Triticale

edited April 2019 in Recipes

I have just found a source of triticale and i will receive the grains next week. Does anyone have any experience with this grain? Or alternatively any pointers to using unmalted grain. I have 4 recipes that i want to try with this stuff. A bourbon, a whiskey, a quinoa and triticale whiskey and a straight triticale. I just havent used unmalter grains before.

Comments

  • You'll need to do a cereal mash and then use either malt barley or enzymes.
    You are in for a treat, i've played with Triticale before and it's a beautiful spicy spirit. One of th best grains around i think.

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  • @DonMateo said: I have just found a source of triticale and i will receive the grains next week. Does anyone have any experience with this grain?

    Keep the tribbles away from it!

    I'm more like I am now than I was before.

  • edited April 2019

    Well after looking for 2 years i finally found a farmer about 200kms south who grows it as a rotation crop. He is selling for 20cents a kilo. When he asked how much I wanted I said 400kgs. I asked him how much do you have and he said 90 tons. If only i had my distillery up and running i could go through a fews tons.

    Thanks @punkin

  • hey @punkin Does triticale turn into a gelatenous mess like high rye washes ?? Or is it clean to work with, ie makes a thin wash, like a malted wheat wash ?

  • edited April 2019

    Triticale is high in beta-glucan, it can be difficult.

    Also remember, usually triticale is used raw - unmalted - meaning higher glucans than malted grain. So while malted wheat is easy, unmalted is less so. And triticale is a hybrid of wheat and rye.

    Beta-glucanase enzyme is your friend when dealing with unmalted grain, especially oat, rye, and the high-BG hybrids, etc. Add in the high temp alpha amylase and the cereal mash becomes significantly easier.

  • Thanks @grim. I have some beta glucanase. Thanks very much.

  • edited April 2019

    Do you have a maltster near you mate?

    They may be interested in a small batch run for you, i mean not 400kg, but maybe a ton or two?

    StillDragon Australia & New Zealand - Your StillDragon® Distributor for Australia & New Zealand

  • Mate, No mate I am in the middle of nowhere. 1100km from the nearest maltster. But thanks for the suggestion. When I can finally find a shed I was considering malting my own grain for things like triticale but maybe I should consider that more. There are enough people with agriculture degrees who could do it here. Thanks again mate. Matt

  • edited April 2019

    You may find you like the flavor profile of unmalted grain better. Having worked with unmalted rye and wheat now - let me tell you - I think unmalted grain makes better whiskey. It's an overall cleaner flavor profile, if that's your kinda thing.

    A lot of higher alcohol and congeners are created by the amino acids that are broken down in the malting process. More aminos, more tails alcohols.

    Most American Bourbon is actually 70-80% unmalted grain when you consider that corn and rye are typically always unmalted. Maybe its just my Yankee palate likes it better.

  • Agreed that there is nothing wrong with using enzymes either.

    StillDragon Australia & New Zealand - Your StillDragon® Distributor for Australia & New Zealand

  • edited May 2019

    Wow you guys were right. I have just mashed in and fermenting my first two x 200l triticale washes. Smells fantastic and my ferment went nuts. It dumped the grain cap. @LocalGoat recommended fermenting off grain but I thought I would try ongrain anyway. Great stuff. Mashing in straight triticale today.

  • Any news on this batch

  • @hudsonbaydistiller. Well the first couple of washes I thought I would just add the triticale into the mash and see what happens, without cooking it first and it was a complete disaster. The next round of attempts I added water at 98 degrees and kept my tank insulated for an hour then cooled down. I got shit yields out of that. Triticale is tough and right now I dont have a mash tun that will heat a wash as I only have a still with immersion elements. Anyway the triticale whiskey I got out of the two runs I did was great. But I am not going to do anymore with it until I can do the proper procedure. I have a bain marie boiler but its at my tank makers shop as I dont have anymore room in my galpon. I really like triticale but you need to do a cereal mash and without a mash tun thats tough.

  • Thanks for the update ,we are trying to source some triticale too do some test runs so any info is great.

  • The final whiskey was amazing. Its got a softer even musky perfumy type wheat aroma, and a nice wheat and soft rye flavor. Very enticing. But what I was going to do was cook some Triticale in some 50 litre pots I have on my range, cook up 20 kilos for example and then add that to a wash with 20 kg of malt. If I do that I will have control over the temperature and the mash. Obviously this wont work with much larger masses of grain when I am doing ferments at 1000l rather than 200l like I am doing right now. But absolutely amazing stuff but you have to do a cereal mash on it. I did a couple of washes with 75% triticale uncooked and 25 % wheat malt and they ended up stuck and dead even with lots of enzymes.
    Just a comparison recently I did some straight malt wheat washes which came out well with great flavor and good yields but the malt wheat is just wheat. It needed something more for a little more complexity. I put that on French oak and the final whiskey is aging out well for a lighter type of whiskey. But Triticale is an amazing taste so I really want to use it some more apart from the fact I can buy it for $.20 per kilo.

    When the temperature improves where I am I am going to try Wheat/rye combination and try a wheat Triticale combination. I definitely thing Triticale would also make an excellent bourbon in combination with Malted wheat. It would come out as like a soft version of Woodford Reserve. That is on my grain bill for a triticale bourbon. 51 % Corn 25 % wheat and 25 % triticale. I cant wait to do that.

  • edited July 2019

    @DonMateo said: 51 % Corn 25 % wheat and 25 % triticale. I cant wait to do that.

    I can't wait to hear how you mange.

    StillDragon Australia & New Zealand - Your StillDragon® Distributor for Australia & New Zealand

  • Well If I am not working in Peru I will do that recipe in September. I did a Quinoa bourbon that turned out really well if anyone wants the recipe. That was corn 51%, barley 30% wheat 15 % and quinoa 5%. Aged on American oak it is very nice.

  • So you have already done a mash with 101% of ingredients?

    WellDoneSirPunkin

    StillDragon Australia & New Zealand - Your StillDragon® Distributor for Australia & New Zealand

  • Well I was never good at maths.

  • This is just an update to a previous thread. I managed to get some tritical and got it malted. I am just running my first spirit run and it tastes and smells amazing. I am doing a Triticale light, at 20% Triticale 30% wheat and 50% pale ale and its excellent. Highly recommended and at 20% it doesnt goop up like Rye. The yeild is lower a barley wash but a bit better than rye. But so much easier to handle than Rye.

  • This is an update from a previous thread. Well I aged out my first straight triticale whiskey, 55% triticale and 50% wheat. And I have to say its bloody amazing. Really nice with almost licorice flavors. Its been in the bottle about a month now and getting better every week. I aged it on 100l american oak barrels. For the whiskey lovers out there is really a grain worth working with. As a final comment it produces almost as much glucans as rye so you need beta glucanayse for the lauter. I have my Farmer Marcos saving me 4 tons of it right now. Its makes great whiskey.

  • edited March 2022

    @DonMateo, nice!

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  • One more thing I forgot, is the yield of this whiskey is really low, about the same as rye. Normally I get 40l of low wines out of a 200l wash on a stripping run but with this stuff I was only getting around 30l, this is using a standard grain bill of 50kg per 200l or a rate of .25kg/l.

  • great work mate. Would love to try it sometime

  • edited March 2022

    @Smaug said: DonMateo, nice!

    Hey mate. I might be able to get you a bottle. I have an Argentine mate who goes to Miami regularly. Watch this space.

  • I'll wait here. Though I'm nearly 2 hours North of Miami depending on traffic.

    StillDragon North America - Your StillDragon® Distributor for North America

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