Making wheat malt.

[jedneck]

I have been having bad luck with my malting of late. Damn weather. I'm gonna use enzymes to make up for it. Is there much of a flavour difference in fully malted and chit malted. I would like to keep the same flavour if I can?

[shadylane]

Jeb
If I had to pick I'd say the chit malt is a little cleaner tasting than fully modified.
Probably because there ain't no roots or shoots that give a grassy taste.
But I've noticed a big taste difference between dried malt and kilned.
After kilning those pesky roots will turn to dust and are easier to winnow.
I've been experimenting with malted wheat that has everything from chits, to shoots that are starting to turn green.
Not because I want to. I'm having shitty luck malting at high temps. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Some of the seeds chit over night and others take a day or three. In a week malt is all over the place for germination.
My latest experiment is wheat malt that was sun dried but not enough to get the roots loose,
then finished drying in a 275f oven for a couple of hours. Rub and winnow the roots, then grind.
I'd bet good money any natural enzymes have been denatured by the oven temps, but that don't matter.
SEBStar-HTL and SEBAmyl is being used for conversion. One side benefit is the wheat malt has been heated more than enough to kill anything on it and the mash temp is high enough also. It's been making a nice clean ferment, nothing funky has been growing on top of the ferment. I like this experiment enough that I ordered some more enzymes.

[MichiganCornhusker]

That sure sounds like it's gonna make a fine drop, shady.
I haven't had a chance to do anything with my toasted wheat yet, will look forward to hearing how this turns out.
Like you, I suspect the kilning is going to make a big difference.

[shadylane]

A couple of things I've learned from reading and experience.
Wheat sprouts better after it's set in the refrigerator for a couple months.
The first couple of soaking and rests "also known as tides" is best done at around 40-45F.
When the moister content is high enough, raise the temp to 60F and the germination is more consistent.
Once chits appear it's easy to drowned the malt.
Non-viable seeds are were the mold will start on first.
If you squeeze a seed after it's been soaking and milky goo comes out, the seed is dead and will start molding instead of sprouting.

[shadylane]

Since the weather has been nice, I've been malting wheat.
Here's the wheat getting rinsed.

[shadylane]

Found a junk electric oven to make a malt drier out of.
The oven control circuit board was smoked but the heating elements were good.
Tore all the wires out and rewired it for 120v and used a mechanical thermostat.
On 120v the two elements make 1400w. That should be more than enough power to dry malt.
In the future I'll be adding a small fan to stir the hot air.

[yakattack]

Hell yah buddy. I'm just putting together my electric smoker to do the same thing.

[MichiganCornhusker]

Kilning could become a whole 'nother hobby...

[yakattack]

I took to malting like a pig to mud. I love it. I'm going to be playing with malts for a very long time now. Have only used enzymes up until now.

[yakattack]

Shady. What are you using as a Matt for the grains over the grills?

[shadylane]

Shady. What are you using as a Matt for the grains over the grills?

Aluminum screen wire, tied to the oven rack with baling wire.

[rad14701]

Shady. What are you using as a Matt for the grains over the grills?

Aluminum screen wire, tied to the oven rack with baling wire.

OMG...!!! You said aluminum...!!! You know the rules, only copper or stainless steel...

Hey, you left the gate wide open...!!!

Great idea for a malt drier...

[shadylane]

I thought about using a rotisserie with a wire drum.
Figured having the grain tumbling like in a cloths dryer would be good.
Then I realized the dried roots and shoots would be sprinkling down on the lower oven element.

[shadylane]

Great idea for a malt drier...

It's not my idea, I'm coping Bubba
And that's normally, not a good idea

[MichiganCornhusker]

Then I realized the dried roots and shoots would be sprinkling down on the lower oven element.

Smoked grains, even better!!

[shadylane]

I tried heating some of the root dust from the wheat malt until it started smoking.
The smell reminded me of a resistor going up in smoke
I've got a junk electric skillet, figure to put that in the bottom of the oven and fill it with sugar maple wood.
Don't know how well it will smoke the malt, but I'm going to find out.

[shadylane]

I moved the malting racks outside for the pics, normally their inside in the dark.
The racks were originally meant for drying the malt.
But I've found they work good for malting.

[shadylane]

Just a thought.
When making malt. The grain is soaked in water for a while, drained and let rest for awhile..
After doing this a couple times, the malt begins to chit. It's then time to spread it out and keep it moist.
The racks made out of wood and nylon screen work really good for that.
Better than all the other options I've tried.

[shadylane]

Another 50 pounds of wheat malt

[MichiganCornhusker]

Another 50 pounds of wheat malt

Ha, malting can get addicting, that just looks delicious!!

I agree that the screens work great for malting wheat.
I use buckets for my corn, and they work great, but wheat tends to retain more moisture and will start to go funky in a bucket.

[shadylane]

I've been using a bucket to soak the wheat for around 12hours.
Then spreading a layer in the trays and stacking them in a cool dark place.
The top tray has a piece of cardboard over it and the bottom tray is free to drain.
I'll spray a little water on top around twice a day and restack the trays once a day.
4 days latter the wheat malt is ready to dry.
I've had zero problems with mold and the grain sprouts more equally than my 2 bucket experiments.
Next time I'll try malting some corn this way.

[shadylane]

A friend has been using trays for malting wheat, barley, oats, corn, millet and sorghum grain.
He stacks them 10 deep and malts in a storm cellar.
An old cloths drier and oven is used for drying and kilning the malt.
The only problem I've seen so far, is the bastard is better at malting than I am.

[Swedish Pride]

i grabbed a handful of popping corn and soaked for 72 hours with new water every 24hours just to see if it would work.
Now after 2 days of keeping them damp about half of them have chitted, I can see how this can get addictive.
don't really have the space get in to it properly. on the other hand the feedstore have 25kg on whole wheat for 10€...

[Beerdude]

I tried malting some wheat... now i´m not sure whats happening. It smell not very well, only a few sprouted and if i squeeze those who look like normal grains, a "sticky white cream" comes out of the grains? Did this one fail? Maybe i soaked to long and there was not enough air flow?

Thanks for any help

[Kegg_jam]

Yuck....

I believe you probably drowned the poor buggers.

Shorter soak times and let them breath a little in between soaks.

I haven't done wheat but had luck with barley, rye and corn.

[Beerdude]

Yuck....

I believe you probably drowned the poor buggers.

Shorter soak times and let them breath a little in between soaks.

I haven't done wheat but had luck with barley, rye and corn.

Ok, smell was to disgusting, i dumped it. Did wheat malting 2 years ago for beerbrewing, that was a success, but only once. I start a new batch with a smaller amount to practise more, 1 kg or so.

[shadylane]

Damn, Didn't store the wheat malt properly and the last couple pounds got infected with meal bugs
But that's Ok, there's green malt, stewing in the oven right now
And some more malt slowly air drying to preserve it's DP

[shadylane]

The dried wheat malt is on top
And the bottom shelf has over modified oats.
That's why it's green

[MichiganCornhusker]

Hey, Shady, what temps are you using for kilning?
Any idea where your DP ends up, or are you just using liquid enzymes?
Would you say you are drying, toasting, or roasting? All of the above?

Nice drying setup, do you force air through it?

Your lucky to have such great luck with oats, I haven't been able to malt oats yet, they just get mushy for me, no sprouting.

[shadylane]

Hey, Shady, what temps are you using for kilning?
Any idea where your DP ends up, or are you just using liquid enzymes?
Would you say you are drying, toasting, or roasting? All of the above?

All the above and/or stewing the malt
Guess the DP depends on the moister content/temps I tortured the malt at
Most of the time I use liquid enzymes, some times I roll the dice
Often I use the malt for nutrients/flavor in a sugar wash.
In other words, I seldom do the same thing twice

Nice drying setup, do you force air through it?

Forced hot air would be the cats meow for drying
This modified oven only "had" a fan inside to stir the air.

Your lucky to have such great luck with oats, I haven't been able to malt oats yet, they just get mushy for me, no sprouting.

First oats I've gotten from the feed store that was viable.
Must have been an accident