Blending Of Smoke Beers

[joshuahardie]

Hi

I have a Smoked APA in secondary, that used approx 2.5% rauch malt. The idea was to just get a bit of a background hint of smoke.
Problem is that 2.5% was way too small of an amount to get the taste that I am after.

I was thinking, can I do a stovetop mash so say about 500gm of malt, ferment that in a PET bottle and blend that back into the base beer until I get the flavour I am after.

I have done a bit of reading / podcast listening, and I am not sure if the rauch malt on its own has enough diastatic (spelling) power to convert itself to ferment. If that is true, can I assume that it won't ferment, and then would be a bad idea to introduce something like that to my finished beer.

What are peoples thoughts on this.
give it a go cause it is likely to be OK
or just let it go, drink it and adjust my recipe for next time.

This is my first experience with smoked malt, so I am in the dark on this one.

Cheers
Josh

 

[glennheinzel]

According to the Weyermann site, you can use rauchmalt for up to 100% of the grain bill so it should convert okay.

http://www.weyermann.de/eng/produkte.asp?i...7&sprache=2

 

[crundle]

Not really sure about the converting power of the Rauch malt on its own, but you could do a mash with 500g of Rauch malt and add some other malt just to get the help it may need and give it a try.

FWIW, I made a smoked pale ale and thought that 10% smoked malt would be overpowering, but it almost isn't enough once the beer has aged for a few months - the smoke flavour dies pretty quickly I have found, so either drink it fresh or load it up and let it age till the smoke hit tastes how you want it to.

Crundle

 

[DJR]

Wey Rauch still has good DP

http://www.weyermann.de/eng/bmprodukte_neu...7&sprache=2

Listed as "High"

So minimash would work, personally i'd skip the ferment in another vessel and just mash, filter, boil and then add that into the beer after it's cooled trying to avoid oxidation of course... the yeast will wake up and ferment it no problem, it's just like the traditional Krausening method.

 

[HarryB]

Smoked malt by itself would be fine. I personally wouldn't consider making a smoked beer with less than 50% smoked malt, since the only one I have made was 50/50 pils/rauch and it was a bit light on for my taste.

 

[joshuahardie]

Nice idea DJR, I might give that a whirl.

Thanks for the input guys, I am alot less confused about it now.

Josh

 

[joshuahardie]

Smoked malt by itself would be fine. I personally wouldn't consider making a smoked beer with less than 50% smoked malt, since the only one I have made was 50/50 pils/rauch and it was a bit light on for my taste.

Harry,
For a true rauch, I would go with your advice. In this instance I just wanted the smoke to be a background note.
Thought 2.5% would of been enough. I seriously miscalculated though.

 

[marksfish]

i have just done a rauch beer that used 90% wey smoked malt and got full conversion with a 90 minute mash at 67c