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DISTILLATION.
159
the oats diffused through the wheat flour and
rye meal keep it open, or porous, when mashed,
and thus favor the abstraction of the wort;
while the gluten of the wheat tends to convert
the starch of the barley and oats into sugar.
vVhen the whole of the grain, however, is
malted, a much inore limpid wort is obtained
than from a mixture of malt with raw grain;
hence the pure malt is preferable for the ·ale
and porter brewer, while the mixture affords a
..
larger product, at the saine cost of
materials~
to
the distiller. vVhen barley is the only grain
employed, from one-third to one-sixth of malt
is usually mixed with it; but when wheat and
rye are also taken, the addition of from one–
eighth to one-sixteenth of barley inalt is suffi–
cient. Oats are peculiarly proper to be mixed
with wheat, to keep the meal open in the
mashing.
1. MASHING.-Barley and raw grain are
ground to meal by millstones, but malt is
merely crushed between rollers. If only one-