Malt Extract in Baking

Hi Louis,

Your question would be a great posting for the American Homebrewers Association web forum. Visit http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/forum/index.php  and register for an account to view/post on the forum.  Please let me know if you have any further questions.

Cheers,

Sarah White
Member Services Specialist
Brewers Association |736 Pearl Street | Boulder, CO 80302  | p: 303-447-0816 ext. 157

From: Louis Lancaster [mailto:louis.lancaster@sbcglobal.net]
Sent: Friday, August 12, 2011 11:54 AM
To: info
Subject: HomebrewersAssociation.org Help

Dear Sir or Madam,

My wife is searching for recipes to bake “sugar free” cookies.

I have some reference material from the 1920’s about malt extract in baking cookies.  Could you direct me to any material that covers using malt extract in baking?

I appreciate any advice or guidance you can provide.

Louis Lancaster

Malt extract is sugar - it’s mostly maltose and not glucose or sucrose, but it’s still sugar.

In the Sept 2011 issue of Brew Your Own they had a recipe for pretzels made with malt extract.

They also show the optional substitution of honey…
Another sugar.

I made this recipe twice last weekend.  I’m trying to get the technique mastered before our Oktoberfest on the 17th.  I used brown sugar and it worked very well.

If you make them, aim for a little wetter doe to start with, raise twice and roll out with a rolling pin and slice your pretzels.  Much easier than rolling out by hand.

Paul

What are you doing to the poor deer? I see a man standing on his porch with a hose spraying bambi down.

and spraying his hops too.  :smiley:

I really have to stop typing while I’m on the phone.  ::slight_smile:

or worse, not using a hose

To the OP:

During the Prohibition Era, aka the Great Failed Experiment, many new recipies came out using malt as a substitute for honey, molasses and refined sugars. The malt producing companies were looking for alternative markets since the production of beer and liquor was illegal, expept for medical reasons, their usual alcohol producing customer base fell 30 or 40 percent. It is used today in the majority of mass produced baked goods.

Like the good Dr. tschmidlin said, its still sugar, just a different chain structure.

Note: fell 30 or 40 percent is not a typo. Seen all those old films of the G-men busting up keg after keg of beer they confiscated from the speak-easy? You don’t get that level of production in a backyard shed :wink:

Dear Sir or Madam,

My wife is searching for recipes to bake “sugar free” cookies.

I have some reference material from the 1920’s about malt extract in baking cookies.  Could you direct me to any material that covers using malt extract in baking?

I appreciate any advice or guidance you can provide.

Louis Lancaster

[/quote]

Who wants “sugar free cookies” anyway,  I’ll take mine with extra malt  I think that “suger free cookies” might even be an oxymoron.

See also: Biscuit

Tubercle,

Cut me some slack.  We have a diabetic family member and the wife is fishing around for a refined sugar sub.

Splenda does not quite work like she wants it to.  Don’t really know if malt extract can be used safely.  That is what we are doing, looking for info.

If anyone has useful information, I’d appreciate hearing about it.  Even if we are looking in the wrong place.

There is no slack to cut. I gave you useful information about malt used in recipies and some of the history of it and made a comment abbout roguenationpatriot’s question of what a cookie is without sugar. Several others gave you information about malt actualy being sugar and using it wouldn’t be a “sugar free option”.

Maybe a baking forum would be a useful venue to find a sugar free substitute or information about malt in baking goods.

Have you considered stevia?  I have no recipes, but google should.  Talk to your doctor about if this is an acceptable substitute.

That might actually work I have used that stevia herb in tea’s and coffee’s.  It is very sweet and as far as I know it’s not really a sugar.