Brewing with strange adjuncts.

[JoKing]

I was gonna leave this as a bit of a suprise... for a case swap maybe but I had a killer idea that I havent seen anywhere else before. So I'm after a bit of feedback for a few points...

1, What grist / type of beer would the adjunct go best with
2, Would it be worth it?
3 Would it work?

So,... what is the mystery adjunct?

I was thinking about toasted sesame seeds! Like making a really toasty, bready beer... minimal hop contribution, and using 250 grams of toasted sesame seeds in the grist.

WhaddyaReckon?

[Reviled]

Anywhere we can get flaked Maize in NZ?

[James P]

I haven't found it.... but popped corn would provide a similar effect...

[JoKing]

Polenta

[James P]

That's what I have been looking at too, given we make polenta at home quite a bit.... corn grits for you southerns! :P

[Tony]

Yeah, it makes me go snap, crackle, pop.

Seriously, it adds to the head retention. Cornflakes does the same thing. Can add slightly to the body, but not by much.

[Soren]

I've oftne thought about wheatbix as well, but have been concerned about the additives and potential their effect on the mash and fermentation... I assume it would act much like unmalted wheat? do you just put it straight in the mash?

[Tony]

Yup, straight in with the grains. For a 5kg grain bill I normally put in about 200g or about 3-4%. I haven't had a problem yet.

[Soren]

Cool. What kind of taste do you think it contributes, same as unmalted wheat (i assume the bix is unmalted...)? do you think you could make a "real" wheat beer with say 40% bix?

[JoKing]

Have a look on the pack, and see how much Carbohydrate is in it... I thought that Wheat Bix was mostly made up from the wheat bran... the by-product from making white flour. Next time you use it Tony, enter its weight value (in promash) under "Wheat Malt" instead of "Wheat Bix".

What I am interested in knowing is the potential yield from the Wheat Bix... so Wheat Malt is something like1.032 potential, so if you use 2.5 kilos of the stuff in a standard 20L brew, you'd get about 1.026 SG in the brew. If Wheat bix has a lower potential yield, but you entered it as Malt, you'd undershoot your expected SG thus telling us that there is less potential for starch conversion in wheat bix. If the SG is the same as expected, we could tell that Wheat Bix is as useful in the brew as any other whole wheat product.

Should be a good little experiment.

[Tony]

It states 20g of carbohydrates/2 biscuits Δ 6 biscuits would contribute 60g of carbohydrates. As I said it is mainly for head retention, not flavour. I believe Weetbix is the wheat husks left over from when they thrash the wheat for, whatever. But it does contain barley malt extract, sugar, iron and a few other trace elements. So I would assume, they must add to the mash. I wouldn't want to add that many, as you probably know, what Weetbix looks like when it is wet, it would be hard to avoid a stuck mash. So I don't rely on it to provide any SG, therefore I don't calculate it as such. It probably does contribute some character, but at the amounts I am using, not a noticeable amount. If I wanted to use malted wheat, I would use malted wheat, not weetbix. I have entered it into the beersmith database, as an adjunct, not a malt, as such. I have absolutely no idea, how much SG it would contribute.