Home malting geminating fail

[Mr Majik]

Hello brewchums

I've had a busy summer but with some free time (and baby number two on the way!!) i've got alot of time at home meaning TIME TO BREW AGAIN :party:

However i have an odd hitch.

I make my own malt. I had quite a good system going last wither but the place i got my grain from was an hours round trip away. Then i found a farm near by that sells direct.

BUT
only about half the grain is germinating... The grains that are not geminating do swell.. And eventually the rest of it does sprout, just much much later. as a test i left a failed bucket to see if the "dead" grain would come to life. So it seems that this barley is, well, at least 50% retarded grain. Either that or theres a problem in the system i employ but its pretty simple and was very successful with 50 odd kg of the other farms grain.

Any ideas on this??

Merci

MM

 

[pittsy]

don't do that myself but grain ain't always good for brewing , it may be for cereals or worse still just for cattle feed thus **** stuff . Surely somewhere in france will sell you good brewing grain already malted , here in the uk it's about 40 euro for a 25g bag , cheap when you get some 150 liters from it .

 

[Fil]

Only thing i can suggest is to go back to the original supplier who it seems has a better stock of grain.

But i would luv to hear about your process for malting your own grain on the small scale? even 5kg must take some room spread out sprouting?

 

[Farmbrew]

Not all barley will germinate for a couple of reasons:

It's too old

It has been dried too hot by the farmer and the heat has destroyed the enzymes that allow the grain to germinate. If the barley had a relatively high moisture content off the field the farmer would have dried it to stop ot going mouldy edp if its going to be used for winter feed.

Not all the barley is the same variety...more husk means more steeping before the grain germinates.

Too much chlorine in the steep water will also stop germination.

Hope above us useful.

F

 

[Mr Majik]

Little update

I was given the phone number of a guy who sells bio malt. Gave him a call and he said "none left, all mine goes straight to a cooperative and on the on to malters, you have a hard time buying brewer quality grain straight from a farm here in Normandie it's all animal feed"

So I called my original supplier who sells most if his grain to brewers and the rest as feed/private sales. It is 6 row but meh, it malted well last time.

Problem is it's an hours drive so I'll get 100kg this time round.

 

[Mr Majik]

Ha Haa third out I was wrong. But it's one of those days I'm happy to be.

Turns out it's not the typical 6 row I was lead to believe (by who Liam? The voices in you head that's who!) I had a chat with the main farmer this time (last time I had one of the farm hands who, despite looking like a hard worker, didn't look like he could out wit a rake) and he told me the species. Beatrix which over here is quite popular with the maltsters BUT not many farms around here produce it (see "animal feed" comment above)

So I went for 100kg which cost 28€ but came away with about 120 kg on te good will of the chap so maybe i'll drop him a few brews off next time.

It's still early days for me, I haven't been brewing a whole year yet and still very much a novice but for those interested I will put a "how to" up on an effective way to malt 3kg batches without taking up much room/time and most importantly money !

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some bottling to get on with :)

 

[oldjiver]

I believe Screamlead does his own malting. Would be nice to hear from him :thumb: