Muntons Bock Beer - Steeping Malted Grains?

[Minitrue]

Hello all... I am new to this forum, and new to the world of beer brewing (though I have experience with making wine and whiskey). I've been doing a lot of research and gathering the necessary equipment for some decent brewing. But I want to start small and learn from the mistakes I will undoubtedly make.

So, I bought a can of Muntons Bock Beer LME (pre-hopped) today. The instructions call for @ 2lbs of sugar + the LME + water for 6 gallons of beer. I know this kit is not a real bock beer, and I know that adding sugar in not ideal. I was hoping some of you could give me some advice.

I do not have dry malt extract, but I do have malted barley, malted wheat, malted corn, and malted rye (all of it is whole grain - but I have a grinder). Instead of adding sugar, can I steep some of these malted grains? If so, which grain or combination of grains would you recommend? Also, how much of grains would it take to replace roughly 2lbs of sugar?

Finally, is it really worth it to steep the grains instead of just using sugar. Would the difference be that dramatic / noticeable?

Thanks so much for any help!

 

[wonderbread23]

2 lbs of sugar is roughly equivalent to 3.75 pounds of malted barely if you are mashing it and getting 70% efficiency. This will get you into the expected gravity range for the original recipe. I'd mash it low (148ish) so that it is quite fermentable and should help balance out the LME.

Raw sugar is not typical in a bock beer, although depending on the amount of LME you're using, it cold be a good thing and help dry out the beer. Some extracts are more fermentable than others, so it's hard to really know.

 

[Minitrue]

Thanks wonderbread23. For the heck of it, I might steep about 2lbs of malted barley and add 1lb of sugar. I like drier beer... and I have no idea how this "kit" will come out... so half the sugar (the rest steeping) sounds like a compromise.