Flaked Maize in a bitter?

[brewinhard]

Have brewed JZ's ordinary bitter recipe several times and have been very pleased with the results. I was thinking about adding a pound of flaked maize and adjusting the base malt to a 1040 along with the other specialty grains called for. I also wanted to dry hop a touch with about 1/2 oz. of EKG. Anybody ever use flaked maize in a bitter before? if so, whadya think? Was it a noticeable improvement or should I just stick to the base malt (Maris otter) instead?

[Mylo]

That's going to give it a significant corn flavor. The good thing about a bitter is that it is simple. Sounds like you are going to make a cream ale with marris otter. Might be interesting, especially with a little touch of diacytl from an English Ale yeast... Buttered corn on the cob!

Ain't no bitter, no more, though. Just sayin'.


Mylo

[brewinhard]

What if I lowered the corn to under 10%? You think I would still get a noticeable corn aroma? I am looking for a nice malt profile with maybe just a touch of corn aroma. I do know that many British breweries used to add adjuncts like corn, wheat, sugar to their beers but it was most likely used to dry the beer out (and cheaper) instead of adding aroma/flavor components.

[brewerTristan]

Yeah I think it's fairly well documented that British brewing doesn't shy away from "adjuncts". I'm not sure what flavour components they contribute, but it wouldn't hurt to try a little. The thornbridge bitter recipe they gave on the session a while ago calls for 9% Torrefied wheat.