Happiness is: Home malting

Yakima 728
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A few points about the air circulator: I used a 1/2 inch air tube after the 3/4 inch tube running through the 1" pvc pipe seemed to block it up and made it difficult for the beer to also fit in the pvc pipe. When I finished up last night I couldn't really feel air at the other end of the pipe, so the 1/2 tubing might not be wide enough to allow air to flow. If it doesn't work I'll try fitting the 3/4 inch tube back in.

Second, the fan ought to have been attached to the box with the electric plug, not on the removable door piece. As I made it, the door doesn't really separate because the wire from the fan attach it to the plug on the box. A minor mistake there.

Also, I originally screwed the fan in the wrong way! That was a simple fit, too.

The directions I followed is in my post from the 19th.
 
Yesterday I bought the last part I needed to complete my tap system. The nitrogen regulator I bought from a gas supply company in town did not use the same fitting as the hose and pin-lock set I bought from Kegworks, and Home Depot had nothing to marry the two. Going back to the supply store, they sold me a nipple that screwed directly onto their regular (cost me a dollar) and my problem was solved.

I'd already used sanitizer to clean off all the beer line equipment and attach the faucet to the face place via the longer 3" shank, get the nut on the shank, clamp the beer line to the nut, and then down in the fridge connect the beer line to the keg. Getting sanitizer down the beer line, which was in the lead wall at the time was a bit of a bother.

When I connected all the parts and clamps of the gas line and turned it on there was a leak at the regulator. A big wrench fixed that. I eased the pressure up to 30 psi to see if things worked, and they didn't.

From the inside of the fridge I pushed the beer line into the wall. I had fiddled with the faceplate while the line was attached to it, and figured it must have been pulled taught around a corner and kinked. Luckily, pushing the beer line into the wall must have relieved any tension that was there, because my second attempt yeilded a stream of cloudy, pungent beer. Even better, the second pull yeilded clearer, decent-tasting beer!

After a months of malting, brewing, and building, I have a working tap system with home made beer!

I set the pressure to 40 psi to hurry carbonation. On Friday we have guests coming for my wife's birthday, so I wanted everything in order by then.

 
CtrlMaltDel said:
Yesterday I bought the last part I needed to complete my tap system. The nitrogen regulator I bought from a gas supply company in town did not use the same fitting as the hose and pin-lock set I bought from Kegworks, and Home Depot had nothing to marry the two. Going back to the supply store, they sold me a nipple that screwed directly onto their regular (cost me a dollar) and my problem was solved.

I'd already used sanitizer to clean off all the beer line equipment and attach the faucet to the face place via the longer 3" shank, get the nut on the shank, clamp the beer line to the nut, and then down in the fridge connect the beer line to the keg. Getting sanitizer down the beer line, which was in the lead wall at the time was a bit of a bother.

When I connected all the parts and clamps of the gas line and turned it on there was a leak at the regulator. A big wrench fixed that. I eased the pressure up to 30 psi to see if things worked, and they didn't.

From the inside of the fridge I pushed the beer line into the wall. I had fiddled with the faceplate while the line was attached to it, and figured it must have been pulled taught around a corner and kinked. Luckily, pushing the beer line into the wall must have relieved any tension that was there, because my second attempt yeilded a stream of cloudy, pungent beer. Even better, the second pull yeilded clearer, decent-tasting beer!

After a months of malting, brewing, and building, I have a working tap system with home made beer!

I set the pressure to 40 psi to hurry carbonation. On Friday we have guests coming for my wife's birthday, so I wanted everything in order by then.

Click to expand...

It might take longer than 3 days to carb up. Remember, beer gas is 25% CO2 and 75% N2. Since nitrogen isn't soluble in beer, you're pushing 10psi of CO2 into solution. 10psi takes a few weeks to carb up a keg under normal conditions (35-45f) so you're probably going to see something similar. You could 1) shake the keg every hour for the next day to reach equilibrium faster 2) get a carbonation stone 3) carb with CO2 at 10psi (again shaking) and then put it on Nitro before serving or 4) try it how you're planning and see what happens!
 
Thanks for the advice, baba. I cranked up the pressure and turned down the fridge temp, so we'all see where that gets us.

Here the finished product:



I'm happy about this, since the first batch of beer wasn't the best. I can still claim a victory for the keg set up, and look forward to serving the next batch!
 
There was some kind of leak in the gas line, because the nitrogen was reading zero on Thursday, after being plugged in only a few days. Never the less, the beer flowed from the tap on Friday (could the 50 psi in the keg have pushed it out by itself?) when party goers were over.

The faucet also started to malfunction and wouldn't turn off all the way, so I had to reach into the fridge and attach the beer line when I wanted to dispense beer, then detach it to stop, but things still worked out okay. The carbonation levels seemed fine, there was lots of cascading bubbles and a small head on each glass, which everyone liked watching.

The guests drank a lot of the beer, which was flattering. We agreed that I had made an aweful stout but a pretty good lambic or sour. The night was an excellent conclusion of my adventure with my first malting, homebrewing, and tap installation.
 
I'm a little late to the party here. As many, I stumbled on this thread looking for information on home malting. My plan is to make an "estate grown" beer. All ingredients grown on my property (including the yeast which is a separate thread somewhere I'm sure). I started brewing beer waaaay back in the 1990s in my early 20s. I was a BJCP early on and took a long leave of absence (kids, work, etc) and got back into over the past couple of years. I live on a couple of acres a few miles from Seattle, WA. I bought a 5lb sack of barley seeds from Johnny's Seeds to grow in a bed in my garden and quickly realized that wouldn't be enough to do much so my plan is to plant a fairly large bed to get maybe 50lbs of barley to malt. I'm a little late this year The hops are already climbing up their trellis as we speak.

Before I go hog wild, I'd like to get my hands on a 50lb sack of unmalted barley for me to play around with. Does anyone know where I can find some barley in Western Washington? We are blessed in this state with a large amount of barley and hop growers, but finding small quantities is always the issue. I can find wheat all day long, but barley is much harder. There is a lot of barley research up the road from me in the Skagit valley at WSU and a custom malting operation called Skagit Valley Malting

I found some a few pounds of wheat berries at the grocery store that I am currently sprouting to get a feel for how it goes. If things go well, I plan to scale up a bit but my main interest is estate grown barley and hops so it will never be a lot although I have a plot about 200'x50' I could plant which is probably way more grain than I could ever use. I have the space to malt under climate controlled conditions, I just need a way to kiln the malt. Is there anyone else in the Seattle area doing this?
 
Finally found some feed barley at a feed store in the Skagit valley about an hour north of Seattle. $10 for 50lbs. They say the barley is grown a few miles from the feed store, which is pretty rare around these parts. I'll be picking up a couple of bags in a week or so. I need a dehydrator
 
I suggest you ask the name and do a little research on the different types. You should use Malting barley. You have use johnney Seed and they sell 25 pound bag of Conlon 2 row malting barley.

If you look back in this thread the field pictured in post 388. It is about the same size as you are planning to plant. I used 5 pounds of the Conlon and it was over seeded by recommendation. I harvested about 70 pounds.

There is a store farmers use around here called The Mill. is was Southern Staes co op they do carry malting barley.

I have not malted mine it is sealed in buckets for now. I am well aware it may go bad. I spent the last year remodeling my home and now in the process of moving.
 
I plan on using the feed barley to try some malting. Actually, I ordered 25lbs of hard red wheat from Amazon for $13 and free shipping because we are Prime. So between both of these I am going to get my malting system down before I try and malt anything that I grow myself.

I planted a vegetable bed with Conlon from Johnny's Seeds a couple of weeks ago (I know this seems late in the year but it was in the 50s last week the 2nd week of June). I have already had problems with birds and maybe rabbits or rats eating some of the sprouts so I will need to deal with them too. I actually have about 1/2 acre I could plant, but not equipped to deal with that much barley. I've got a tractor and pto rotoliller, just need a seed driller to plant that much!

I think unmalted barley will last 2-3 years if keep cool and dry.
 
I planted some hops years ago and I don't remember what I planted. They are growing up the side of my barn. I just planted Willamette, Centennial and Columbus hops so I know what I have this time. This is WA state, it's not like we can't grow hops or anything here! (Don't ever get stuck behind a truck hauling hops to the dryer in the Yakima valley, I could barely breath!)

@sfish I see you are from Baldwin, MD. My sister lives in Bel Air and my brother in Baltimore. I grew up in MD but moved away years ago to take a tech job. Love MD , but don't think I can ever move back with the heat...
 
lol a small pond it is
my son moved out there for the job as well
I grew up in timonium
sfish

If I ever finish my dirt to glass project I'll send you a beer.
 
FYI, for anyone following this thread. I submitted a request to the admins to get our own forum called Growing and Malting Barley (or grain or whatever). He said it was a good idea and was going to bring it up with the other admins. Sounds promising so look for a forum dedicated to this thread!
 
Wow i was just perusing this thread and when you mentioned the mill / southern states it caught my eye i grew up in jarretsville and still live in bel air, small pond indeed
 
farmersteve said:
FYI, for anyone following this thread. I submitted a request to the admins to get our own forum called Growing and Malting Barley (or grain or whatever). He said it was a good idea and was going to bring it up with the other admins. Sounds promising so look for a forum dedicated to this thread!
Click to expand...

Yooper's a she. Now you've blown it :)
 
Has anyone had problems with voles, rats or mice? I have a pretty big garden next to my house and have all types of vegetables, lettuce, herbs and whatever. I know I have rodents digging holes and such, but they don't usually touch my veggies. I decided to plant a 32sqft bed with barley for the hell of it figuring I'll get a few pounds this summer. Twice now I've come out in the morning after I saw my barley starting to break through the ground to have it all mowed down the next morning. I was thinking about putting chicken wire over the bed, but not sure that would keep them out. I could build a fine mesh screen around the bed until the shoots are big enough that the rodents won't eat them. Poison? Ideas?
 
Farmersteve, congratulations on your ambitious plan! I've been pursuing a similar scheme as you, growing hops and barley in the hopes of creating an estate beer. My research indicated that 100 square feet ought to yeild between 5 and 15 lbs of grain, dependent mostly on the levels of nitrogen available (https://www.daf.qld.gov.au/plants/f...ld-crops/barley/planting-nutrition-harvesting). I'll send you a pm with my full notes on nitrogen and phosphorus, with some more links.

For seed, I contacted the University of Idaho Foundation Seed program ([email protected], ask for Christopher Rogers). For $25, they sent me 25 lbs of Endeavor barley, which is a malting barley they've created for Washington climate. It's a winter barley, and I planted 200 square feet last September. As a matter of fact, I harvested it just this week!

I'm not sure how much yield I have, but I'm guessing it's closer to 10 lbs than it is to 30. Here's the action:

8rWMDMS.jpg


I just went out with scissors and cut it up. It took maybe an hour.

Barley is a pretty rough customer, and doesn't seem to need much pampering. I don't know about quality beer-making product, but without much work at all I can now say I grew and harvested my own barley. I'll keep the forum posted.
 
@CtrlMaltDel Where in WA state are you located? I'm in Woodinville... I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I could possibly lease an acre or two of prime farm land down in the valley here and grow barley, but I think my wife would have a fit! Plus what would I do with a couple of tons of barley?

Anyway, I bought one of those sonic mole/vole chasers. I'm not quite sure if it's birds or voles, but I put up some bird scare tape too. I know planting them now is kind of a crap shoot but I wanted to work out the kinks before I scaled up to a couple hundred sqft. I have the farm equipment, I need to prep the land. I need to lime and fertilize before the rains come again in October.

I found a feed store in Mt. Vernon, WA that sells barley and I plan on buy a couple of sacks to experiment malting with, also to get my system down so when I actually grow this stuff, I don't screw it up! I malted some wheat last week and it went pretty easy.
 
I live in Richland, where it's been nice and hot lately and rain is something that happens to other people.

An acre of land sounds like a big operation! But if you have a tractor and you have the time, don't let me dissuade you. 60 bushels per acre is a modest yeild, and even that is 3000 pounds of barely.

For me, I was satisfied with the prospect of one or two batches of beer from estate grain. That's 20-30 lbs, for which I only needed my 200 square foot plot. That amount is easy to dry in the dryer or sun and kiln in the oven.
 
Ah Richland, I've been there a few times. I was in the wine industry for many years and traveled to the tri-cities for our annual convention every year. Of course, I spent a lot of time in the Yakima valley for grapes and stuff...

I'm going to try winter wheat and barley starting in October. Probably 2/3 of my plot in Barley and 1/3 in wheat. We'll see what happens next spring! I hope to grow 50lbs of grain and use it mainly for beer but I am interested in making some bread and pizza dough from the wheat too...
 
richl025 said:
There's a reason farmers used to keep cats....
Click to expand...

I'd love to have a barn cat. I used to have a cat that killed everything within a 1/2 mile of my house, but he died years ago. My wife and kids are allergic to them so it would truly have to be a barn cat. I think my sonic rodent repelling device is working. I'll know for sure when my latest batch of seeds sprout. Once they get 2-3" high, they seem to ignore them after that...
 
I used to work on a family-owned wheat farm, in Kennewick, off Hwy 395. Every time I go to the LHBS, the smell of grain brings back memories of being in the top of the grain elevator, 100+ degree weather, knee-deep in wheat. I'm now living in Lynnwood.

By the way, our neighborhood here in Lynnwood is being attacked by voles and either moles or gophers. Several neighbors, including myself have the ultrasonic devices and yes, we're still finding dirt mounds near them. Neighbor was telling me yesterday, she found a mole/gopher mound right where the ultrasonic device was suck in the ground!
 
Sooo... I wasn't sure if it was birds or rates/mice/voles and now I'm pretty sure it's the rodents. I planted for a 3rd time in one of my garden beds (I know it's June, but this is to work out the kinks for a much larger plot of land). I ordered one of those ultrasonic rodent scaring devices and at the same time put up some flash tape on a bunch of tomato cages to scare the birds away. This time I could see the barley shoots come out of the ground which is about the furthest I've gotten and wham the next morning all dug up and eaten. So, I put out some rat/mouse poison next to the bed as my last resort for my next attempt. Actually, my last resort is 1/2" mesh hardware cloth over top of the bed. BTW a few seeds did make it past this and are growing 5-6" tall now. So, it seems if they get past a certain stage then the rodents leave them alone (until I have ripe barley!) I'm not sure I will have this problem when I plant out in a big field since we have tons of owls, hawks or whatever that would pick off the critters if they were in an open field. Garden bed is next to the house and hard for raptors to get in there. We shall see! It so funny because I have many other beds of vegetables growing and they only eat the damn barley shoots!

Lesson learned this time, ultrasonic repellent devices are worthless.
 
Minor update... After about 4 attempts I think I took care of my rat problem. I put out rat poison next to the garden bed. Rats ate it. Did it again just to make sure. Planted barley and this time no digging or eating the young shoots. I still have about three dry months in front of me so I think I should be able to get some barley before the rain comes in October.

I'm think ahead in October when I will plant my winter barley. I am going plant a fairly big plot. Soil isn't the best and I plan to amend with lime and some compost. I've seen people broadcast spread seeds and rake but I am thinking about getting a walk behind seeder to better control the seeding process. Has anyone used one of those?
 
I'm brewing tomorrow! I malted up a ten-pound batch of grain I got from the university last year (the grain I harvested this summer is being saved for later), and I just finished the dark malt last night. I had half a pound of my pale malt in the oven at 450 F for 30 mins. It got quite smokey and made the house smell like popcorn, but I think I got the job done. Many of the kernels looked merely amber on the outside (hulls), but they all proved to be black or very dark brown when I split them open.

I'm still worried, since the first time I malted I got very light-colored beer. I'm going to grind my dark malt at the homebrew store and compare its color to ground chocolate malt. If mine is too light, I'll buy some chocolate malt to augment my home-malt.

I'm repeating the recipe I've used the last two times. My first attempt used my first attempt at malting, but ended up contaminated with wild yeast during a very dis-organized cooling. My second attempt used store-bought malt and came out wonderful, so I'm hoping this time will be a successful home-malt.
 
I know I was late to the party this year, but in my garden bed I'm starting to see stalks of barley with heads forming so I'm fairly confident I'll get a tiny crop! It will go with my tiny crop of hops! I might do a BIAB 1 gallon batch with all home grown ingredients.

I never did track down a bag of unmalted barley around here. Summer got in the way. Vacations and family visits. I plan on picking this back up when the rains come back to Western Washington. That's when I'll start preparing my large bed of barley and wheat. I'm hoping to plant winter wheat and barley in October. I probably could plant an 1/4 acre but I don't want to commit that much to something I'm not sure is going to work yet. I'll probably plant about 625 sqft (25x25) and see how that goes!

I bought a dehydrator to experiment with the drying part of malting, my oven sucked for the wheat I malted. It's a small one but if it works, I'll upgrade to a big unit. I really don't want to build my own dehydrator like ive seen other guys do.
 
Wow, that guy is going to the extreme- isolating his own yeast and gathering his own rain water!

For my part, I've had a hiccup with my current brew (using my home-malt). My AC went out while I was on vacation, and the fermentor got to at least 88 F. It must have been like that from day 15 to day 17 of the fermenting.

Is it okay to put in the keg and drink?
 
of course you can. it probally fermented lower. what is your expected FG and what did you get?
Lucky you have brewed this resipe before and will be able to compare the finished brew.
 
The beer is a success! Gravity started at 50 and got down to 05. The color is a wonderful near-black, the taste is mild with dark notes, and the head is thick and rich off the nitrogen tap. I'm very pleased with this one.
 
After harvesting my grain in June or July, I got a little side-tracked with the newborn daughter. Now in November, I've finally got around to processing the grain.

nj2u4Iq.jpg


I started by stomping on the grain with my moon-boots to break down the long pieces of straw I cut during harvest. This reduced the volume to about 1/3.

odmOQoB.jpg


I had to push handfuls of this into a sleeping bag case and swing it against he concrete floor, getting lots of spikey barley bits in my clothes along the way. After an hour or so of this, I had pounded it all out, and went back through with gloved hands to make sure everything was broken up.

Eternally windy eastern Washington came to my aid for the winnowing. I went out back and tossed the grain into the air and lifted handfuls up and dropping it back into the box, with the wind sending the non-grain away. It was surprising effective.

Xufmc6J.jpg


In the end, I got 8 pound of good grain from my 200 square feet. I'll malt this up soon. I have several handfuls of hops in the food dehydrator that will complete the batch.
 
I've begun the first steep. There was a few handfuls of chaff that floated to the surface, which I was able to remove. Water temp is about 50 F. I wanted to add some hydrogen peroxide (I was worried about germs on the grain) but I did not have any.

JRSQzKj.jpg
 
Last edited:
CtrlMaltDel said:
I've begun the first steep. There was a few handfuls of chaff that floated to the surface, which I was able to remove. Water temp is about 50 F. I wanted to add some hydrogen peroxide (I was worried about germs on the grain) but I did not have any.
Click to expand...

Grain is covered with bacteria and molds, some good (i.e. lactobacillus) and some bad (mycotoxins). Viruses may attach themselves to the grain, soil-borne viruses might also but with most of these you will know and see that your grain doesn't look normal.

The first step is to clean the grain with a fanning mill, the next step is to rinse the grain changing the water each time and skimming the chaff and dirt that floats to the top. By the time you're done rinsing your grain, your steeping water should be clean with a slight yellow tinge. It should also have a raw barley smell to it. You then begin the steeping cycle.

Hydrogen Peroxide or Sodium Metabisulfite would be used to control mold. If you have fusarium (a lot of red color in the grain) then you may want to think twice about using it for malt.
 

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