Specialty

Specialty Malts & Brewing Grains

Shop specialty malts and brewing grains for homebrewing to add distinctive flavor, aroma, color, body, and complexity to your beer. While base malt provides the foundation of a recipe, specialty malts allow brewers to fine-tune the finished beer with flavors ranging from biscuit, bread, toast, and honey to nuts, rich malt, and bread crust.

Specialty malts are typically used as a smaller portion of the grain bill, but even modest additions can make a noticeable difference. Depending on the malt you choose, specialty grains can enhance malt aroma, body, mouthfeel, foam, color, and overall malt complexity without necessarily adding the sweetness of a caramel or crystal malt.

Biscuit and toasted malts can contribute dry bread crust, cracker, toast, and nutty flavors. Aromatic and melanoidin-style malts can intensify rich malt aroma and create flavors reminiscent of bread crust, honey, and deeply kilned malt. Other specialty grains can be used to improve body, foam, mouthfeel, or create a specific malt character that would be difficult to achieve with base malt alone.

Specialty malts are useful across an enormous range of beer styles, including Pale Ale, IPA, Amber Ale, Belgian Ale, Saison, Märzen, Bock, Oktoberfest, Brown Ale, Porter, Stout, Strong Ale, and many others. The key is choosing a specialty malt that complements the base malt, hops, and yeast rather than simply adding more flavor.

Whether you're trying to add a touch of biscuit to a Pale Ale, bread crust to a Märzen, rich malt aroma to a Bock, or another layer of complexity to a Belgian ale, specialty malts give you the tools to dial in the character of your recipe.

Beyond Brewing: Specialty Malt for Bread & Baking

Specialty brewing malts can also add distinctive flavor and aroma to homemade bread and baked goods. Finely crushed specialty malt can be incorporated in small amounts alongside regular flour or grains to introduce flavors such as biscuit, toast, bread crust, honey, nuts, and rich malt.

Experiment with small additions in artisan breads, pretzels, crackers, rolls, pizza dough, and other baked goods where an extra layer of toasted or malty flavor would complement the recipe.