Little Beer Brewday Continued: Ordinary Bitter

Ordinary Bitter isn't a very inspiring label. Ordinary: pedestrian, plain, dull. We even use ordinary as a descriptor when we mean bad. There's something nice about the idea of an Ordinary Bitter though. Ordinary Bitter just is, no punching people in the face with high ABV or flavours turned up to 11. A well made Bitter has a place even though it can't compete with crazy Belgian beers and West Coast IPAs for straight up impact.

Bitter is better when pronounced 'bit-ta' like Roots Manuva

I brewed this one earlier in the year and I think it worked well. It was just 93% Maris Otter and 7% Medium Crystal with 35 IBU worth of First Gold hops. I carbonated some bottles as normal and carbonated others with only half the normal amount of sugar. When comparing them it was almost as if they were two different beers. This time I've run out of Medium Crystal so it's the less traditional Caramunich II instead and I've got East Kent Goldings instead of the First Gold. I'll start fermenting it at 20C and raise the temperature slowly over the week to 24C. Another time I'd like to leave out the crystal and just add a little black malt to adjust the colour.

It's not a revolution in a bottle, it's not different or new, it won't stand out. It's not meant to. It's just meant to be well brewed and good to drink. I like beers that are different and challenging but it's nice to just brew something that can be simple and good without any extra pretension.

Liberty Bitter (23L batch)
OG: 1.037 (1.038 measured)
FG: 1.010
IBU: 35
ABV: 3.5%
EBC: 11.6

93% Maris Otter
7% Caramunich II

25g East Kent Golding @ 90 min
30g East Kent Golding @ 20 min
30g East Kent Golding @ 0 min

1L starter of WY1968

9g CaSO4, 1g CaCl2, 3g MgSO4

80g Acidulated malt to adjust pH.

DIY roasting malts: crystal malt

I haven't managed to get hold of a coffee roaster for roasting malt yet but I thought I'd have a go at roasting some crystal malt in the oven and see how that turns out. As with last time, the info on Barleypopmaker was my guide.

I decided to use Maris Otter pale malt because I've got plans for a Best Bitter and I thought that the English MO crystal might give a nicer flavour than the ordinary crystal I use. The aim was for something reasonably dark, around the 300 EBC mark although I have no way of measuring that except by comparing it to commercial crystal malt.

I measured out 1kg of Maris Otter into a bucket and added enough filtered water to make sure the grain was totally covered. It soaked for around 4 hours.

I love the aroma of Maris Otter as it steeps

After that I mashed the grain at 65'C on the stove for an hour. This is the same as when brewing beer except that the grain isn't crushed. The enzymes are at work during this stage, converting the starches into sugar like they do in a normal mash and a fair bit of it remains trapped inside the grain. This is where crystal malt gets its sweetness from.

Into the pot

Next time a little less water so that more sugar stays in the grain

It took a bit of jiggling with the heat to keep it around 65'C

Then the grain goes into the oven at 120'C until it's dry. This part took ages for me and if I was doing it again I'd do a smaller batch so I could spread the grain out as much as possible to speed the drying up. I stirred it every now and then so that the grain dried out evenly. It tastes so sweet and soft at this stage.

Drying out took ages

Ready to go into the oven for roasting

Finally, the grain is roasted. The sugars are caramelised giving it that caramel/toffee flavour that crystal is all about. I roasted the grain at 180'C for 25 minutes at which point it was a nice, dark colour, I wouldn't have wanted to take it any darker.

The crystal malt just out of the oven

It tastes pretty good. It's quite dark and has a burnt toffee kind of flavour. There's roastiness up front and the sweetness follows on from that. There's also a deeper malt flavour to it than with the crystal malts I've used before.

Crystal and Maris Otter side by side

Overall, I'm glad I gave it a go but it did take me all day. It's the sort of thing that fits into a home day pretty well but would be a hassle to have to do very often. 1kg was really a bit ambitious with our crappy oven and that probably added a couple of hours to the whole process. Ultimately though, the finished product will determine whether this is worth doing again.