Using Sprouted Grains in Brewing
Q: I have been seeing rolled, sprouted grains at the store. What is the deal about the grains being sprouted and, more importantly, can these be used for something tastier than a bowl of breakfast oatmeal?
— Frank Modesto • Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
A: Sprouted grains have been used for thousands of years for cooking and brewing, with malt being the ultimate sprouted grain product. The history of food and cooking is largely comprised of stories of trial and error, and the consumption of sprouted grains naturally began without people knowing anything about biochemistry or nutrition because those sciences had not been developed and grains don’t require any intervention to sprout when given moisture and time. More recently, people have been focused on differences between the bioavailability of nutrients in grains before and after sprouting. No big surprise to us brewers, germination modifies the grain endosperm (energy reserve) and has an effect on all sorts of parameters. Long story short, sprouted grains can definitely be used for much more than a hot bowl of oatmeal.
For starters, what are these sprouted products popping on store shelves and where can they be found? Although there is no standard definition of sprouted grain, these products are definitely not germinated like malt. Based on observation and chewing, my assessment is that the products I have tried are probably soaked, briefly sprouted, dried and flaked. To put this in the context of brewing malt, these sprouted grains are similar to chit malt.
If you have never knowingly consumed foods made with sprouted grains or never noticed these products at the store, go to the whole or healthy foods aisle at your local grocery store and look for products like sprouted bread (Food for Life is one company that has been in this market segment for about 50 years), sprouted quick oats, and sprouted rice. Just like brewing malt there is a very wide range of these products on the market.
Taken to the extreme you can also find sprouts (often bean or pea sprouts) in the produce section, but these products are well on their way to becoming plants. In fact, you can sow these in soil instead of casting upon a salad! By the way, there are all sorts of sprouted legumes, but sprouted cereals like oats, rye, wheat, teff, barley, and rice are the products that are probably of most interest to brewers.
So, what’s the big deal with sprouted grains; sort of sounds like clever marketing to help sell grain, right? It turns out that there is more than a name to go along with these products. When cereal grains germinate, enzyme systems activate and begin converting the energy reserves within the grain endosperm into simpler compounds that can be used by the embryo, rootlets, and acrospire (shoot) during transformation from seed to plant. In practical terms, cell walls are softened, vitamins are made more available, amino acid levels rise, and starch hydrolysis begins. And just like malt modification makes it easier for brewers to produce wort, sprouted grains make nutrient assimilation easier on humans. But we are talking about brewing here, so let’s leave the grocery store and enter the brewhouse.
Any rolled grain you can buy in your local market probably has a brewing analogue and can be used directly in brewing. Have a recipe calling for a pound of flaked oats and want to give sprouted oat flakes a try? Go for it and just sub pound-for-pound. Don’t expect much of a flavor change, instead pay special attention to things like extract yield, ease of wort separation, mouthfeel, and foam stability. Keep in mind that there is no standard for sprouted grains and some of these products are certainly more modified than others. In general, expect them to be a bit easier to use than raw grains, especially when used at rates above 10–20%. Experimentation in the brewhouse continues to push the limits of beer, so when the patchouli aisle gives you sprouted oats, make beer not war!
And to all those folks who like a bit of patchouli, so do I.
