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beer and food

Spent-grain bread

Bread and chocolate stout
Bread and chocolate stout

Thanks to Bionic Laura at Aran Brew for this one. She’s just started all-grain brewing, and wanted to find something to do with all that spent brew, so she made soda bread with it.

We had to give it a go after our brew day (a nice light English ale, since you ask).  I kept back enough grain to do two batches.  This was a good job, as my first batch wasn’t that great – I think our grain was pretty moist, and so I shouldn’t have added so much milk.  It turned out very dough-like, even after 50 minutes of cooking.

I only added a cup of milk to the second batch, and this worked much better, although it was still quite moist.  Still, what I like about this recipe is it’s pretty good the next day, unlike most soda bread which has to be eaten fresh.  We’ll definitely be making it again.

Boak

7 replies on “Spent-grain bread”

I have done this a few times. Its really important to get the grain dry, I wrap it in a tea towel and wring the hell out of it.

I once used yeast from the trub of an IPA fermentation, unfortunately a fair bit of hop matter must have gone into the fermentor because the bread had an intense bitter grapefruit marmalade character!

The hazard I have noticed is that malting barley isn’t always pure, I have had the odd bit of flooring compound and twig turn up in my loaf.

You can make some great bread though.

Very interesting!

I’ve been wary of doing this sort of thing because having chomped a fair bit of grain (spent & not) I thought all of the husk material would be a bit indigestible. i.e. husk is what is said to make barley good for brewing & not for bread – vice-versa for wheat.

Can I ask for a recipe, to give me some idea of how much barley to use?

& did you notice the husk when eating?

& did you do as Kieran recommends & dry the grain?

(sorry for all the Qs – you’ve really got me interested though!)
cheers
Mike.

Hello

Recipe is per the link to Aran Brew in the post, although I would definitely recommend either drying out the malt thoroughly, like Kieran says, or going easy on the milk (add it half a cup / 125ml at a time, stop before it becomes liquid!)

You do notice the husk, but it’s like a really wholesome, seedy bread.

I made bread again with my last brew and had to cut down on the milk added quite a bit. As well I think it works best with lighter grains. The dark ones don’t taste as nice when they’re turned into bread. I think add some liquid until the bread is quite dough like. I like the tip to use a tea towel that might help a bit.

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