they include instructions on roasting your own, which I am looking forward to this year . . . . . you do need an accurate thermometer (digital) with a probe that is happy to sit in the grain in the oven to get best results . . . and a Fan oven is recommended for consistency

[BritishBelgianTwst]

Cheers Aleman.

Fan Oven : Check
Thermometre : No check

Finders Crispy Pancakes on standby......

[boingy]

I can't help thinking you may be slightly over-simplifying the art of the Maltster

[BritishBelgianTwst]

Well how difficult can it be? (reminds me of my DIY attempts, I've often said that to SWMBO before later discovering I can't manage it and leaving it half finished)

I'm a keen amateur and the fella on oz.craftbrewer makes it seem pretty easy....I think that the difficult bit would be the malting (which I'm not gonna try) and not the kilning (if thats the term one uses in this respect).

[TC2642]

I can't help thinking you may be slightly over-simplifying the art of the Maltster

How difficult can it be on such a small scale? People have been doing this for hundreds of years and without the aid of modern technology. Same way that making candi sugar is very easy but they charge through the nose for it in homebrew shops.

[Aleman]

I can't help thinking you may be slightly over-simplifying the art of the Maltster

In what way? We are not starting with raw barley, but with Pale malt . . . all that happens to make 'darker' kilned malts is the pale malt is loaded into the kiln, and heated until the colour is right . .. Certainly it would be easier with a drum roaster, but with a good oven, and a decent thermometer checking the degree of roasting every 20 minutes . .. it should be (and is from those that do it :;) fairly simple to do

[mysterio]

I make amber malt all the time because I don't like the stuff from the HB shop. I roast mine until its darkened a few shades (half an hour or 40 minutes at around 180C) and the malt smells like nuts. Nice addition in a Scottish ale or a porter or something. Like Aleman says get an oven thermo. And you have to start with uncrushed malt then crush it yourself.

[BritishBelgianTwst]

Would a seasonably apt turkey thermometer be OK for this? The Australian fella I read about uses a metal strip thermometer whatever that is, I was thinking of one that you stick in the meat and has a dial like a speedometer.

[boingy]

Hey, I wasn't saying it is impossible and I wasn't saying don't do it.

I was saying that it is not as easy as you make it sound. Without a method of continually turning the grains it is very difficult to get a consistent roast unless you only roast small quantities at once (so that the grains are in a very thin layer). It's also very easy to arse it up and carbonise those precious grains, especially the ones around the edges (even with a fan oven). The inconsistency is not a massive problem but it can be difficult to end up with exactly the colour level you wanted.

And, yes, people have been doing it for hundreds of years without any equipment but I imagine they arsed it up quite a bit before they figured it out heheh...

BTW, I once had some usable results using a plumbers blow torch to lightly colour some already crushed pale malt. You had to be really gentle with the flame but I managed to get that nice nutty flavour. I tried replicating the method under a gas grill but you could not see the grains well enough to control the heat.

[paulcav]

I'm supping on a rather delicious brown ale at the moment which has 10% of my own roasted amber malt in it. I used Mosher's instructions in his radical brewing book and I was rewarded with a lovely biscuity aroma. I avoided any charring by only roasting small (500g) amounts at a time and stirring every 10 minutes.

Paul

[Bru4u]

It's as easy as pissing in bed (so I'm told), I made a kilo of chocolate malt, spread on a baking tray or two, no more than 15mm deep of malt, into oven at between 220 - 230 deg C for between 2- 2.5 hrs, turn or run a fork through it every 20 mins and open all windows in the imediate area, make sure SWMBO is out for the night. I got fantastic results. I dont think the temp is so critical as you are turning the grain so often, well it worked very well for me. What you got to loose, a few quid of grain, worth a try aint it, get up from the computer now and turn on the oven and tell the others how easy it is.

I'm not going out to the workshop in this weather to take a photo either.
Bru