Gluten Free - No Malt Experiment

[BBBF]

It's a shame we can't get the same enzymes here in the states. I found this thread because I was thinking about doing the same thing with flour or unmalted grain.

Gluten free beer tastes like beer. It just might not live up to your preconceived notion of what a beer should taste like. And why should it? A rye beer or a wheat beer isn't expected to taste like a barley beer, but you still recognize it as beer. I have no problems with gluten, but I have tried several gluten free beers. Red Bridge and Bard's are trying to be "real" beer and I think they fail. I'm not saying they aren't enjoyable. I just don't think Red Bridge tastes like Budweiser or whatever AB style they were going for. However, if I put it in it's own category as a sorghum beer, it tastes fine. New Grist is the best that I have tasted and tastes the most like beer. I would never turn one down. The three from Green's that I've tried fall somewhere in between. Sprecher's beers were the most interesting because they were african beers that happened to be gluten free. If I ever make it to Australia or if Millet Man's beer ever makes it to Chicago, I'd love to try it.

I'm currently fermenting my first gf beer from quinoa and amaranth. I malted according to Millet Man's instructions and tried brewing to his instructions, but ran into some sparging problems.. I also went for a pale ale, despite a preference for dark beers, so that I can get an idea what the grains will offer. If it tastes similar to a pale ale, I'll be thrilled. If it tastes different, I'll still be thrilled as long as it tastes good. I'm sure the people in my brew club would be interested in trying a quinoa/amaranth beer.

 

[mpcondo]

this is a great gluten free thread, here in the states it impossible to find anything but a sorghum and rice lager.

I love the idea of baking the biscuits.

what kind of differences in flavors and extraction between malted and unmalted millet and buckwheat.

I was interested in making a pilsener with malted millet and malted buckweat and a little millet crystal 75L. the pilsener seemed like a good choice because of the assertive hopiness. any thoughts?

I have to say that the idea of a Marzen or Vienna is intriguing and I was curious on if anyone has actually tried this.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Glad you like the thread

I'm sorry I cant help with the differences between the malted and unmalted grains ... or anything else really. This is my first excursion into the gluten free realm, and I am specifically looking to do it with 100% unmalted material.

Search for posts by Millet Man - he is the undisputed guru on the whole gluten free topic. What with being a professional gluten free brewer and all.

I wouldn't bother with all the rigmarole If you could just nip out and buy a bag of malted millet, but you cant. And I want a quick and dirty way to make a half decent beer without having to tool up for home malting.

I shall refrain from pretending to be able to give advice -- search out millet man's posts or perhaps shoot him a PM.

Cheers

TB

 

[mpcondo]

Thirsty,

I'm really interested in this no malt expiriment that your doing. If you can, I would love to hear some notes on the final outcome once your millet beer is ready to drink.

 

[mpcondo]

I am preparing to do a small batch of millet beer myself and I'm not wanting to go throught the process of malting until ive done a little experimenting to get the feel for these grains. the problem is that it seems as though the enzymes that are mentioned on this site are not available in the united states. however I can get amylase and Alpha-Galactosidase Enzymes.

will these work ok, and if so will it be the same mashing proceedure that has been spelled out for use with the improzyme?

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I dont know about the alpha-galactosidase... sounds like it might try to invade your solar system if you get it wrong.

Amylases though -- yeah. They will do the trick. You just need to remember that yo have to gelatinise the GF grains first (at 80C or more) and then cool them down for the enzymes -- how much to cool them down will depend on which enzymes they specifically are. Malt derived amylases have different optimum and denaturing temperatures than do bacterially derived amylases.

I reckon if you go to a big specialist homebrew store though -- you could probably get the improzyme that Millet Man was talking about - or an equivalent. You migh thave to ask them to order it in for you. Or you could mail order some from the sponsors of this site ... they'll all have it.

Nearly ready to have a taste of teh millet flour beer -- I'll let you know how it goes.

TB

 

[muckanic]

the problem is that it seems as though the enzymes that are mentioned on this site are not available in the united states. however I can get amylase and Alpha-Galactosidase Enzymes.

The distilling forums are actually full of Aussies chasing US mail-order enzymes. Try a search at http://www.homedistiller.org. Mile-hi seem to be a popular supplier. The main advantage of the Improzyme is that, as well as converting starch into sugar, it also breaks down glucans and proteins. This is not absolutely necessary, it just increases yield a bit and makes sparging easier. You can always batch sparge if necessary.

Your main requirement is for alpha amylase. A beta/gluco equivalent is available in the shape of Beano (digestion aid) in almost all US pharmacies. No idea what the temperature and pH specs are. That is a product we don't seem to have here.

 

[katzke]

The distilling forums are actually full of Aussies chasing US mail-order enzymes. Try a search at http://www.homedistiller.org. Mile-hi seem to be a popular supplier. The main advantage of the Improzyme is that, as well as converting starch into sugar, it also breaks down glucans and proteins. This is not absolutely necessary, it just increases yield a bit and makes sparging easier. You can always batch sparge if necessary.

Your main requirement is for alpha amylase. A beta/gluco equivalent is available in the shape of Beano (digestion aid) in almost all US pharmacies. No idea what the temperature and pH specs are. That is a product we don't seem to have here.

Was doing some searching yesterday and in one post it was said that Beano could be contaminated with wheat. I have no idea but if you are brewing gluten free you should check before trying it. Alpha amylase is easy to get in the USA from brew shops.

 

[muckanic]

Was doing some searching yesterday and in one post it was said that Beano could be contaminated with wheat. I have no idea but if you are brewing gluten free you should check before trying it. Alpha amylase is easy to get in the USA from brew shops.

The one thing we can get readily here (and I presume in the US) is dry beer enzyme for the low-carbohydrate set. The problem is, you probably don't want completely dry beer, so there is the issue of how long to let it rip. Actually, it is usually added to the fermenter to work slowly rather than to the mash tun. You could dry the brew out completely then sweeten it back up with some maltodextrin/corn syrup, but that requires working out some way of denaturing the enzyme. In theory, enzymes are catalysts and so aren't consumed by the reactions they promote; in practice, folks do in fact seem to use selective amounts of dry beer enzyme to control the terminal gravity.

 

[Joel]

Two updates (excuse typos - 330ml Russian Imperial stouts, number 4 going down as I type...)

No-malt exp #1 is ready to bottle - I have taken a final gravity and it 1.011 from 1.047 (I seem to recall) so has given me by pure chance, what I think is a perfect attenuation. Tastes not too bad... it has a mild tart edge and is is a little "winey" but it also tastes a hell of a lot like beer too. It is in my book missing that "malty" character. But I reckon its not too bad for a light lager style. Just waiting for my final "evening out" rouse to settle down and I will bottle this tonight. Should have a taste report of a force carbed sample by this time tomorrow morning.

Millet biscuit making - I just whipped up a batch of millet cookies and baked m to various stages of colour. They are undergoing final low temp drying out atm but here's areport on the smells of the various colour. I have assigned malt equivalent names based on an estimate of the colour.

Ale / Vienna - just got a little colour on them and pulled em out. Smells like a loaf of fresh cooked white bread torn apart.

Munich - biscuit. That dry dark bread crusty aroma. With a little bit of Nanna's scones thrown in.

Amber - This is the money shot. This one smells malty. Like sticking your nose in a bag of MO

Choc - Not really anything choc about it except the colour (not quite burned black) has some of the maltiness of the amber, and a lot of really dark bread crust. With hints of the acrid burned and some of that slightly deeper "browness"

After its all done I will run congress mashes (steeps really) on each sample and get real EBC figures - plus a taste report on the resulting worts

I recon I can even make a "crystal" biscuit. All I need to do is mix some of the pullulanase enzyme with water and use that water to make the little biscuits. Cook them at 80C under a foil cover for a while to "stew" them crystal malt style - then ramp the temps up to roast them. Should give me little disks of semi sugar/caramel darkened to whatever color I want...

Photos of cookies etc this evening after drying is all done. congress mashes and official EBC figures will probably have to wait till next week.

I have a modicum of confidence about the concept - the more Russian Imperial Stout I drink, the better I think its going to work...

TB

G'day TB,

Could you provise some more detail on your roasting process please? I'm interested in the whole thing; the method for making the biscuits (have you tried the enzyme in the water yet?), the drying stage, how long roasted for and at what temperature.

From your description the Amber sounds pretty darn good. Once my vienna has finished hogging the bar fridge lagering, I would love to give a millet english ale a try.

 

[mpcondo]

I'm loving your gluten free threads. and i would love to hear how the final product on this experiment turned out.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

This very first one turned out surprisingly well - The drawn out process I went through at the end of the boil means I think I have picked up a wild yeast infection which is slowly adding a dirty socks flavour to the bottled beer - BUT - that is to do with the fact that I used flour rather than grain.

Underneath the dirty socks is a moderately pleasant beer. Lackng in malt character and a little tart. But not too bad.

I hold quite high hopes for the beer I made with the rice wine enzymes... it is down to 1.008 and tastes quite normal. The addition of the colour biscuits mentioned above seems to have added a level of maltiness missing in the other GF beers I have tried, so they might be the secret ingredient. I need to work on them a bit.

BUT - this version, with the industrial enzymes is most likely what I will do when I move out of pure mucking about with enzymes territory and actually try to start making a proper batch of beer. I have one more weird conversion technique to try (sweet potatoes) and then I will try to start "normalizing" the techniques - seeing if I can get away with more standard mash routines rather than the 6 hours to 3 day marathons involved with banana or rice wine enzymes.

I strongly suspect that I will be able to churn out decent beers in reasonable brew day formats - and not have to malt a single grain. In fact I know I will because Millet Man has been there and done that - so really this is just an excuse for me to muck about and type excessively long posts

Joel - sorry I haven't replied to your question. The biscuit making was a fairly unscientific affair. 250-300 or so grams of millet flour, a tablespoon of sugar and mixed with water to form a dough. Cut into poker chip sized cookies about 4-5mm thick. They were cooked/dried at around 150C for about an hour then some removed. My oven isn't hot enough to brown things properly, so I put them under the griller and went from there... I just grilled till I noticed "some" colour and removed a portion, then kept on removing some when I noticed a significant increase - trying to get a sort of even slop from just slightly coloured up to dark brown. This was all on one side and it was only on the two darkest increments where the colour started to come through to the back. You could get more bang for your buck so to say, by toasting both sides. I haven't tried the sugar enzymes and stewing thing... I probably wont because I would just use actual caramelized sugar to get a similar effect. But maybe oneday??

TB