We want to brew a German Pils, Category 5D. Something close to a Bitburger. Crisp, slightly dry, well attenuated, with moderate to high hop bitterness.
We have used both Ireks Pils Malt, and Weyermann floor malted Bohemian Pils Malt.
What malts are recommended for this classic style? What has your experience been? Do you have a favorite malt?
This will be a single malt grain bill. A very simple beer, but a very difficult one to do well.
Following. I too would love to know which brands are people’s favorites. I almost always use Weyermann… but I have not been able to successfully achieve “that German flavor” yet. It does come close, but not exactly what I want yet.
My choice would be Bestmaltz.
Does anyone know what malts the German breweries use? That might be a good starting point.
It’s my understanding that it is not Weyermann, as they are primarily an exporter, not selling much in the domestic market.
Same here
Many of them produce their own malt.
There are many German maltsters that we have never heard of. Only a few are imported. Weyerman isn’t in the top 10 by volume, but they make a high quality product and make most of the specialty malts in Germany.
As Denny says there are breweries that malt, but not all.
In response to the original question, I would use Avangard or Durst for a Northern German Pils.
Edit - Weyerman sells a lot locally in Frankonia to small breweries that show up in the small van or station wagon.
Pay attention to Jeff. He knows.
German brewers will buy locally. I looked at Avangard, they have a malting in Koblenz, not too far from Bitburg.
Avangard Pils malt is really nice. It’s one of the few malts I buy by the sack
Order placed -
55 lb bag Avangard Pils Malt.
Yes, I am paying attention!
I had major problems with Avengard. I bought it in super sacks at Yellowhammer and maybe it was just bad luck but it was full of chaff and I didn’t;t feel like the beer turned out very good. I switched back to Best as soon as I was through it and was very thankful that period was over. I literally had to go through an entire tracker trailer load of Avengard super sacks (2000 lbs each).
I like Wyermann too. The floor malted Wyermann is good but you definitely need to boil for 90 minutes because I got a lot of DMS from that malt.
I had a crap bag of Best Pils. It happens.
Had a 55 lb bag of Ireks, that was infested with weeds, and all sorts of odd plant debris. Took it back to the store, and it was replaced.
Been liking a 50/50 blend of Best Heidelberg and Best Pilsner malt lately.
That and Hop Heaven Mittelfruh. I can’t believe the difference in hop freshness with their hops. Even the noble hops are resin bombs compared to other hop sources.
Good to know, ordered 2 pounds of Hallertau whole leaf.
I guess, yeah, if it was a sack I’d be forgiving. This was a tractor trailer full of 2000 lb super sacks. The samples I got were great, that’s why I switched.
I also thought our lagers took a flavor hit in the wrong direction.I was very, very glad when we got through those sacks. Went right back to Best.
I feel like half of the German style pils I’ve had here in LA are made with Weyermann Bohemian and the other half made with Weyermann Barke
Used the Bohemian Pils malt numerous times, but not the Barke. Can you give some insight on this particular malt?