Pale Ale Base Malts - Maris Otter vs Golden Promise vs Malteurop vs Gladfield

[Cain Harland]

I'm interested in peoples opinions on:

Maris Otter vs Golden Promise vs Malteurop Pale Ale Malt vs Gladfield Pale Ale Malt

Particularly in something with a simple malt profile like a west cost IPA

And are the first 2 worth paying twice as much for?

And if there is a big difference can a base of one of the cheaper ones plus a small amount of a specialty malt achieve a similar effect?

[Crusader-Rob]

I use Gladfield (Local) alot, while it is a great malt, it misses the mark for some of the meatier beers, Porter etc.

For an IPA, I';d go with the cheaper option, IMHO.

[Peter Smith]

I reckon you can achieve an interesting result if you mix gladfields ale and pilsner in a 3:2 ratio vs golden promise.   I think MO is out there by itself.    But 95% of my brewing uses Gladfields,   I am in the learning stage, I am also using Gladfields crystals etc I think its fresher.  Gladfields has a malt substitution chart out, only in printed form,   email them and they will post you one.

[Cain Harland]

I have liked a bit of pils in my pale ales lately.

[Peter Smith]

the real question for me is, how come a malt that is no where near as fresh is so much more expensive

Answer has to be freight and multiple distributor markups.

[Crusader-Rob]

Pretty much freight charges.

I'm a gladfields man, Although in my pale ales I've subbed out around 15-20% for Maris otter, it definitely gives more body.

I made a porter some time back with Gladfield Pale, and made a beer with MO straight after (different beers) but noticed on a lower mash temp beer, the bodsy seemd as full as the porter, so I'd recommend Maris Otter for English styles, Porter Stout Bitter etc.

[Jono Galuszka]

Me too. Great way to get an extremely clean malt base. Pils with a bit of crystal to give it colour has always worked well for me.

[Richard Jack]

I've mostly used Golden Promise and Maris Otter by preference. I've dabbled with gladfield and malteurop in the past and not really been happy with taste, and had more problems with clarity and efficiency than I'm used to so went back to what I felt was more predictable. No science in those results though, just my own anecdotal experience.

Lately however I've been loving the gladfields specialties so I'm giving them another go on the base malts. I've been using a bit of glads pils recently and have been impressed so far (only one brew). Maybe I'm a less-bad brewer now? when my current sack of GP runs out I'll try gladfields ale again for pale beers. I'll probably stick with MO for english styles.

I know gladfields had some new plant go in down there, was it just for the specialties or did they change their base malt processing as well? Anyone know?

[Samuel Loader]

for an american IPA/PA where you dont want any bread/toast character I tend to go for the gladfields or malteurope but any english style beer I definately use the the golden or the maris from a style point of view

[Matt Smith]

I made a decision, mostly philosophical to stick with Gladfield base malts, as it does't really make sense to me to use malt shipped from the other side of the world, to an australasian supplier, then to a home-brew shop, then to me, when we have our own grown right here that we can get for much cheaper. I'm still using European specialty malts. Now that Gladfield are doing specialties I need to get myself sorted and start doing some substitutions to see how they translate.

A huge bonus with using Gladfield is freshness. Sacks of Golden Promise or Maris Otter that I've bought in the past are always at least 6 months old, wheres I've never had a sack of Gladfield more than 2 months old. A few days ago a did a side by side chewing on some Gladfield Vienna vs Weyermann Vienna, the difference in freshness was massive.

I also had issues with clarity when I first started using Gladfield base malts, however as soon as I got myself sorted with a PH meter and started using Acidulated malt those issues went away. Before I nada PH meter, I was relying on the EZ water calculator predictions. Now that I'm able to test these, it turns out they are consistently about .3 or .4 of a PH lower than actual readings. For example, if I dialled in my mineral and acid additions to a target of Ph 5.3 as per the calculator, the actual reading would be more like 5.6. Dialling this in to the 5.2 - 5.4 range has a massive impact on clarity in my experience.

Regarding Maris Otter/Golden Promise for English styles, I'm starting to wonder if its a bit of a myth based on tradition. If your using a good English Yeast, English hops, Gladfield base malts and add a bit of Munich or some other lightly toasted malt in the grist, I think you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference. I'm happy to be proven wrong though!

[Scott H]

Have recently switched to using Gladfields malts aswell.

I brewed an Amber ale about 6 weeks back and it was a thing of beauty also stoked with the end result of my NZ Pilsner using GF too.

I'll most likly continue using them in any new recipes I make but recipes I have that a tried and true using GP or MO I'll keep using the respective malts just for consistency.

[Tilt]

I'm a big fan of Gladfields.  They're producing good quality local product and going the extra mile to improve quality, meet customers needs, expand their range and do something interesting with specialties that I reckon in time will give us something locally that no one else will have so close to home. Who knows, red back, shepherd delight or manuka smoked malts  might become to US brewers what victory, golden naked oats and carabelge were to us a couple of years ago  - written up in mythical recipes but far away and seemingly unattainable.

I can brew 90℅ of the styles I like by knowing the characteristics of the   local base malts and adjusting my method and grist to suit (e.g. by mashing a couple of degrees higher or by adding acidulated malt for pH balance or munich/ vienna / biscuit / choc etc for complexity).  There's very little I haven't been able to do with Gladfields base (ale and pils) and some specialties so far...but

The only exceptions are:

I haven't been able to reproduce the nutty, malty richness of maris otter in a bitter....and

I haven't matched the clean rich light aromatic maltiness of imported pils malts in a pilsener or pseudo pils.

My take is that any style which relies more on the yeast or hop or speciality malt characters is fine with local malts.  

There are a special few international styles (like in cooking where valrhona chocolate or Spanish jamon or genuine Thai fish sauce make the vital difference) where reproducing the flavours and sensation of a beer brewed overseas relies on using the ingredients from that area.  At its best beer is a fresh and live food that unashamedly reflects its origins so it makes sense to use belgian or German or English ingredients for a beer style originating in Europe.

What this does make me think though is that, with world class unique and locally grown raw produce we are on the cusp of genuine and distinctly different New Zealand styles that showcase our local crops and take them to new heights.   I'm thinking that the commercial and home brewing scene here are more than capable of using the best of what we have to create distinctive New Zealand new world flavours in beers that rival anything made overseas.  Some already do and I'm sure there are more to come.

I reckon its time we moved on from fanboi US hop style wannabes we sometimes seem to be and make a fist of using kiwi ingredients to showcase the best of NZ in the beer world.   There's already a lot of uptake of NZ ingredients like Riwaka and Nelson Sauvin overseas but it'd be a shame for the best of our crops to be used by off shore brewers.  There's more than enough talent here to be ahead of the Aus and US micros in pushing boundaries with our hops and malts and maybe even over time isolating and generating our own "pacific" yeast strains.

That's enough of me for a Friday night rant.  Cheers to kiwi brewers, I'm looking forward to what's on the horizon!

[Cain Harland]

I'm liking the responses here. local ingredients tick a lot of boxes economic, environmental, ethical, fresh etc. And we in NZ produce ingredients there that are both world class and unique and brew beers that are both world class and unique. This discussion has reminded me of the intent I had when I got into all grain brewing, to use as much NZ based ingredients as possible and make great NZ styled beer. I had forgotten this after reading so in magazines and on the internet about how great this west coast IPA or Belgian wit or American hop combination is. I guess that's just a function of living on a small island at the bottom of the world in this age of global information. So thanks for reminding me about the benefits of local. Now to designing an NZ dIPA to replace the yank one I had planned.