Making wheat malt.

[jedneck]

Malts on the drying table. Minds must think alike Shady. I was thinking of a oat/ wheatmalt mash. 25# oats and 7# white wheat malt.

[shadylane]

Jed, obviously, we prefer the easiest way to getter done.
Just pulled a sample of the mash it was 1.041ish when cooled to 60F.
I tried to figure out what that meant for mash efficiency , but I'll have to wait until I'm sober.
Just added 1 oz of medium temp alpha amylase. According to the info supplied that's enough for 62 pounds of grain.
The enzymes have been working good for converting un-malted grain with this amount.
I'll be dropping the temp and adding gluco also.
If the SG stays the same then I'll assume the malt was good enough to get the job done, without the enzymes.
But, after all the work I've put into malting and mashing, I consider the enzymes as insurance, to guaranty success.

[jedneck]

Shady
I have always used 35-40% of my grain bills as malt. I have always get conversion. The only one I didn't do an iodine test on was a rice mash but still got 5-6% estimate off of yeild. I am starting to decrease the amount of malt in my bills. I have yet to use enzymes. Now that the weather is finally starting to brake I can dig the keg out and start bigger ferments. I got some building to do first. Gonna build a malt roller and also make trays to fit my frodge smoker to smoke/dry my malt.

[shadylane]

I don't have any iodine to test with at the moment.
And I haven't a clue as to the DP of my homemade wheat malt.
So I'll also guess 35-40% is needed for conversion.
I'd recommend getting some alpha and gluco enzymes. Their cheap and easy.

[jedneck]

Ive read that wheat is 180ish for it dp. I always figured 150 but I am going to do a test on my next mash. I'm going to start buy adding 1/2 the malt and mashing for a hour then check conversion. If not converted fully I'm going to add a half pound every half hour till it gets full conversion.

[shadylane]

Sounds like a good way of figuring out the DP of home made malt.
Keep adding it until there's enough.
Trust me on this one jed, buy some alpha and gluco amylase. And make home made malt.
Time, temperature and the proper pH are variable. Having enough DP is guaranteed with store bought enzymes.

[shadylane]

The mash had the biggest cap I've ever seen. Had to scoop some of it off the top to avoid an overflow.
The husks from the 15lbs of ground up oats supplied most of the cap. The ferment is sizzling loud enough for me to hear it without my hearing aids. It also smells more than anything I've ever fermented. I had to remove the insulation from the fermenter to keep the temp from raising too much. To be honest, the fermenting wheat and oats got ahead of me. and I'm trying to do damage control.

[jedneck]

I just started another batch malting. That will give me enuf to convert enuf for a 30 gallon ferment. Its time to get the keg back out and start bigger ferments. Only been runnin a five gallon for the past 4 months.

[shadylane]

It's that time of the year for malting. I want to make enough malt to get me through the year.
Lets see, I can legally make 200 gallons of beer, that's a good excuse to make 400 pounds of malt.
Honestly, I'll probably be too lazy to make that much malt.

[jedneck]

Some beers use more than 2# to the gallon.

[HDNB]

I just started another batch malting. That will give me enuf to convert enuf for a 30 gallon ferment. Its time to get the keg back out and start bigger ferments. Only been runnin a five gallon for the past 4 months.

holy smokes Jed, you ain't gonna get no aging stock that way.

I'd like to thank the rest of you for showing me this branch of the rabbit hole.

[jedneck]

I just started another batch malting. That will give me enuf to convert enuf for a 30 gallon ferment. Its time to get the keg back out and start bigger ferments. Only been runnin a five gallon for the past 4 months.

holy smokes Jed, you ain't gonna get no aging stock that way.

I'd like to thank the rest of you for showing me this branch of the rabbit hole.

I made sure I had enuf stock to get me through winter.

[shadylane]

I just started another batch malting. That will give me enuf to convert enuf for a 30 gallon ferment. Its time to get the keg back out and start bigger ferments. Only been runnin a five gallon for the past 4 months.

holy smokes Jed, you ain't gonna get no aging stock that way.

I'd like to thank the rest of you for showing me this branch of the rabbit hole.

I made sure I had enuf stock to get me through winter.

The long winter is over, it's time to start malting, fermenting and stilling again.

[jedneck]

AMEN..

[shadylane]

On a side note, the mash made with the malted wheat has been fermenting for 2-1/2 days now.
It's still too thick to get a accurate SG reading, the cap is getting thinner but it's still sizzling.
And it smells like a breast fed babies diaper that's very close to your nose.....

[jedneck]

My mashes seam to go through a stink spell right around the same time. Seems to pass as the cap falls. I gave up trying to get sg readings on my mashes. I work backwards for the starting boiling temp( yes I got a thermo in my boiler below the liquid level.) Been getting 5-6% with 2# to the gallon.

[shadylane]

My thermo is in the vapor, so it's not as accurate to reverse engineer the alcohol in the pot.

[MichiganCornhusker]

I got my 100% wheat malt fermenting this weekend.
Once I had the malt almost totally dry on a screen, I put it in the oven and sort of kilned it at about 140F for an hour. I've read that the malt needs to be fairly dry before kilning or the heat will damage the enzymes. The oven treatment definitely finished the drying process and gave it a lightly sweet/toasty taste.
It was easy to grind up, and I ended up mixing about 48# of malt with 24 gallons water to hit 1.06 OG, with iodine showing good conversion. Pitched US-05 and it has a nice frothy cap today.
Gotta say, the mashing was a no brainer. Mixed up the grain with hot water, hit 150F, and let it sit for a couple hours, stirred twice. Done. So simple. But the smell was amazing, it was all I could do to not get in there with a big spoon and just start eating it all. Really looking forward to this run.

[Jimbo]

Makin me thirsty MC! Wheat single malt is one of my all time fav's. So damn good. Was nice to meet up in your hometown for dinner yesterday while passin through. Next time I gotta see your setup.

Single malt is bone simple. My recommendation for anyone looking to step into AG. Barley or Wheat (or both). But wheat is my personal fav.

[jedneck]

Just started drying batch two. And started 25# of corn malting. Any guesses what I'm making?

[firewater69]

jimbo's wheated bourbon?

[jedneck]

jimbo's wheated bourbon?

Yup only I'm using malted corn and a little rye.

[firewater69]

Sounds good Jed, is the rye malted too?

[Tokoroa_Shiner]

Makin me thirsty MC! Wheat single malt is one of my all time fav's. So damn good. Was nice to meet up in your hometown for dinner yesterday while passin through. Next time I gotta see your setup.

Single malt is bone simple. My recommendation for anyone looking to step into AG. Barley or Wheat (or both). But wheat is my personal fav.

Thanks for that recommendation, been looking for something easy to do as a first all grain. As soon as I can find some wheat I'll do a single Malt wheat and then try your wheated bourbon.

[jedneck]

7# white wheat malt getting a little beech wood smoke treatment.

[MichiganCornhusker]

That looks beautiful, Jed, can't wait to hear how this one turns out. I did some beechwood smoking with my taters, but I don't have the process dialed in enough to have any confidence as to how much to smoke. Putting this on my list of things to learn.

[jedneck]

That looks beautiful, Jed, can't wait to hear how this one turns out. I did some beechwood smoking with my taters, but I don't have the process dialed in enough to have any confidence as to how much to smoke. Putting this on my list of things to learn.

Got some corn malting that might get the same trewtment with white oak. Gonna make an all malt wheated bourbon.

[shadylane]

jed does your box have a screen bottom?

[jedneck]

jed does your box have a screen bottom?

Yup screen on the bottom. Box is a snug fit into smoker, maybe a 1/8 inch gap around it. Smoke has to go through the malt.

[shadylane]

Sounds like a winner.
How are you controlling the temperature and how dry was the malt before you started smoking it?