Low Gluten Brewing

[kevnlis]

I got some bad news a couple weeks back, and the second opinion today confirmed it. I need to cut gluten from my diet, but I was thinking maybe I could continue to drink beer if I could find a way to use a lot less malted barley/wheat and a lot more oats/rice/corn/sourgum etc.

I have done a fair bit of reserch into GF brewing and am not all that interested in malting my own exotic grains.

I was thinking if I use a bit of a high power grain like Galaxy, add some promalt and use some dextrose alone with a heap of unmalted oats/rice/corn depending on style I could still make some decent brews.

One thing I have not figured out is how I would make spec malts, but that could always come later.

If anyone has any info/experience with a brew like this, or has a good reason why it would not work please let me know.

Cheers,
Kev

 

[troydo]

I feel sorry for ya mate
I'll be wearing a black armband in memory

 

[Lukes]

Kev,

Andrew would be the one to talk or PM to about this as he does it now for a living.

I am sure you will be able to make good quaffer's and something quite exotic.

- Luke

 

[Dave86]

One of the site sponsors (G&G) sells malted sorghum, not too sure on using this however... Link

 

[AndrewQLD]

Sorry to hear that Kevin, hope that won't mean you'll be missing out on any Brew days.
As posted above Milletman is the gluten free specialist, hope it turns out for you.

Andrew

 

[kevnlis]

Thanks guys, this is all new to me, and will take a fair bit of experimenting to see where I am at with it.

I think for my first experiment I will make a beer that is something like:

50% Galaxy
35% Popped Corn
15% Dextrose

4.5% ABV and maybe 25 IBUs of Crystal

Probably won't even need the promalt for that recipe, and it should taste alright I would think.

 

[Ross]

Bad news Kev, especially with your love of good beer....all the best mate.

Anthony of Brewers Choice in Jimboomba sells gluten free extract. This would probably be the easiest way to reduce the gluten content.

cheers Ross

 

[geoffi]

If you're not cutting gluten out altogether, then maybe you should use something fairly hefty as your base malt, like a Munich or Vienna. That might make up for the lightness of the gluten-free ingredients.

 

[Millet Man]

I got some bad news a couple weeks back, and the second opinion today confirmed it. I need to cut gluten from my diet, but I was thinking maybe I could continue to drink beer if I could find a way to use a lot less malted barley/wheat and a lot more oats/rice/corn/sourgum etc.

I have done a fair bit of reserch into GF brewing and am not all that interested in malting my own exotic grains.

I was thinking if I use a bit of a high power grain like Galaxy, add some promalt and use some dextrose alone with a heap of unmalted oats/rice/corn depending on style I could still make some decent brews.

One thing I have not figured out is how I would make spec malts, but that could always come later.

If anyone has any info/experience with a brew like this, or has a good reason why it would not work please let me know.

Cheers,
Kev

Kev,

Sorry to hear that mate, I remember thinking when I was told "who gives a stuff about bread - no more beer"!

Firstly I don't know if it would be wise to continue drinking barley/wheat (no rye or oats either) based beers even with very high adjunct levels. When I used to travel alot in China I would drink the most rice laden beer I could find - cheap local stuff with a fake yellow colour - but it would still make me ill after a week or so. Now the only time I will touch "normal beer" is on special occasions like the exhibitors tasting day after AIBA and then only in moderation - karma will make you spend time in the smallest room in the house to pay for your sins.

If you're an all grain brewer already then it shouldn't be to hard to adjust to GF brewing but the brew days are much longer (10-12 hours). G&G do sell pale sorghum malt so that can make up 80-100% of your grain bill using other grains like rice/corn/millet/buckwheat and any sugars are ok and useful for adding flavour and head retention eg: treacle or belgian candy sugar.

Specialty malts can be made to give extra maltiness, colour and roastiness but I'd start with a pale ale or lager and take it from there, also remember to drop the bitterness back a bit as you don't have to malt backbone to support it.

I posted some articles on here on GF malting and brewing some time ago so if you do a search that will be a start.

PM me if you need any more info.

Cheers, Andrew.

 

[KHB]

Sorry to hear about your bad news mate

 

[Mothballs]

Hi Kevin do you have to remove all gluten from your diet entirely or only reduce the amount in your diet?

There are a fair few options either way, however if you only have to reduce the amount in your diet you have a lot more flexibility in making a larger variety of different beers. Gluten free and low gluten beers can both be made with AG, extract or a combination of both. If you wish to go extract there is an option. As Ross said we sell unhopped gluten free sorghum syrup which can be simply used like unhopped LME and if you use 100% of this or use this with gluten free adjuncts like honey and sugar you can make a gluten free beer fairly easily.


Cheers
Anthony

 

[kevnlis]

Thanks for the words of condolence guys! I have had symptoms for 10+ years and lived with it this long, so I reckon if I can cut back to a level which my body can deal with I will be fine.

Like you said Andrew, my first thought was "oh shit I can't drink beer!" and it took about two seconds for me to start formulating plans of how to get around that. :lol:

I actually have a form which causes random rashes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dermatitis_herpetiformis) on my body, in addition to the internal nasties which had been improperly diagnosed as Kronz disease 10 years ago.

I am going to spend a at least a month on a completely gluten free (is goon gluten free?) diet and start slowly working low gluten beer into my diet.

I did find out that briess malting (which is a 20 min drive from where I grew up in the US) makes a sourgum extract... DOH! Maybe I could cut my recipes in half with that? Use a batch of low gluten beer and blend it with a batch of 100% sourgum extract beer.

I want to be able to make beer without putting in more work, it may sound selfish but I can't be bothered going through the work of malting my own grain!

As a side note Andrew, I checked a few bottle shops here in Bundy for your beers and had no luck! If you have any ideas please feel free to fill me in

 

[kevnlis]

Also oats are fine as long as they have not been processed on machinery that was used for barley and wheat etc.

 

[bonj]

Sorry to hear your bad news, mate. You'll get on top of it.

 

[Sprungmonkey]

Sorry to hear about it mate.

How did the doctors diagnose you with coeliacs disease. Biopsy?

My girlfriend was diagnosed with ceoliac disease about 3 yrs ago (biopsy). She would constantly be tired and rundown . She loves her beer, pasta, and breads, however had to cut these foods out of her diet (even though she still can't resist a beer every now and then... ).

 

[kevnlis]

Cheers Bonj and Sprung,

I have only had the bloood test done to diagnose, but what I have read about the condition makes a lot of sense to me and I am pretty certain I do have it.

I did have a bipsy taken about 10-11 years ago but they were looking for Kronz and Colitis back then, I do not think they tested for Coeliac.

I will have to undergo further testing no doubt. I do not look forward to it!

There are heaps of Gluten Free pastas, bread mixes, snack foods, etc. at my local bulk foods store. Have a look around at health food shops and the like, even the health food section at the local IGA had a good selection!

 

[Wasabi]

I got some bad news a couple weeks back, and the second opinion today confirmed it. I need to cut gluten from my diet, but I was thinking maybe I could continue to drink beer if I could find a way to use a lot less malted barley/wheat and a lot more oats/rice/corn/sourgum etc.

Kev,

Sorry to hear about that Kev.

My Honours project is on looking at the impact of barley varieties, malt types, and brewing processes in an attempt to find out what sort of combinations reduce gluten levels the most, and thereby hopefully provide a guide to what ingredients to use etc, to produce a beer with low gluten levels. I'm not looking at Gluten Free brewing, just as producing beer from typical ingredients with a lower gluten level.

Keep in touch as I should be finished by the end of this year. We have some new bewt (read expensive) test kits that let use look at trace levels of the omega fractions (the protein chain in gluten that causes the problem)

Previous research has suggested lighter styles (lagers, pilseners) are more appropriate, but I'd be staying clear of wheat beers

 

[kevnlis]

Yeah excellent Wasabi, thank you very much for that reply. That is exactly the kind of info I am after!

I do not see why I could not include a bit of barley in my beers. Surely it does not have to be an absolute zero intake of gluten.

If I can manage to completely cut gluten from my diet and only get that little bit from the 1-2 beers I have each night, and manage not to get sick from it, I will be laughin!

 

[Sprungmonkey]

Wasabi,

Sounds like a nice project. What are you doing at uni?
I do a bit of gliadin (Gluten protein) testing here are work using an ELISA method. Its a pain in the arse to test because it such a labour intensive method.

Kev,

There are plenty of options out there GF. Just to save trying different GF pastas and being disappointed with the results try San Remo GF products. They are the best on the market and you can hardly tell the difference between that GF and non-GF. BTW - no affiliation with the company.

There is a few GF beers on the market but I have only tried a few, one which is made in melbourne and will only be stocked by your larger bottlos. Its called Silly Yaks (as in ceoliacs). Not too bad. A bit fruity though.
Its becoming quite a large thing in the food and beverage industry with many people being diagnosed with ceoliacs disease (unfortunately many of which are self or wrongly diagnosed, but anyhow).

 

[Wasabi]

Wasabi,

Sounds like a nice project. What are you doing at uni?
I do a bit of gliadin (Gluten protein) testing here are work using an ELISA method. Its a pain in the arse to test because it such a labour intensive method.

SM,

I finished my Bachelor of Food Science (Brewing) in 2006 and was lucky enough to score a full time job here. Running the AIBA beer awards for about 3 months of the year and the rest of the time working on research and our onsite brewery (cleaning, maintenance, brewing). Also I work as the Brewery tech so helping out with the Short Course in brewing and the Grad Cert.

The uni has done a bit of work with Gluten in beer, so I was offered the project that I mentioned earlier. At the risk of angering Andrew .... the Food Code here in Aus says to be gluten free a product must not use any ingredients that contain gluten. The Europeans are a little more relaxed saying that if it's under 200ppm then it can be labelled gluten free. the 200ppm limit seems to stem from the inability to measure gluten (or more appropriately, the omerga-gliadin fraction) below this level.

We're using the new Ridascreen kits which claim to be able to analyse omega-gliadin down to 20ppm. They're bloody expensive, but hopefully will be able to give us a really good indication of the gliadin fraction content of different barley varieties, malt type and hopefully even processing methods.

Have you used the new Ridascreen kits?