Marris Otter v Mild Ale Malt

[Saisonator]

I plan to make a mild ale this weekend, but when I ordered my grain from GEB a few weeks back they did not have Mild Ale Malt so I ordered Maris Otter instead.
I wondered if it will work fine or another option would be to substitute 1kg of my Maris Otter for 1kg of Vienna Malt?

 

[peebee]

Pale malt from Maris Otter barley is often kilned a touch higher anyway (about 5.5EBC). Mild Ale malt is kilned a bit higher (6-10EBC?) and will be subtly different 'cos it's usually made from Triumph barley (not that I'd believe it to be noticeable).

You'd be fine using 100% Maris Otter pale malt. I've heard it said that the concept of "mild ale" malt is a bit of a joke in the brewing industry anyway, bit like "Vienna malt" which is a bit of a joke in my book too (kilned to about 5-8EBC? Probably means more if used with very pale "lager" malts or the like). If you feel you must add a "speciality malt" I'd probably go with a light (or British preferably) "Munich" malt (although these apparently do "stew" a little too, like crystal malt does, because they are kilned damper than normal) or even an "Imperial" malt or other fancy named malt kilned to the 15-50EBC mark.

 

[Saisonator]

Cheers peebee, think I'll just go with the MO then.
I was keeping the Vienna for a Rye IPA I plan to brew in a month or two.

 

[Sadfield]

Had a 100% mild malt smash brew last year, the Mild Malt gave it a really full flavour.

I'd go the other way as Rye and IPA hopping will be quite dominant, and use the Vienna in the mild where malt is more prominent. Although it'll be a subtle difference. Just my opinion.

Sent from my E5823 using Tapatalk

 

[Pavros]

Presumably you will want to be able to taste the rye in the rye IPA rather than other malts, so I would do as Sadfield suggests and use the Vienna in the mild

 

[ACBEV]

++ with Vienna Malt... I often use mild malt 50/50 with MO.

 

[peebee]

Had a nosey at some "intermediate EBC" UK malts after posting to this thread - in-between Pale Malt and Chocolate Malt (ignoring Mild Ale Malt which is right down near Pale on the EBC scale). I knew about British "Munich" malt and wondered what else there might be given that so many beers now contain exotic Continental malts.

Seems Simpson's is well on the case (possibly due to it being a supplier to Fuller's who seem be an established traditional UK brewery who do not want to lose out to this "craft brewing" malarkey) . "Cornish Gold" (EBC20-27) and "Imperial" (EBC45-55) diastatically active malts before you hit their very good "Amber" malt (EBC54-71) and beyond. Worth a shot?

 

[Sadfield]

The also do Aromatic Malt.

 

[dan125]

Had a 100% mild malt smash brew last year, the Mild Malt gave it a really full flavour.

Was that in the SMASHoff? I entered a 100% mild brew - can't say I liked it that much and I haven't used it since.
For my money its very different from MO, and not in a good way.

 

[Sadfield]

Was that in the SMASHoff? I entered a 100% mild brew - can't say I liked it that much and I haven't used it since.
For my money its very different from MO, and not in a good way.

It was in a homebrew club smash off. Paired with Bramling Cross, although that's as much as I know of the recipe. IIRC it won or was at least in the top 3 beers there. Got my vote.

Sent from my E5823 using Tapatalk

 

[Likbas]

Mild Ale malt is kilned a bit higher (6-10EBC?) and will be subtly different 'cos it's usually made from Triumph barley (not that I'd believe it to be noticeable).

Triumph is the formerly german "Trumpf" barley. It's a barley variety from GDR(German Democratic Republic) from 1973. Now it's in britain renamed to Triumph(means the same as Trumpf) and re-growed, mostly used for Mild Ale malt. But why they use an old eastern german barley variety?

Read it: https://beerandbrewing.com/dictionary/JhxAGlxvew/triumph-barley/

 

[ACBEV]

I did read it... and I think I know why mild malt is mostly made from the east German (Czech) barley type. In the 19th century a lot of Czech barley was imported into the UK, due to its very good qualities, unlike most other European barley, which was considered inferior (still is). I suspect the East Germans wanted good beer, so grew the best barley available from another eastern block country.

 

[Likbas]

I did read it... and I think I know why mild malt is mostly made from the east German (Czech) barley type. In the 19th century a lot of Czech barley was imported into the UK, due to its very good qualities, unlike most other European barley, which was considered inferior (still is). I suspect the East Germans wanted good beer, so grew the best barley available from another eastern block country.

The UK has also very good barley varieties. Plumage, Archer, Spratt, Goldthorpe, Chevallier, Golden Melon and their crossings are famous and historic brewing barley varieties.

Trumpf is an eastern german variety. Much german barleys was crossed with Hanna. Some barley breeder from Germany has their own "Hanna varieties".
Also some German breeder has their own Goldthorpe barley varieties. But Hanna is original czech and Goldthorpe is original british. With Hanna barley, the czechs brews the first Pilsner Beer. The malting technology comes from Britain, because british malting technology with coke as fuel for kiln was leading. The most british brewing barley varieties were "imperial barleys" i.e. erect > "hordeum vulgare distichion erectum", most german(and continental europe) brewing varities are nutant varieties > "hordeum vulgare distichion nutans". But much german breeders had also their own "Imperial Barleys" and some their own "Chevallier barleys". Today is the nutant form the most present form.

In Germany we have a seed bank for some present and much historic barley varities. I bought some old german barley(and oat, later also wheat) varieties and want to grow my own. Also I want to build a historic coke-kiln(but much smaller than in historic times) for it. The seed bank has also much old british varieties(the above mentioned).