Malting your own barley in small quantities?

I just grabbed a bucketful of barley from the combine driver in the fields next door, I was hoping I might combine that with the very small quantity of hops I've got from a couple of first year plants.
It's just for the sake of it being a bit of a laugh to have made a beer from stuff a few yards away, that's all.
Hops wise, it's going to be enough for about a gallon of beer I think (which I'm happy with), so we're talking in the region of a kilogram of malted barley grain.
So as far as I know, you soak the grains in water, I presume keep them in the dark until they are sprouting, then pop them in the oven at a very low heat to kill them off and dry out the water.
So, can I do that straight away?
How long do they take to sprout and how long should I leave them once they do?
What kind of temp should I "kiln" them at?

Once done, I'll need to mill them, I'm hoping just to stick them in the blender since I don't have anything else. Will that do?

I'm not at all fussy about what comes out (so long as I can drink it, it has alcohol and isn't foul) so I'll be in lob it in and see mode, just wondering if anyone had any knowledge or advice they could offer on the barley?

TIA,

Jim.

search and you shall find :
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/happine ... ndex6.html

All looks a bit too complicated and long winded really

I'm sure as a small boy my dad and I made a beer with sprouting barley, maybe I'm wrong?
I'll ask him about it perhaps.

To Malt your own -
First give the grains a wash and rinse to remove any dust or muck
Then place in bucket and cover with water leave for 2 hours then spread out on something to dry off for 8 hours somewhere cool and shaded
repeat above about 4-5 times until the barley sprouts
Keep it damp at this stage as you need it to grow - once the rootlets are 3 x the length of the grain then its time to stop them
Now they need drying - so stick in a pizza tray or something like that so they are no more than 2 inches deep and dry in oven overnight around 50c
The rootlets turn dark brown and will start to drop off - use a colander or similar to shake/rub all the rootlets off - you dont need these.
That will gove you basic pale malt if you want darker place back in oven for about 2 hours at 120c keep checking if they turn darker and stir them often The ideal colour needs to be buff so grab a grain and a stanley knife and cut down length of grain to open it there should be one part of it a light buff colour (acrospire) if not stick back in oven at 180 for 30 mins and check again keep going until you get the buff colour then they are ready
If you want darker still cook at 200c until happy with colour

Now you need to crush them - blender - maybe, even better electronic mincer, or bash on hard surface with a bit of hard wood - the idea is to split open the grains so the mash water can get in and not to make flour.

Thats basically it - i've malted in excess of 100kg plus now using those methods but now geared up to larger scales doing 5kg at a time with drying screens, electronic grain mill and various ways to roast too. : Have fun!

what a great idea to have a go at. Why don't you combine it with the challenge back to basics as well now that's real beer.

Thanks screamlead for the comprehensive reply. Much appreciated.
My only real problem is that I spend 1/2 the week in London, away from all my brewing gear.
Not sure I can give the barley the attention it needs (without putting it in the back of the car! )
Maybe over the christmas holidays it could work out though.

Jim you can leave it in a large bowl for a couple of days but keep it damp cool and in the dark. It will be fine, if it can be stirred to rotate the grain in the damp and seperate from clumping even better. If its left it will clump up once sprouting which makes it harder to seperate when it comes to drying. I've left mine a couple of times in my attic due to bad weather. Get it going for a couple of days at 2 soak 8 dry/air then just keep damp while away and get swmbo to stir it for you until back.

Ok, thanks! I'll give it a go. I think I'll have about a week continuous down here next week if all goes to plan, so hopefully that will be enough.
I've got access to the combine in fact, so if need be (i.o.w. I mess it up) I can always scrape a bit more grain out of it - there's probably about a sackful or two left in them at least before they get cleaned out, and that won't happen for a couple of months at least. Just might have to fight back the mice, thats all :)

Interesting, I'd like to experiment myself. I think the maltsters add things to control the microbe activity as there is a lot of fungus (fusarium, aspergillus) and lactic acid bateria activity going on in theses stage which can have lasting effects throughout the brewing process.

You can add a campden to the first soak or a minute diluted amount of bleach to counteract any fungus or microbes if you want. I do all my malting in turkey and never had a problem anyway and its waay hotter here.

But what was variety of barley ?

screamlead said:

That will give you basic pale malt if you want darker place back in oven for about 2 hours at 120c keep checking if they turn darker and stir them often The ideal colour needs to be buff so grab a grain and a stanley knife and cut down length of grain to open it there should be one part of it a light buff colour (acrospire) if not stick back in oven at 180 for 30 mins and check again keep going until you get the buff colour then they are ready
If you want darker still cook at 200c until happy with colour

Now you need to crush them - blender - maybe, even better electronic mincer, or bash on hard surface with a bit of hard wood - the idea is to split open the grains so the mash water can get in and not to make flour.

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Great post screamlead, I would love to give malting a try. I do have an electric burr (coffee) grinder, but even on the widest setting, it will take a long time to crush 4Kg. However, I've just rang the local farm supplier and was quoted these prices:
Whole grain barley - 20Kg = £5.50p
Rolled barley - 25Kg = £7.15p

Rolled barley is partly crushed, but the big question is 'Can you malt rolled barley or does it have to be crushed after malting?'

Usually its roasted before crushing not sure what would happen to part crushed or rolled? I have about 20kg of pale crushed at the mo and cant get any more barley either so i may give that a whirl and see what happens.
One of the 'sperts' may come back with an answer - maybe it does something to the sugars in the malt etc????

Perhaps the sprouting sprouting phase is essential? a kind of 'wake up call' for the grain? Once it's crushed, it won't germinate.
I use crystal malt for about 5% of the grain bill. I wonder if it's possible to re-produce in DIY mode.

Yes, the sprouting is essential. That's when starch in the germ gets changed to sugar.

oldbloke said:

Yes, the sprouting is essential. That's when starch in the germ gets changed to sugar.

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Thanks Dave I'll give it a whorl, once I've used up my stash of pale and crystal. When I get to the crushing phase, let's hope I don't burn out my coffee grinder. :hmm:

I've done it with millet, can't remember what I used to crack it up after though - one of the food processor attachments, probably. ...and I was only doing enough for 1 gallon.
I have an old (very old) CJJB book which suggests using a rolling pin or wine bottle as an alternative to a coffee mill or food processor. He points out you don't want it ground too fine as this leads to problems with clearing.