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How about Corn? A lot of us have used corn in our recipes from time to time and corn comes in many forms. What is corn? It is actually considered a mutant grass that produces large kernels. Corn is an adjunct that is used to lighten beer. Corn when added to the mash adds no enzymes and therefore must be used with a malt high in enzymes. Corn contains more oil than barley and therefore the total amount of corn used should be kept below 40 percent of the total grain bill or else it will produce off flavors. There are several ways to use corn in brewing. It can be used in the form of corn meal flour. Flour should be kept low in the total grain bill or you may get a stuck sparge. Grits can also be used but they must be boiled or at least heated in water to 190 to fully gelatinize. This should also be done with corn meal. The typical way to use these forms is to first mash the corn at 190 and then add it to the Barley. The goal would be to hit a temperature of 149-158 when the two are added together. To avoid mash problems you can use torrified corn. This can be found in all brew stores or you could make it yourself. Torrified corn is actually POPCORN. The process of popping corn is actually corn being gelatinized. The water inside the corn is actually converted into steam which completes the process by rupturing the corn shell. Now if you decide to pop your own remember not to use oil in the popping process. The air poppers or the microwave both are good ways to pop the corn. Also it is important to use freshly popped corn since popped corn will go stale very quickly. And stale corn could add some off tastes to the final product.
