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How much maltodextrin to use?

MaltLicker

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How much maltodextrin does it take to make an appreciable difference in maltiness in five gallons? 

thx


 
start with some specifics.
What's the ingredient list
What is the mash data
What's yer gravity
What's the hop blend
That sort of thing, then is anyone has a "feel" for your brew (meaning they've been there and done that)  they may be able to offer you some input.  Otherwise it's more than a teaspoon and less than a ton.
 
There is no specific recipe yet.  MD is 95% unfermentable, so the recipe and process should not affect that too much.  Isn't it more a question of how much unfermentable MD is needed to achieve XX effect in a beer? 

Maybe people could post they used XX amount in ZZ style brew?  And whether that worked or should have been more/less?  I'm just looking for the general benchmarks in some different brews.  Thx.
 
Well of course there is the question of whether malto-dextrin is the best entity for getting more malt flavor.
I believe it's  for  body & head  and  does not give you much at all by  way of flavor or sweetness

One way to get more malty flavor is to use more of the darker caramel malt grain.
As you know, they have less enzyme and a darker maltier flavor.  Boost the percent of darker malt beyond the normal 10% - 15%  to maybe 20% or 30%.

There are products that boost malt flavor like  any of the Muntons Malt Extracts (or any  malt extract really), a pound of which is supposed to make a lot of difference  in flavor, but I think that's for replacing other sugars in an all extract brew.   So you know it'll kick the Gravity up.
So, you might experiment with  quarter pound increments knowing that the more you use the more you'll need  a high alcohol tolerant yeast.  And of course you will be getting all the characteristics of the extract brew which you might - or not  - find appealing.

If you want more malty flavor why not boost your  base grains with more  Munich malt.   Get some caramel grains and just  do a bigger mash,  Mash a 5 gallon brew in a 10 gallon tun.  With a lot more grain concentrating on the Munich.
Still you are looking at higher gravity but it'll be all grain high gravity.

I've thought a lot about  doing something like this  trying to get my alcohol up to oh say 16 or 18 percent.
The first ferments would be to the extinction of the beer yeasts ( due to alcohol production)  whose flavor I'd want and then  the rest of the sugar conversion would be done by adding a  neutral  Champagne yeast which can go to 18% alcohol.

Down side to that of course is all the alcohol.









 
I should have said body/mouthfeel and not maltiness.  You raise the issues of how to increase body/MF without also increasing OG and alcohol. 

For ex, a Scottish 60/- with a low OG should still be malty and have nice body without being higher than ~1.040.  So you use Maris Otter, mash higher, and you're still not happy with it.  What's the range of MD to use to boost the body/MF if the recipe is otherwise good to go?
 
CR said:
I've thought a lot about  doing something like this  trying to get my alcohol up to oh say 16 or 18 percent.
The first ferments would be to the extinction of the beer yeasts ( due to alcohol production)  whose flavor I'd want and then  the rest of the sugar conversion would be done by adding a  neutral  Champagne yeast which can go to 18% alcohol.

Down side to that of course is all the alcohol.
You should go for it, It has been a great journey for me.

I have been up around 15.5% (4th attempt) with a Scottish ale as an experiment on how high I could go with just Beer yeast (No champagne yeast). I used 1728, it has been cold conditioning since July of last year. I will let it go till probably around the 4th of July this year. You should note, that the next batch I will be adding champagne yeast to get the FG down below 1.024. The up side to this is that you can make an old ale with the second running's, so you get two beers for the cost of one. :)

Cheers
Preston
 
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