Has anyone done a comparison on the taste of an all-grain malted beer and the same beer made with equivalent roasted grains plus enzymes? I assume they should taste different but would be curious to know if anyone has done a side-by-side test.
Taste of Malting vs Enzyme addition
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I have done both, but never as a fair side by side comparison using similar recipies...so please take my reply with a few grains of salt.
All of my curent beers use non-malted grain +enzymes for the base malt (8 -11lbs) and Eckert rice malts as specialty malt (2-5 lbs). The Eckert rice malts dramatically improved my beers when they became available, they are far superior to my previous atempts at home malting and grain toasting.
For me this hybrid aproach is producing great beer.
There probably are some very malt driven beer styles that would benifit from using more malt (munich or viena millet, or biscut rice) and less raw grain.
For most beer styles i do not think it is a quality compromise to use non malted grain for the base malt...this method can produce exelent beer.
All of my curent beers use non-malted grain +enzymes for the base malt (8 -11lbs) and Eckert rice malts as specialty malt (2-5 lbs). The Eckert rice malts dramatically improved my beers when they became available, they are far superior to my previous atempts at home malting and grain toasting.
For me this hybrid aproach is producing great beer.
There probably are some very malt driven beer styles that would benifit from using more malt (munich or viena millet, or biscut rice) and less raw grain.
For most beer styles i do not think it is a quality compromise to use non malted grain for the base malt...this method can produce exelent beer.
Interesting to know, and really helpful, thanks! Have you roasted grains and then used enzymes? Does this approximate any kind of darker malt in a useful way?
We don't have any commercially available GF malts here yet beyond sorghum extract. I am solving for cheap base malt myself using a few different methods. We have one local commercial beer that is drinkable (O'Brien) and Glutenberg is available (expensively). The main question I have is whether a base malt extracted from unmalted grains is likely to be better than other options...Taste is obviously hugely subjective, I will ultimately give it a go myself but am trying to figure out what priority to put on various experiments.
After 9 months or so of homebrewing, my current state is -
- Extract base malt costs are around $4/kg and are tasting OK for certain styles of beer. They still take months of conditioning to be at their best.
- Cheapest grain I can get a base malt from is about $4 per kilogram and I will get around 50% of that as sugar. This tastes better quicker, but I am pretty time-poor so will need some automation around this at some point.
So the extract base is easy and cheap, but not a great finish in the beer. Am experimenting with different sugar mixes to see if I can improve things and dry the finish out. Grains make the beer much better, but are not a fit for every style.
So many experiments to do still
We don't have any commercially available GF malts here yet beyond sorghum extract. I am solving for cheap base malt myself using a few different methods. We have one local commercial beer that is drinkable (O'Brien) and Glutenberg is available (expensively). The main question I have is whether a base malt extracted from unmalted grains is likely to be better than other options...Taste is obviously hugely subjective, I will ultimately give it a go myself but am trying to figure out what priority to put on various experiments.
After 9 months or so of homebrewing, my current state is -
- Extract base malt costs are around $4/kg and are tasting OK for certain styles of beer. They still take months of conditioning to be at their best.
- Cheapest grain I can get a base malt from is about $4 per kilogram and I will get around 50% of that as sugar. This tastes better quicker, but I am pretty time-poor so will need some automation around this at some point.
So the extract base is easy and cheap, but not a great finish in the beer. Am experimenting with different sugar mixes to see if I can improve things and dry the finish out. Grains make the beer much better, but are not a fit for every style.
So many experiments to do still
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