Anyone made Barley Coffee/Espresso?

[12BottleBar]

I tied to make it once by roasting in the oven -- set the whole oven on fire. I have been forbidden to ever attempt it again, and sadly I couldn't salvage the first attempt.

Anyone tried this successfully?

Edited October 21, 2010 by 12BottleBar (log)

[cdh]

Have had it in a hippy/vegan/"healthy" eatery once... not bad but didn't strike me as different enough to be worth repeating. If you want the raw materials, pre-roasted barley is available at homebrew shops... for like $2/lb.

Your question puts me in a mind to raid the brewing supplies and grind up a barley espresso to see what happens... I know I've got some chocolate malt and some black patent malt around someplace.

[maher]

this probably isnt very useful, but i have been wanting to post something similar for a while. i really like espresso d'orzo in italy, or barley espresso. i have checked out the roasted barley kernels and they appear to be exactly what you said... dark roasted kernels. i have been planning to stick some on the stove but thought it might be a better idea and try when i fire up the outdoor grill next time. ill be sure to report back.

if anyone knows if it is possible to run barley through a coffee roaster please enlighten us.

one note of caution though, i was told by a barista in milan to only try barley in a manual espresso machine. he says it gums up the automatics since the puck doesnt eject as cleanly as the coffee puck. i dont know if thats accurate, but i thought its worth passing on.

[cdh]

Don't bother trying to roast your own. Find a local homebrew shop, or order from one of the online brew supply places. Plenty of selection, e.g.: http://morebeer.com/search/102158/beerwinecoffee/coffeewinebeer/Roasted_Malts

Now down to the basement to see what dark grains I have handy to experiment with.

Edited October 21, 2010 by cdh (log)

[cdh]

Found an open bag of Carafa malt and tried to treat it like espresso. Unmitigated failure resulted.

The roasted barley plugged up the espresso machine when treated like coffee beans and ground as fine as they need to be ground. I ended up with a sticky compressed puck that let no water through it. So I tried again, but opened the grinder up a few clicks to make a somewhat coarser grind... still plugged up the machine. So I tried a very chunky preparation, more crushed than ground. That let water through the machine, but it wasn't anything like espresso on the other side. It seems a lot of experimentation will be necessary to figure out if there is a grind setting that will work.

I'm thinking that perhaps a different device, like maybe an AeroPress, might be the thing to try to get an espresso-like extraction from dark roasted barley... will try that next.

[cdh]

Still failing at this... it plugged up the AeroPress too...

[maher]

i suspect that the brewer dark roast is nowhere near dark enough for a coffee roast... it was practically espresso roast black for coffee use.

[cdh]

Your suspicion is incorrect. Do I need to take pictures of this stuff? You know the color of Guinness, right? This "brewer dark roast" makes that happen at about 5% of the grain bill or less, if that's not dark enough for your tastes in coffee, well... I don't know what to tell you.. The stuff responsible for Guinness flavor is sold as "Roasted Barley", meaning it's not malted... which might be the problem with the dark malts I tried... they appeared to fuse together into a lump of black sugary stuff in the portafilter.

[rlibkind]

Sounds like a barley version of Postum, which was made from wheat.

[Jenni]

Sounds rather like this, which my Dad likes. I don't think it's made from roasted barley malt though, just roasted barley. I could be wrong though...

[12BottleBar]

Thanks for the heads up on the brew shop route and the Barleycup. I'm a big barley tea fan, so now I need to go try these. After that, a barley version of orgeat, I think.

[Jenni]

^^ I just googled orgeat to see what it is, and I notice that the wiki article says that it was originally made with barley...I'm guessing you knew that though..

[barrett]

You'll probably find more information if you search for barley tea.

[Jenni]

^^^

Barley tea is quite different.

[12BottleBar]

Jenni - yup, I knew that re: orgeat. I make the almond kind already, so I'll be curious to see how the barley version works. Oddly enough, I'm currently bouncing back and forth between this thread and an orgeat thread over in Cocktails.