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Anyone else having poor OG with Briess 2 row??

Ck27

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I must have gotten some bad grains or something did everything right expected 1.055 got 1.034... have no clue what happened had to dump some DME into my robobrew to save beer.
 
Grind or mash temp error come to mind. If the grain was old or improperly stored, I suppose there could be issues as well, but I would expect some error as the culprit.
 
BOB357 said:
Grind or mash temp error come to mind. If the grain was old or improperly stored, I suppose there could be issues as well, but I would expect some error as the culprit.

It's not my error I can assure you crush was perfect mash temp was 152F so absolutely no chance it's my fault.

 
BOB357 said:
Grind or mash temp error come to mind. If the grain was old or improperly stored, I suppose there could be issues as well, but I would expect some error as the culprit.

I bought grains 3 days ago and was told shipment was 2 days old at the shop so I'm thinking unless Briess sat the grains in some warehouse for months before my shop got then idk how they would be stale
 
It is most common to blame the maltster when in fact they have pretty amazing controls on their process and storage facilities.  I would request the lot number from the bag the grains came from and look up the COA for that lot.  It has been several years since I bought a bag of base malt from Briess, but I would bet they still have the date of packaging on the report.
 
Oginme said:
It is most common to blame the maltster when in fact they have pretty amazing controls on their process and storage facilities.  I would request the lot number from the bag the grains came from and look up the COA for that lot.  It has been several years since I bought a bag of base malt from Briess, but I would bet they still have the date of packaging on the report.

turns out it was the maltster this time, I emailed them and they told me that I should not be seeing green grains that they might have been harvested too early.
 
Ck27 said:
turns out it was the maltster this time, I emailed them and they told me that I should not be seeing green grains that they might have been harvested too early.

Can you please post the lot number to this? Malt is created tens of tons at a time, so this is no small issue. At the very least, low extract should be part of their lot analysis report.

Malting barley is typically the finest portion of the whole year's crop. The rest goes to cereal and animal feed. Within the industry, candidate crops go through at least two pre-malting analysis processes and several during and after malting. At more than one point, undersized kernals are sieved out and either reprocessed as a roast grain or go to animal feed. Briess is a large, professional, consistent company with many awards for quality, sustainability and innovation.



 
brewfun said:
Ck27 said:
turns out it was the maltster this time, I emailed them and they told me that I should not be seeing green grains that they might have been harvested too early.

Can you please post the lot number to this? Malt is created tens of tons at a time, so this is no small issue. At the very least, low extract should be part of their lot analysis report.

Malting barley is typically the finest portion of the whole year's crop. The rest goes to cereal and animal feed. Within the industry, candidate crops go through at least two pre-malting analysis processes and several during and after malting. At more than one point, undersized kernals are sieved out and either reprocessed as a roast grain or go to animal feed. Briess is a large, professional, consistent company with many awards for quality, sustainability and innovation.

When i get home I'll pm you the details on the lot.
 
I bought a bag of Briess 2 Row about 6-7 years ago from a guy that stopped homebrewing. Long story short, same thing happened to me. I also had to add some DME to up O.G. Needless to say, I have never bought another Briess product since. When it comes to American 2 row, Rahr is the only grain I buy.
 
RLinNH said:
I bought a bag of Briess 2 Row about 6-7 years ago from a guy that stopped homebrewing. Long story short, same thing happened to me. I also had to add some DME to up O.G. Needless to say, I have never bought another Briess product since. When it comes to American 2 row, Rahr is the only grain I buy.

I regularly use great western malts,rahr, and I can't remember but theirs a company in Texas that makes malts.

Usually though I make British beers so most of my grains are from crisp, Muntons, Thomas Fawcett etc. Never had a issue with any of those grains.
 
I was going to ask a similar question. I have been having the same problems and also noticed a lot of chaff,debris and clumps of what appears to be dust that got wet and balled up. I just made a dubbel using some pilsner malt [unknown brand] and had none of the issues I had with briess 2 row. not saying anything bad about them but they must be having some issues.
 
bowhunter64 said:
I was going to ask a similar question. I have been having the same problems and also noticed a lot of chaff,debris and clumps of what appears to be dust that got wet and balled up. I just made a dubbel using some pilsner malt [unknown brand] and had none of the issues I had with briess 2 row. not saying anything bad about them but they must be having some issues.

yeah, my shop told me that they got a bad batch the other day from briess, I mean not knocking briess. All the pilsner malt I use is Weyermann if I recall...
my shop has stuff from Canada, Scotland, US, Belgium, UK and Germany.


 
When it comes to a Pilsner malt. Wyermann is the only malt I buy.
 
bowhunter64 said:
I was going to ask a similar question. I have been having the same problems and also noticed a lot of chaff,debris and clumps of what appears to be dust that got wet and balled up. I just made a dubbel using some pilsner malt [unknown brand] and had none of the issues I had with briess 2 row. not saying anything bad about them but they must be having some issues.


Let's just talk openly and honestly here. No one is looking over your shoulder. Briess, I stay away from with a 10' pole. Maybe some people here have been using their malts for years, and with success. Me, no sir.
 
I haven't used Briess 2-row,  but I have used other malts of theirs (Munich, Victory, Caramel, chocolate) with no problems at all. Of course the kind of issues being discussed here for 2-row are not likely to be an issue with 2 oz of Chocolate malt.

--GF
 
I'm not going to rake Briess over the coals over a bad batch of 2 row. ive been using their products ever since I started brewing with awesome results. plus they are a Wisconsin company and I'm a Wisconsin boy so I like keeping it local if possible.
 
Yeah, it happens but it pissed me off cause it set a batch up for failure, Now I literally use Maris Otter even in American beers, cause I like the flavor and it doesn't have that issue.
 
well I just ordered a bag of briess 2 row and we'll see what happens. hopefully I get a better lot this time! if not i've got some DME on standby!
 
bowhunter64 said:
well I just ordered a bag of briess 2 row and we'll see what happens. hopefully I get a better lot this time! if not i've got some DME on standby!

Let me know how it goes, :)
 
Hi all-

Sorry to hear about the issues you're having.  I'm the Director of Homebrew at Briess- I typically receive these calls and emails, but don't remember being in touch about this issue.

Briess doesn't release malt out of specification, we have no reason to.  Unlike other malting companies, even some mentioned here, we have much tighter specifications than many maltsters.  We're a smaller (fun fact: 26th in the world), family owned malt company, but we also sell in to food malt and feed barley industries.  Unlike other maltsters who may just choose to release whatever is produced, we have other sales avenues for out of spec malt.

We contract our own barley in Wyoming and Montana with multi-generation barley farmers, we're not looking for the cheapest stuff on the market like other folks may.

I don't think the issues you're having are malt related- if you do have a lot number I can send you all of the specs for that particular lot.  I can also see if craft breweries who received the same lot had any issues (though I don't see anything for Brewers malt dating back a while.)  Homebrewers use the same batches of malt Bell's, Allagash, Founders, Ballast Point, etc... use in their beers without issue.

Feel free to drop an email any time, I love talking malting and brewing- aaron.hyde@briess.com.

Cheers,

Aaron

PS- hope to see some SE CA folks at the BYO Boot Camp! https://byo.com/byo-boot-camps/2018-san-diego-byo-boot-camp-overview/
 
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