Mashing in techniques

[Nathan]

So adding the grains to the water is one step I really stuggle with on my own its seems to hard to stir and pour at the same time....what do you guys do Im thinking about going to get one of those paint stirrer things you put on a drill and using that instead of my little paddle

Cheers

[Sam DT]

I'm not sure if you could swing it with a three vessel system (I BIAB) but if you add your grain at protein rest temperature 50 - 55 deg it's below the gelatinization temperature so you don't get clumping & then you could lift the temp by infusion?

[Nathan]

Yeah thats not gonna happen soon hehehehe...

[Crusader-Rob]

HAha, yeah not only does that protein rest sort your lumps and bumps, but it supposedly also helps the enzymes that protect head retention? correct me if I'm wrong?

[Sam DT]

Yeah that's the theory, it basically reduces the length of the proteins. Medium length proteins are supposed to give good body and head retention although you have to be careful with fully modified malts as if you cut up the proteins too much you end up with short proteins and worse body and head retention.

The trick seems to be to keep to between 55 - 58 deg for fully modified malts which will break down larger chain proteins that are left into medium length ones without shredding them completely which should give better body and head retention and a clearer beer. Also recommended if you're using a lot of adjunct.

Apparently if you do a decent acid rest at around 40 - 45  you can break down all the gums that cause clumping in the first place but I've never given that a go.

[Peter Smith]

I have seen underletting work on three different 50L+ systems,  I still just add my grains on top and stir as I add them, takes a few mins but I don't seem to get dough balls, I have not even got close to a stuck sparge yet , perhaps I need to reduce the mill gap a tad.  Mashing in a 50L keg.   I want to move onto underletting but I am still not 100% on the thermal mass calcs of the cold stainless keg, so I tend to add all my mash in water check temps then mash in.  

[Nathan]

Yeah I hear that, I missed my mash temp by 1deg also......Lets just say along with burning my foot stuck sparge and missing my numbers it wasnt the smoothest brew day ever but i managed to get everything back on track in the end thanks to dextrose and warm water. Oh and dont go standing in bare feet where you have just had your gas burner blasting for an hour the concret can get warm hahahaha....Wort smelled and tasted fantastic.

Id love to try underletting but dont wanna ruin a brew day out of an experiment 

[Jamie McQuillan]

I have never had a dough ball or stuck sparge either. While we are on this topic, what about mash thickness? I have typically been using 2.3 -2.5 L/kg followed by 2 x batch sparges. I am considering thinning the mash a little and shifting to one batch, partly to speed things up a bit but also because the bigger volumes will probably hold the target mash temperature a bit better through out the process. I am still getting my head around how mash thickness will influence the beer. Opinions seem to differ a fair bit, but going by this article it seems a thinner mash will favour better efficiency and less beta-amylase activity at higher mash temps  (which means more body right) https://byo.com/stories/item/1110-managing-mash-thickness. Keen to hear what mash thickness others prefer. 

[Nathan]

well this brew I did yesterday was 24L with 8.5kg grains then another 14L sparge. was very thick but no dough balls 

[Sam DT]

From what I've read higher temp enzymes prefer thinner mashes and lower temp thicker. I.e. protein and acid rests are better thick & scarification is better thinner. I hadn't heard about alpa & beta but sounds like the rule of thumb holds there too...

[Richard Rice]

I've been playing around with mash thickness as well...and just clicked that some of my latest beers have been a bit off...potentially through mashing too thick?  From what I've been told recently, it really shouldn't matter all that much, but up until the last few beers, all my brews have come out really well with good numbers and I started improving volumes as well...then suddenly, my last three or four beers have been off.  Substantially.

I have to start wondering how much difference that makes.

Also, reading some of these responses, I brew alone at the moment and I just dump the grain in the mash tun, which I pre-heat, then just slowly add the Hot Liquor to the grain, stirring as I go.  I don't know how much difference it makes, but I don't seem to get any dough balls.