Choice of pale ale malts

[rpt]

It seems that most home brewers choose maris otter as their pale ale malt, but why? You can also get other types such as golden promise, flagon, halcyon, optic and pearl. What's the difference?

 

[zgoda]

My experience with pale malts is limited to MO, GP and continental malts, but I prefer these made of so called "Carlsberg variety" (from Danish Malting Group). Very high yield north of 82%, excellent pH buffering capability, healthy amount of yeast nutrient with amount of proteins just right to give good foam without resorting to wheat. Flavour-wise I am unable to taste any difference between them all.

 

[StevieDS]

According to the homebrew company Maris Otter is "the most highly prized of all pale malts" so ive always used it but Im curious about the differences myself.

Apparently Halcyon is "brighter and lighter in flavour than pearl and produces a less sweet wort than MO", but i havent tried it personally.

 

[LeithR]

I know that up here in the NE of Scotland Cascade is a popular variety along with Moonshine - they are grown almost exclusively for malting for the Whisky industry. I recently went round a local maltings and couldn't determine if there was any difference in the method of malting for the Whisky trade versus malting for the beer industry. It seems that each distillery has its own preferred blend of barleys

I came away with 15Kg of malted Moonshine which I have been grinding and mixing with my basic MO maltings. from TMM It works good and the beer tastes fine.

 

[rpt]

I think malt for whisky has a higher nitrogen or protein content because they aren't worried about haze - that all goes when it is distilled.

 

[PD]

I've been reading that Timothy Taylor Landlord should be brewed with Golden Promise Malt. Might have to give that a go on its next day out...I've only ever used Maris Otter or Crisp.

 

[dennisking]

Over the years I've used Maris, golden promise, pearl and maybe a few I've forgotten but for the last year or two have been using Crisp's pale malt from the maltmiller. Cheaper , better extraction rate and tastes as good as any other I've tasted.

 

[PD]

that's good enough for me....

 

[graysalchemy]

+1 for Crisps malts though I use the Marris Otter, and not the one advertised as crisps pale malt which is Flagon.

:thumb: :thumb: