Spent grains are the solid residues obtained after infusing the malt (germinated and roasted cereal grains) in hot water. This stage of beer brewing is called mashing. The liquid part, the wort, is used to make beer by adding hops and yeast.
You can recycle spent grains to cook several dishes: crackers, cookies, bread, you can use it with flour do make a pie dough or pasta…
Here I give you a cracker recipe for which you can adapt the seasoning.
Brewers spent grain crackers
Ingredients
Crackers
- 350 g dry brewers spent grains
- 280 g flour you can mix different types
- 100 to 150 ml tepid water
- 7 g salt
- Fleur de sel
- 8 g baking soda
- Olive oil
Seasoning
- Cumin seeds + pepper
- Pumpkin seeds + grated parmesan or emmental
- Rosemary + oregano + dried lemon zest
Instructions
- In a bowl, mix with your fingers the spent grains, flour, salt and baking soda. For the flour, I use: 80 g of rye flour, 100 g of semi wholemeal flour and 100 g of T55 white flour. You can use all kinds of flour depending on what you have at home and the flavor you are looking for.
- Add water very gradually in order to be able to bind the dough into a ball. Depending on the moisture content of your spent grains, you will need to add more or less water. When you manage to bind the dough, no more water is needed.
- If you want to test different flavors, separate your dough in 2 or 3. Then add the ingredients for the seasoning and form a ball.
- Flour your worktop (or the baking paper you will use to bake the crackers) and using a rolling pin, roll out a ball of dough until the dough is about 3 mm thick.
- Brush the dough with olive oil and sprinkle a little fleur de sel. Then cut into small squares (about 3 cm x 3 cm).
- Do the same with the rest of the dough, and put the crackers in the oven for about 20 minutes at 180°C on rotating heat.
- Check the baking time after 15 minutes: the crackers should be hard. If they are still soft, you need to cook them a little more. Adjust the baking time according to your oven but be careful not to let them overcook (when they brown/blacken, they are overcooked).
- Once cooked, let them cool at least 15 minutes in the open air on a rack.
- You can store them for several days to several weeks in a metal can or in a closed glass container once they are completely dry.
Notes
Spent grains are the solid residues obtained after infusing the malt (germinated and roasted cereal grains) in hot water. This stage of beer brewing is called mashing. The liquid part, the wort, is used to make beer by adding hops and yeast.
Enjoy varying the flours, mixing them, to make the base of your crackers.
Then, for the seasoning, you can try all sorts of combinations of seeds and spices, fresh or dried herbs, cheese, and other dried condiments.
I made these easily and they are great. I divided the dough into three. Added Cajun spice to one. Pepper to another and the last are plain. All are good. Now I just need to wait for the beer to be ready to drink with them.