Roasted barley - should I have crushed it?

[Nottsbeer]

This is probably a stupid question, but should I crush roasted barley?

I made an oatmeal stout mid July and it smelt odd when fermenting (I've posted about this before). Having opened a bottle tonight, it still has the smell and not much taste. Thinking about what went wrong, it struck me that maybe I should have used crushed roasted barley? Bought it from the local HB shop and just presumed it was good to go. Do you think using uncrushed barley in the mash (60 mins @ 66oC) could have resulted in the odd smell?

This led me to my GH book which has the recipe, and it notes not to add this ingredient into the mash in the table Pg 26. I'm now thinking that having a stepped mash is good for this recipe, and adding the barley towards the end of the mash maybe good?

Any feedback gratefully received. I will attempt this or a porter again before Xmas, and succeed!

 

[DavidDetroit]

The grain should be crushed to varying degrees depending on what method you brew. (BIAB, for example, could stand a pretty fine crush). Uncrushed would make it difficult to extract what's needed for the wort. The idea is to expose the inside through milling.
There would be no odd smell from uncrushed.
I am curious as to whether you hit your target OG.

 

[Nottsbeer]

The grain should be crushed to varying degrees depending on what method you brew. (BIAB, for example, could stand a pretty fine crush). Uncrushed would make it difficult to extract what's needed for the wort. The idea is to expose the inside through milling.
There would be no odd smell from uncrushed.
I am curious as to whether you hit your target OG.

Hi, I did a BIAB method, scaled the GH recipe down for a 13l brew. I was over my gravity targets, probably as this was only my third AG brew and my efficiency was higher than expected. I only used 37g roasted barley....as you can see from the pic it is definitely not crushed. As I had bought choc malt and crystal from the same shop (crushed), I just presumed I was fine. It seems to break down easily when chewed so I can probably crush this for the next attempt. This brew was a bit of a failure as I realised when I was getting my hops ready that I had the wrong ones, which may also account for the bland taste. Am puzzled by the smell but that is probably something else which I may never suss out. Last couple of brews have gone to plan with no smell so hopefully just a one off. Cheers.

 

[DavidDetroit]

I understand your situation better now and would have probably posted a little different response.
In any case, regarding the smell, if you could describe it, that might lead to a solution. You could check out common off-flavors in beer (smells will be there too) and see if any of those are what you're experiencing.

 

[Nottsbeer]

Hi David, your initial response was great. If I had thought about the grain more on brew day I probably would have eventually twigged that it wasn't quite like the crushed grains. A mistake to add to my growing list!

Regarding the smell, it's hard to describe and I can't find anything similar in the brewing book I have. It's more annoying that I can't identify where I went wrong rather than having bland beer with a slight smell! It's probably an infection of some sort. Good to know it wasn't from uncrushed grain. As my subsequent brews have gone fine (), hopefully just a one off. Thx for your help.

 

[user 43495]

I have always bought crushed grains. Unless you want to chase them round the kitchen with a rolling pin I see no reason to buy whole. That's just me though.