Marris Otter vs Lager Malt - what's the difference?

[lancsSteve]

I picked up a sack of Marris Otter at Leyland Homebrew the other day - they didn't have any lager malt by the sack load.

What's the difference?

Can you make a reasonable lager with marris otter?

My cellar temps have dropped to a nice stable 10-12C now so I want to get some lagers going. I like malty german style amber and dark lagers - not ultra-thin ultra clear ultra-light styles (which is hopefully convenient for homebrew purposes).

I'm planning a first test one with saflager (?) or brewferm (? - opinions welcomed!), liberty hops and pale malt + something to give it caramel/amber (amber malt or cara munich). For the pale malt as I've got a sack load of marris otter will be that unless there's a good reason not to?

First time will be as much to get process sorted e.g. a secondary wort chiller made/tested/used (just a coil of thin syphon hose between boiler and FV coiled in a washing up bowl of ice) and, if necessary, also putting FV in ice bucket to drop temps that last 8C or so from 20c I can happily reach with immersion chiller to fermenting temps of 12C. Then getting the cool fermentation tried out, testing diacetyl rest temp raising and lagering as well...

Obviously keen to save costs for this sort of experiment then start seriosuly looking at going to the dark side and trying to make something similar to my favourite beers: kostrizer / schwarzbiers and dunkels...

[yashicamat]

My Centennial Ale (a conventional "american styled ale") is made with 100% lager malt and fermented with US-05. Although it's not ready yet, I prefer the aftertaste so far from the malt to MO (or at least, low colour MO).

[lancsSteve]

One tastes good, the other doesn't.

I infer you mean MO is the good tasting one? Or have I got that the wrong way round

You can make a pseudo lager using marris otter, just use a lager yeast and lager hops, no need for cara anything now you're using a decent malt.

SO for dark lagers especially MO should be fine? (Maltier than lager/pilsner malt?)
Further inferring that if there's no need for cara malts that's because MO is maltier in the first place?

Presumably amber and dark malts can be used to add colour and flavour profiles and the 'base malt' in any recipe becomes the category term of '2-row pale barley malt' (in my case MO) rather than splitting hairs over the 'authenticity' of using pilsener malt vs US 2-row vs Marris Otter vs lager malt - especially when I'm planning darker lagers rather than super pale ones.

Right - now time to find me some good dark and amber lager recipes...

[adm]

"Lager" really means "to store".....so a lager is really just a beer that's been stored in the cold for a long time, so theoretically you could use any malt.

In modern British terminology it's come to mean a beer made with a very low coloured pale malt. But don't let that stop you!

Try with the Maris Otter, a lager yeast and some German or Czech type lager hops, ferment it cold and then lager it for a month or two and you should have a superb beer - with more taste and colour than if you'd used "lager" malt.

[lancsSteve]

Thanks adm - figured that was the case. As I'm DEFINITELY NOT aiming for a british-style 'lager' but have the incredible fortune of a BIG cellar with nice stable temps of 10-12 to ferment in and (soon) a spare fridge to lager in at 2-7C then 'lagers' are the way forward. (Unlike a modern house we have stable temps in the cellar but the rooms get warm then cold so less good for fermenting ales.)

Spent 2 months traveling in Europe this summer in our camper van with nearly half that in Germany and fell properly in love with proper german lagers and weissens. Now want to make them - but want to have that full mouthfeel and rich maltiness + amber colour (at lightest) through to black-as-pitch (at darkest) of the real aged lagers. Not that hideous fizzy piss water passed off as 'lager' here.

Shall substitute MO for whichever 2-row/pale malt is specified in recipes and use the Liberty hops I have at the moment in the freezer to get the processes down and then start going for more trad ingredients (wyermann malts and hallertau hops).

Any opinions on good lager yeasts? Not sure whether to go for a good liquid yeast or dry... Suprised how expensive Saflager is so figuring may as well go for Wyeast and split it as that's better and cheaper in long run...

Scheming on adapting this:

http://www.brew365.com/style_munich_dunkel.php

All Grain Recipe - Munich Dunkel ::: 1.052/1.011 (5 Gal)

Grain Bill
7 lbs. - Pilsner Malt
3 lb. - Munich Malt
1/4 lb. - Crystal Malt (120L)
1/4 lb. - Chocolate Malt

Hop Schedule (15 IBU)
1 oz - Tettnanger (60 Min.)
1/2 oz - Tettnanger (30 Min.)
1/2 oz - Tettnanger (10 Min.)

Yeast
Wyeast Bavarian Lager (2206) - 1800 ml starter

Mash/Sparge/Boil

Mash at 152° to 154° for 60 min.

Boil for 60 minutes (remember to compensate your water if you normally do 60 min boils)
Cool and ferment/lager at about 50°

To:
4.5kg Marris Otter
125g Crystal
125g Chocolate

Mash at 67C

28g Liberty (60Min)
14g Liberty (30min)
14g Liberty (15min)

Ferment at 10-12C with large starter of Wyeast bavarian lager

Raise to 14C for diacetyl rest

Lager at 7C

Should be good and has everything i got - except for the yeast which I've just ordered.

[Eadweard]

MO is considered the best of the pale malts - a two row winter barley bred for brewers.

Lager malt is going to be lower in quality and higher in nitrogen. This is why decoction mashing with its protein rest was used on the continent whereas British brewers could use a simple infusion mash.

[Zapp Brannigan]

As a fellow lover of German lagers/weissens etc I will be very interested indeed to see how you get on with that grain bill (more so as I have all of that to hand). Any particular reason for the choice of Liberty hops over Tettnanger though?

Cheers

ZB

[lancsSteve]

Any particular reason for the choice of Liberty hops over Tettnanger though?

Yup - I have them in the freezer!

LIBERTY BREWING HOPS-100g 4.9% Alpha £1.40 **BARGAIN**
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0490195953

And that link's the reason I have them - cos they were £1.40 for 100g instead of £6 for tettnager. Also have Pilot / williamette / mount hood / bravo and admiral from the same guy.

Based my substitution on info here: http://www.brew365.com/hop_substitution_chart.php

In the future I plan to do this much more traditionally with either tettnanger and/or hallertaur hops and maybe munich malt instead of/as well as marris otter plus carafa special 3 instead of chocolate - and maybe even melanodin malt to get the decoction flavours. But as a trial run/learning experience I'll use what I have to hand!

[Zapp Brannigan]

That is a very good price, and a pretty good reason to go with the Liberty

Isnt Liberty a popular choice for American style lagers? I dont really know much about the variety other than the yanks use it for something or other.

Please let us know how you get on, I would be very interested to hear what it comes out like.

ZB

[GARYSMIFF]

I have made some very nice Bitters with Larger malt in the past as well as some lager type beers with MO

but the best result for my lager types was with Half and Half.

[lancsSteve]

That is a very good price, and a pretty good reason to go with the Liberty

Isnt Liberty a popular choice for American style lagers? I dont really know much about the variety other than the yanks use it for something or other.

Me neither - it's a descendant from hallertaur rootstock so shares genetics and some characteristics. Used for American style lagers (((shudder))) but as I won't be aiming for transluscent pi$$-water or putting a load of rice in the mash tun that doesn't worry me too much.

Will post up a brew-day thread as I'll be trying to build some extra kit to do this. But yeah lagers are the way forward for me - softest water in the country (25mg/l CaCO3!!!!) and a cellar to ferment and lager in makes it THE way forward. Hence wanting to use what I've got for round 1 and then refine afterwards.

Thanks all for the thoughts/ideas/help.

[befuggled]

Hi there LancsSteve,

Tempted by your link to the hops, I though I would get a load for the freezer, pretty much some of each.
He doesn't give you much off the postage does he!! £19.50 was a bit steep!

I had to do a serious double take before I realised they are in brown paper bags inside the vacuum pack - they looked decidedly doggy at first!

How have you found them in use? Have you tried any finished article yet?

[Aleman]

What's the difference?

One tastes good, the other doesn't.

[lancsSteve]

Hi there LancsSteve,

Tempted by your link to the hops, I though I would get a load for the freezer, pretty much some of each.
He doesn't give you much off the postage does he!! £19.50 was a bit steep!

He'll add it up and make it £2.50 for the first lot and only £1 per extra item so IGNORE the eBay total and ask for a calculated one and then it's all great value again.

I had to do a serious double take before I realised they are in brown paper bags inside the vacuum pack - they looked decidedly doggy at first!

How have you found them in use? Have you tried any finished article yet?

Not tried finished article yet - they smell WELL iffy on opening (chhesy!) but this is the packaging not the hops, give it a minute and it's all hoppy goodness. Will tell you in a fortnight or so how my third weissbeer turns out - using some this weekend as well but ales take time to tell you effects!

[befuggled]

Thanks Lancsteve!

I look forward to your reports, in the meantime I will keep them in a nice cool garage!