Caramelising an Extract tin in the Oven

[technobabble66]

Alrighty, this could be one of my more stoopid ideas/questions, but:

Basically, i was wondering if anyone has tried heating an extract tin, namely LME, in the oven to ~180°C to caramelise the malts within?
:huh:

Kinda like heating a tin of sweetened condensed milk to produce a tin of caramel.


I became interested in this yesterday while accidentally over-heating an LME tin in the oven while preparing a new brew for the FV. Instead of a few minutes at 150°C, it probably got 10-15mins at 180°C. After letting it cool for a minute in the oven, i moved in into the sink under some water. the top was super hot (i could feel it thru the oven-mit) whereas the bottom was just warm to touch (~50-60°C?). So i just shook it up after it'd been under the tap for a minute & it all seemed fine. Crisis averted!

However, it made me wonder if you could get caramelisation going in a tin while heating it like this & would it be safe to do so, & would it be of any noticeable benefit?

Now, i appreciate there could be a very very serious risk of exploding tins from overheating. I don't know what the safety threshold is for a tin like this. I'm assuming the high concentration of malts should alter the vapour point of the water, otherwise 105-ish°C will probably be the danger point.

Also, i'm not sure what temp is required for caramelisation to occur to a worthwhile extent. I seem to remember reading ~180°C for pH7.0 for maltose. Lower under acidic conditions. Whatever the threshold temp turns out to be, that'd be the desired temp.

A quick web check of the caramelisation of sweetened condensed milk suggests the can is kept in boiling water, so the temperature would be capped at 100°C. It also can be done in a pressure cooker for a shorter time, again in water, but this would be at something a little above 100°C. Maybe 120°C?
Hell, would keeping the LME tin at 100°C for an hour work, then?

Also, i'm not even sure if it is actually going to do anything you couldn't just do by using darker malts. I was under the impression this type of caramelisation should produce a different result compared to the effect of further oven-roasting of the grain to produce darker malts. I could easily be wrong though!



Thoughts?

 

[law-of-ohms]

put it in an oven proof roasting dish and let us know how you went!

 

[Bizier]

People go to a lot of effort to make crystal malt...
Why do you hate these people so much? It makes them cry.

Seriously, I'd do it without a sealed vessel, and even then it seems like investing work into something where you could otherwise invest it and get known good returns.

 

[Not For Horses]

I would be crying but I think you already have some of my Crystal though yeah? ;-)
Having studied thermodynamics for a few years I can confirm, y know medically, that this is a bad idea.

 

[mabrungard]

This should work, but I wouldn't perform the heating in the tin. Move it to another vessel. At 180C, that should be high enough to create the caramelization. However, I caution against overshooting the temperature. I suppose if the oven is used, the temp should be relatively constant as opposed to heating on the stove top and overshooting the temp.

I'm not sure you would need to heat a whole tin's worth of LME. Remember, that tin makes a lot of wort.

 

[technobabble66]

I would be crying but I think you already have some of my Crystal though yeah? ;-)
Having studied thermodynamics for a few years I can confirm, y know medically, that this is a bad idea.

Haha. Apologies to the matters out there. I luv youse all.

NFH, I used some of your crystal in the last batch (carbing in bottles as I write) & biscuit in the current batch in the FV. The biscuit smelt (& tasted) amazing as it got crushed. The boiling wort was particularly yummy- so your biscuit was particularly promising. Similarly with the crystal previously, though it was harder to discern in the high-Munich wort I'd made. Taste tests in a few weeks!

I, too, have severe reservations about the safety of this, having all the relevant fields of science.

So I guess the 2 questions are:
Is it safe (probably not), or can it be done safely (eg: like the condensed milk, in boiling water for 2hrs)?
Will it do anything special to the LME that couldn't be done with a handful of crystal?

Edit: Thanks mabrungard, i wasn't sure how the exposed LME would go at 180°C, but that certainly gets around the exploding tin issue. Yes, 1.5kg of super hot caramelised LME might be a tad too much for a regular batch!
I certainly don't have a good enough oven to hold 180°C at the moment anyway, so this is all really just speculation.

 

[yum beer]

Why not boil the tin like the condensed milk.
or mix some with water and boil it down to caramelise with less chance of burning anything. I often did this when doing kits to add a little extra to the finished beer.
I still do it sometimes with second runnings from the mash.

 

[DJ_L3ThAL]

I would be crying but I think you already have some of my Crystal though yeah? ;-)
Having studied thermodynamics for a few years I can confirm, y know medically, that this is a bad idea.

Why is it medically a bad idea in context of thermodynamics? I was under the impression fruit tins, jams, soups etc are all heated to kill any nasties (botulism bugs) etc at a certain temp?

How hot would the goop need to get to "roast" it? If it's any higher than 80C I wouldn't do it with a sealed can, but otherwise if it is 80C or less, surely that is safe as the manufacturer's do it?

EDIT: temperature confirmed above around 180C... therefore I also don't recommend doing it in the tin!

techno, if your oven can't hold 180C, are you sure it is an oven?

 

[Not For Horses]

I think the condensed milk example may not be as relevant due to the Maillard reactions occurring simultaneously. Lactose does caramelise at a lower temperature but some of the browning (I believe most) will also be a result of the good Dr Maillard.

The caramelisation temperature for most malt sugars is around 180c and I think your best bet would be to caramelise some extract in a saucepan.

I'm fairly sure this has been discussed elsewhere already.

You could keep the tin at 100c in boiling water or ~120c in a pressure cooker and you may get non enzymatic browning but I suspect from Maillard not caramelisation.

You may also end up with a sticky/bloody mess in your kitchen and later hospital.

 

[Toper]

Why is it medically a bad idea in context of thermodynamics? I was under the impression fruit tins, jams, soups etc are all heated to kill any nasties (botulism bugs) etc at a certain temp?

How hot would the goop need to get to "roast" it? If it's any higher than 80C I wouldn't do it with a sealed can, but otherwise if it is 80C or less, surely that is safe as the manufacturer's do it?

EDIT: temperature confirmed above around 180C... therefore I also don't recommend doing it in the tin!

techno, if your oven can't hold 180C, are you sure it is an oven?

Canned foods certainly are heated to kill nasties. Low ph product needs to be heated to approximately 120c in a retort (pressure) cooker.High ph ,<4.6 ph,can be heated in a water bath at just below boiling temps.