Spent grain bread

The main by product of all grain brewing is spent grain. Once all the sugar has been stripped out during the mash, you’re left with a big pile of soggy wet grain.  Most people just bin it, feed it to chickens or cattle, or compost it. 

That seems like a waste to me, so after our last brew day, I decided to do a bit of reading up and try to see if there’s something to do with it.  There must be some wholegrain flavour, fiber and goodness left in it, and I found a spent grain bread recipe. 

You don’t use much of the grain in the bread, about 400g out of 5kg grain, so still a lot for the bin.   Using a little bit makes me feel a bit better about the waste though. 

I would avoid using and spent grain from a dark beer containing roasted grains/dark grains, as I think the burnt flavour would ruin the bread.  Our last brew was a 100% Maris Otter grain bill for a pale ale, so that’s what I used. 

So here we go.  This is an American recipe, so uses cups, volume rather that than weight, so I’ve converted it to grams for convenience. 

Recipe:

275ml/1.25 cups water – warmish, about body temperature

8g yeast/half a tbsp, I use Allinson easy bake

5g/1tsp sugar, I use white caster

750g/5 cups strong white bread flour 

400g/3 cups spent grain

15g salt

Oil for kneading 

Butter and flour for  prepping the tins

Method:

Mix the water, yeast and sugar, cover and let the yeast rehydrate for half an hour. 

After half an hour, the yeast should go milky and foamy.  If nothing happens, either your yeast is dead, or your water was too hot. 

Next, in a mixing bowl, add the flour and grain and combine.  It should be fairly dry. 

Add the water and mix. 

Mine was still too dry, so added a splash of water.  Problem is with flour is that they contain different amounts of water, and depending how they’re stored, and other environmental factors, they can behave quite differently.  Also the amount of liquid left in the spent grain can vary massively, so you do have to do it by eye and feel. 

I added a splash more water.  Go easy with the additions, literally just wet your hands under the tap and go from there. 

Know it’s kneading time.  Whack some oil on a clean work surface, I used extra virgin olive oil, and knead.  I pounded it for about 15 minutes. 

It’s done when you poke it and it springs back. Oil the mixing bowl and return the dough to the bowl.  Cover and leave somewhere warm for an hour until well risen. Pre rise:

Post rise:

Knock it back by punching it down and squeezing the air out.  Prepare 2 loaf tins with butter and flour, and divide the dough into 2. I weigh the dough, as I want to be precise so both loaves cook the same way.  My two bread tins are different, so they do perform differently.  I should get a couple the same really.   Shape and pop them in the tins:

Then leave to rise again for half an hour or so. They do rise quite a bit:

Pre heat the oven to 190c/375f/gas mark 5.

Bake for 35 minutes and check.  When baked, they should sound hollow when you turn the loaf out the tin and tap the bottom.   Finish colour is a bit of a personal preference, so feel free to return to the oven to darken up a bit. 

Here’s my result after 35 minutes:

While cooked, a bit pale for me, so back to the oven for another 10 minutes. 
If you can manage it, allow to cool fully before slicing and tucking in. 

The finished product:

Tuck in that!