Grainswest - Fall 2021

Fall 2021 grainswest.com 41 yielded up to 10 per cent higher than ACMetcalfe. We knew it could be grown well so now we wanted to see how it malted and brewed.” CDC Bow offers brewers key qualities, said Beattie. These include a low level of beta glucan, a component that can impede the brewing process. Its high extract level produces more beer per unit of malt and its low protein level is a key spec of craft brewers. Shawn Moen of 9 Mile Legacy Brewing participated in the Bow Project, which allowed his business to experiment. “As craft brewers, we started very small, as a nanobrewery, before we grew to a microbrewery,” he said. “Much of our growth has come from playing around with different ideas and that is how we have come up with some of our best products.” Moen said it can take a long time for large brewers to try new things and a strength of the craft beer market is that it can focus on experimentation, variety, freshness and local availability. “We have more flexibility than the big brewers. We can be creative with our timing and we welcome variety to a certain extent. We always look for creative and fun ways to think about ag value and Matt at Maker’s Malt thinks the same way.” Beattie said Bow is a flexible variety, so it can suit the needs of craft brewers such as Moen but also meet the specs of the base malt required by multinationals. He has also developed additional malt barley varieties specific to the craft industry. These include CDC Churchill, registered in 2019, which has an enzyme package well suited for craft brewers. Enns’s own farm operation conducts annual agronomic and variety trials that incorporate various barley varieties. This generates improved performance in grain destined for the Maker’s malthouse as well as for export. He describes CDC Churchill and CDC Fraser as interesting newcomers he continues to grow following trials. With his business now well established, Enns remains captivated by the world of craft beer. Since he envisioned his micro-malting career possibilities during that winter in Florida, his ambitions have only grown. The Maker’s team is now at work expanding their malthouse. They will set up a second malting system that will allow them to produce 50 per cent more product. Given existing demand, Enns is confident his craft brewer customers can absorb this increased volume, and more. Eventually, he would like to increase production even further to meet local demand. A second expansion would include the possible construction of an even larger malthouse on his farm. Adjacent to his barley fields, such a facility would allow him to host variety and agronomic tours as well as agri-tourism events at which local brewers could promote their products. “I have always been an advocate for agriculture, especially as I spent so much time in the city in health care and saw just how big that disconnect is,” he said. “It takes a lot of time, energy and money to do it right and I’d like to continue to explore that, one beer at a time.” A 25-kilogrammalt bag is filled at the Maker's cleaning and bagging facility. Craft brewery clients value experimentation, variety, freshness and local availability. Local demand for Enns’s malt products is such that he plans to double production in the near future. Photos:CourtesyofMaker’sMalt