Disturbingly it's over ten years ago that I last visited Warminster Maltings. This time with the CIBD it was considerably less rushed. Which is just as well, as owner Robin Appel, now in his 63rd year as a corn merchant, talked to us at great length about the place. I'm sure he could have gone on a lot longer if we'd had the time.
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| Robin Appel |
He says there's only two floor maltings left in England, and eight in Scotland. Though he then cast aspersions that probably only one of the Scottish ones does much more than look good for tourists. I have to say it does sound quite likely though. Britain stuck to floor more than many other countries. The tax on malt meant we couldn't even consider using the then new pneumatic malting until the so called 'Free Mash Tun' act of 1880. Pneumatic malting arrived here in the early 20th century but floor maltings were still built until 1953. From 1960 large pneumatic malting took off, it's a cheaper way of making malt.
Guinness leased Warminster Maltings and it supplied Park Royal brewery. Guinness did have plans to build a much larger maltings nearby but the take over of The Distillers Company and associated scandal gave put paid to that. There was a management buyout of Warminster in 1984 but the company failed to thrive and in 2001 their largest supplier, Robin Appel, bought the company. And as luck would have it Progressive Beer Duty was brought in in 2002, which was a shot in the arm for small breweries and a certain small maltings.
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| Steeping tank |
When tax was paid on malt it would be measured in the steep, in the couch and on the germination floor. An average of the three was then taken. Steeps had to be flat bottomed for the measuring. Barley at 14% moisture starts to germinate at 32% and will get to 45%. A typical Warminster steeping cycle is:
6 hours wet (moisture rises to 21%)
18 hours air rest
10 hours wet (moisture passes 32%, reaching 33-34%)
14 hours dry
12 hours wet, then to the germination floor. No couching nowadays.
Plumage Archer can take longer and Rye is quicker (a day and half in total). There is no aeration of the steep water.
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| Two layers of germination floors |
The malt goes via an auger to the top floor and half of it is dropped to the lower floor. It has to be half and half so the depth of malt is even and malting progresses at the same time. They have there own well. There are four sets of double floors at Warminster. There used to be four steeps and four kilns too, but there's only one kiln now. The buildings are built in a slight V shape with a courtyard between them, which forces air in the windows. The Victorian builders and maltsters might have thought they were clever doing this, but to be honest they're not a patch on the people who planned Woking town centre.
To prevent matting, cool the malt and release CO2 the malt is turned with a Robinson turner:
And a malt plough:
There's also a big fan! Germination continues until the grain has reached a stage that you can squash it flat and smear the white contents: "maltster's chalk"! Maris Otter takes five days to reach this stage, Plumage Archer can take six.
We didn't see the kiln, but they had a new one installed in 2017-2018. With the new kiln they can make malts paler and darker than before. We did however go into one of the old kilns which has been turned into a mini-malting museum.
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| Traditional kiln floor tiles |
From ten tonnes of barley they get eight tonnes of malt. We were told floor malted barley had better flavour and extract. It can be controlled better than in 350 tonne modern maltings and on germination floors, but not large vessels, bacterial growth creates lactic acid.
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| In the mini malt museum |
After the museum we moved on to a distillery.
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