Hello all. I was listening to an interesting interview on The Craft Beer Channel, talking to Vinny Cilurzo from Russian River about brewing west coast IPAs. He mentions that they have removed caramel/crystal malts from their IPAs - and replaced them with Munich malt - because "crystal malt aids in oxidation." He goes on to say, "the roasting process is creating some negative attributes in the crystal malt which aids in oxidation."
I did a quick Google search and found a 2018 article in Craft Beer & Brewing magazine which reads, "Now, hard science on this is hard to come by, but there’s a growing impression among brewers that significant use of crystal and caramel malts can accelerate oxidation and rapidly erode hops character in beers, under certain circumstances. This, as noted above, is ironic, since caramel and crystal malts usually develop as part of their production an increased melanoidin level—and melanoidins are powerful antioxidants."
So my question is, what is going on scientifically that would "create negative attributes which aid in oxidation" ... and why would other kilned malts such as Munich 20L or 30L not have the same attributes?
Here's a link to the interview, with the crystal malt bit at around the 16:00 mark.
I did a quick Google search and found a 2018 article in Craft Beer & Brewing magazine which reads, "Now, hard science on this is hard to come by, but there’s a growing impression among brewers that significant use of crystal and caramel malts can accelerate oxidation and rapidly erode hops character in beers, under certain circumstances. This, as noted above, is ironic, since caramel and crystal malts usually develop as part of their production an increased melanoidin level—and melanoidins are powerful antioxidants."
So my question is, what is going on scientifically that would "create negative attributes which aid in oxidation" ... and why would other kilned malts such as Munich 20L or 30L not have the same attributes?
Here's a link to the interview, with the crystal malt bit at around the 16:00 mark.