Swaen Malts...

I saw an older thread (2015) in the ingredients section so thought I would start a newer one:  Who has used these malts and what are your findings?  I’m about 75% through a 55lb sack of pilsner and maybe halfway through a 55lb sack of Pale Ale.  The pilsner seems very good to me as does the Pale Ale but the Pale Ale seems to be lacking in depth… anyone else get that?  I have made some pale ales that seem to have a very shallow flavor profile as if the malt wasn’t very MALTY.  The resulting beers have been on the thin & dry side.  I noticed it on two different beers recently so before I made my latest amber ale I subbed two pounds of the pale ale malt with Munich 1 to try to add some OOMPH to the beer.  Any thoughts on this or is it just me?

I just bought some Swaen Munich (for the first time) to use in my dunkles.  I sure hope it tastes awesome.

These malts are fantastic. Glad to see you are getting them in the homebrew world.

I’ve seen these malts at my LHBS and have been curious about the Pilsner malt. Thanks for posting.

I use their pale malt as a continental 2 row to blend a bit with pilsner for my helles and I use it straight up for ales.  I like it and it seems to be a pretty clean pale malt.  I prefer to get Weyermann’s, but my LHBS gets a fair amount of Swaen and Avengard products, so I use them without hesitation.

I guess that when I hear “pale ale malt” I expect something with a little more depth to it.  I don’t necessarily expect MO or GP but I also use a good amount of Rahr Pale Ale which is quite rich and deep.  You almost can’t make a blonde ale with it because it’s got that super deep & full character.  Anyway, as I use the rest of this pilsner and Swaen Pale Ale malt I’ll just make sure to mix in some Vienna or Munich 1.  I picked it up at Label Peelers for something like $36 a sack.  Even with the shipping I can’t get it locally for that cheap.

EDIT:  Some of the early beers I made with the pilsner were already malty styles… Vienna, Dunkel, Festbier, etc. and those came out very nicely because there was Vienna and Munich in the recipe.  The helles and the American Lager that I made were slightly dry and thin because they didn’t have as much Vienna or Munich.  It’s something I can work with as long as I know and I suppose it’s the price you pay when you keep trying new malts.

I’ve been using the Pilsner malt regularly for about a year now. It has a very nice, clean flavor profile and the efficiency I’ve gotten out of it is great. I’ve used it to make saison, Belgian blonde, BDSA, sours and NE IPA. As an added bonus, it’s significantly cheaper at my LHBS than all other Pilsner malts or continental pale malts.

ETA: They have crystal malts under the GoldSwaen name, and some of them do not say explicitly that they are crystal malts. It’s a little confusing so I thought I’d throw that info in here as well. I’ve used the Goldswaen Red, which was wonderful, like a mix between Aromatic and Honey Malt.

The other strange thing is that the label peelers site calls the one malt SWAEN PALE ALE MALT but the Swaen site just calls it SWAEN ALE.  That may sound like a fine point but it could be like the difference between Rahr 2-row and Rahr Pale Ale.  The sack itself just says ALE so maybe it’s really just a standard 2-row.

I agree on the price and I admit that price will sometimes drive my decisions.  But to pay less for malt that you may not care for is probably not good.  Again, I don’t think it’s bad malt but I could use a little more character.

I have tried several of their malts, and all are quite good. I find the Pale Ale malt to be on par with other continental pale ale malts I’ve tried. My house base malt is currently 70% Weyermann Bo Pils and 30% Swaen Pale Ale malt, and it has served me quite well in both pale lagers and IPA’s.

Their version of Carared (I forget the name off the top of my head), and their Vienna are also quite nice.

I haven’t tried the pale malt but the specialty malts are all excellent.

My LHBS has been carrying these and Avangard. I’m not sold on the Avangard, but the Swaen Pils will be next from there.