7 replies to this topic

[billowens]

Does anyone have plans on building a small malt house for a craft distillery?  And, instructions for malting Barely and Corn.
Where do you find a moisture meter?

I want to publish this information on the ADI website.  

Thanks

bill@distilling.com

[doubleD]

billowens, on 12 March 2011 - 11:53 AM, said:

Does anyone have plans on building a small malt house for a craft distillery?  And, instructions for malting Barely and Corn.
Where do you find a moisture meter?

I want to publish this information on the ADI website.  

Thanks

bill@distilling.com

[doubleD]

B:

we're thinking seriously about doing a malt house for Breckenridge Distillery. If so, we're going to do it right and bring in a malt consultant. I doubt we could make enough for more than our own needs though.

[delaware_phoenix]

I used something called google to find this:

http://www.coleparme...asp?sku=5982310

Maybe it'll do the trick?

[Seattle Spirits]

We looked into it as a way to meet the 51% state raw materials law but the regional malt house now sells identity protected malts so we dropped it.

We found that modern information on small scale malting is very thin but if you go back to the early 1900's there is significant information.

As an example google books has "American handy book of the brewing, malting and auxiliary trades" for free that explains a lot of the process.

There are several others like The Practical Distiller which explain the old crude process well.

In my opinion; unless you have a regulatory reason to malt your own barley or if you really need to to fit your branding I would think that it would be difficult to justify on a cost basis especially for barley.

Modern malts are wonderfully converted and allow you to get high extraction rates from simple single infusion mashing, IMHO you will never get to that level of perfection on a small scale for a reasonable cost as malt is rather inexpensive when you realize the amount of labor involved in a small malt house.

[delaware_phoenix]

Denver Distiller has mentioned the Seibel Institute. They reprint deClerks magnum opus which includes a hefty chapter on traditional malting.

[Jason Parker]

billowens, on 12 March 2011 - 11:53 AM, said:

Does anyone have plans on building a small malt house for a craft distillery?  And, instructions for malting Barely and Corn.

Hi Bill,

Here is a link to an amazingly detailed thread on HomeBrewTalk.com about a guy who germinated his own barley, built his own kiln, and posted every detail along the way.

Happiness is: Home Malting

It's 20 pages of forum, but reads like a thriller and is very worthwhile for those considering home malting.

Jason Parker

[Curtis McMillan]

The epa book I read said you can't malt on bonded TTB land. But you can pump co2 out the windows hehe