Crystal 20

[Staticsouls]

If I smash brew with this, will it turn out sweet and gross, or is it close enough to a base malt?

 

[Qhrumphf]

Not a good plan. The way crystal malts are made, they're completely non-enzymatic and mostly unfermentable (unless a base adds enzymes to chop the larger carbohydrates back up).

Plus at 100% you're not gonna get much sugar extraction out of it.

Recipe for bad beer.

Now, there are uses for a 100% crystal malt wort, but it's more for analytical purposes than actual brewing.

 

[bobeer]

Crystal malts aren't fermentable at all if I remember correctly. It would be a gross beer imo. Try Munich if you like that sweet malt character.

 

[Staticsouls]

That's what I thought. Thanks

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Crystal malts aren't fermentable at all

Pretty easy to test this with 1lb C20, 1 gal water, US-05. Overnight cold steep, pitch the yeast dry.
When I did it (smaller batch size, C60L) , it fermented .

Didn't taste or bottle it.

There are some interesting variations: rather than cold steep,

• steep the C20 for 30 minutes at 150* F
  
• 'mash' the C20 with enzymes for 30 minutes at 150* F

 

[Vale71]

No malt will give a 100% unfermentable wort. The malting process itself creates fermentable sugars.
The taste aspect on the other hand...

 

[Lefou]

Makes a passable sweet grain tea, but a single grain beer? Not really.
I consider the crystals as grain adjuncts for flavor and coloring.