Malted Barley Whiskey

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Woodcrafter
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Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by Woodcrafter »

I have a friend who's decided to get out of the "beer brewing" hobby. He has several pounds of Malted Barley remaining, and wanted to know if I would be interested in turning the grain into another alcoholic drink. Can I run the barley by itself ? He's not interested in mixing corn, rye, or any other grain with the recipe......just malted barley. I feel like it's a total waste of the barley, but it's what he wants. Any feedback ?
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by shadylane »

Irish whiskey
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fizzix
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by fizzix »

Malted barley has a diastatic power of 105°L, well above the ~30° minimum to be considered self converting (http://www.brewingwithbriess.com/Assets ... yeMalt.pdf)
so yeah, make Irish Whiskey like shadylane suggests.
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HDNB
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by HDNB »

i'm on it right now. one of my favorites.

Been doing a strip/spirit method and the result is a full, robust, heady (not headsy) whiskey.

Before going Irish on it and stripping flavour with a third run...try it this way, it's truly wonderful on oak. if there is too much flavour you can always ruin it with a third run later.

i got a semi-sourmash idea going on this. All my recent reading on esterfication has me experimenting with some early success! goes like this:
make a gen 1 ferment and strip it.

make a gen 2 ferment and put 80% in still and top up with low wines. heat it up the night before to just about producing and then shut down for the night and do the run the next day....keep a small heart cut white if you want.

make a gen 3 ferment and add it to the 20% left over in the fermenter from Gen2

run 80% of gen 3 topping up with low wines or feints or whatever you want to call them at this point.

etc. etc, until you have a big enough collection of low wines to make a straight spirit run (that's like 5 for me)

the theory being that the ferment is full of them fancy long chain fatty acids etc...adding more ethanol to the mix for the ester reaction and then finally adding heat to speed up the reaction time (i'm allowing about 14 hours of "hot")

plus side, you get to reuse the yeast! and a reduced run time the next day since it's already hot.

first run is promising! lots of fruity nose. the flavour is really nice and i just put it on oak, so we'll see how it fares in the long run.

i've got enough malt 2 row barley to complete the cycle 4 more times (so 10 ferments in total) so i hope for a fairly large finished batch of single malt

remember to turn the mixer on the next day and stir it up to avoid scorches etc from settled particles.
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by kiwi Bruce »

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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by Pikey »

HDNB wrote:i'm on it right now. one of my favorites.

Been doing a strip/spirit method and the result is a full, robust, heady (not headsy) whiskey.

Before going Irish on it and stripping flavour with a third run...try it this way, it's truly wonderful on oak. if there is too much flavour you can always ruin it with a third run later.

i got a semi-sourmash idea going on this. All my recent reading on esterfication has me experimenting with some early success! goes like this:
make a gen 1 ferment and strip it.

make a gen 2 ferment and put 80% in still and top up with low wines. heat it up the night before to just about producing and then shut down for the night and do the run the next day....keep a small heart cut white if you want.........................
Please clarify if you don't mind - when you say "semi-sourmash" do you mean starting with corn ? or do you mean "All malt" ? -with multiple generations like a sour-mash ? If all malt - I'm thinking this coud be a very economical way of going down the "Scotch path". You don't mention sugar either - Are you doing the later generations as full AG mashes and adding them ? or are you adding them as smaller additions, with sugar - like a sour-mash ?
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HDNB
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by HDNB »

@pikey
it is all malt 2-row. corn does not really have to do with sour mashing. no sugar, no gumballhead.

in a true sourmash backset is used to sour the next ferment, probably most would do it just before the mash-in stage to lower the PH and assist the saccrification enzymes. I'm sure there are other ideas on when and how much backset to use.

this is just the idea of re-using the yeast trub of the last ferment to kick off the next. not really sourmashing other than than the incoming trub is sour(er) than a sweet mash alone.

mostly what i'm trying to accomplish is the extra alcohol in the mash, heated up for 12 +hours before distilling to see if it will increase esterfication. anecdotal evidence seems to support the theory at this point. By adding the strip run, i just ended up with 20% too much mash to fit the still, so i started a new ferment with it.

no peated component either, it is giving a big malt flavour. not really scothchy at all.
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by VLAGAVULVIN »

Sub'd, don't stop reporting it, please :econfused:

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Woodcrafter
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by Woodcrafter »

Thanks, for the feedback. I'm gonna start a batch, this week.
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by JellybeanCorncob »

Woodcrafter wrote:I have a friend who's decided to get out of the "beer brewing" hobby. He has several pounds of Malted Barley remaining, and wanted to know if I would be interested in turning the grain into another alcoholic drink. Can I run the barley by itself ? He's not interested in mixing corn, rye, or any other grain with the recipe......just malted barley. I feel like it's a total waste of the barley, but it's what he wants. Any feedback ?
Woodcrafter: All barley malt whiskey is a favorite of mine. Its so easy, and by adding smoked malts you can change flavor profiles. (cherry wood, peat, chocolate malt, oak smoked...). I'm in the middle of a single malt that when done, I plan on aging with some once used bourbon staves that have been soaking in sherry for 6 months.
I only do a strip then spirit like HDNB does. "Robust heady" is a great way to describe all malt Barley whiskey. Thanks HDNB. :D
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by bluefish_dist »

If you want a more scotch style, add a small amount of peated malt. I have a couple batches on malt whiskey going right now. Some more peat, some less, and even a couple of porters.
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by Pikey »

HDNB wrote:@pikey
it is all malt 2-row. corn does not really have to do with sour mashing. no sugar, no gumballhead.............

no peated component either, it is giving a big malt flavour. not really scothchy at all.
Ok so it's a traditional AG - using malt ? - I think that's what you're saying, but gen 2 goes on to the residue of gen 1 after sacherification and a little backset is added as well. SImilar to sour mash - except the sugar comes from the cooked grain ?

Thanks for that.

Oh it's not essential to have "Peaty" in SCotch btw - my favourite "cheapie" - Glenmorangie - does not taste of that burnt plastic taste at all ! :D :D
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by Durhommer »

I really enjoy reading the old threads that give great examples of what to and not to do
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Re: Malted Barley Whiskey

Post by 850stealth »

I'm looking at doing this soon. I just made some with LME and it's currently on oak. Ok want to use just 2 row malted barley and make 2 50 liter ferments. What's everyone's thoughts on how to run it. I can either strip it all and then spirit run through pot or one and done through plated column, I have 4 plates but can remove and drop down the number to 3 or 2 plates.
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