Missing that certain something - body, mouthfeel - Page 2

**pjj2ba** · 03-22-2010, 02:50 PM

I'm an advocate for step mashes, but it depends on the grain. If I use a lot of pils malt, then I do a p-rest. If I use a pale malt I'll skip it (but will still do a two step, 150 ish then 160 ish). I've been experimenting with mashing-in pale malt at 125 and then immediately ramping up to my initial saccharification temp. These results aren't in yet.

Hannable1975 · 09-17-2010, 03:21 PM

bump for results of pjj2ba's experiment . . .

Pivovar_Koucky · 09-17-2010, 04:53 PM

Aventinus is a weizenbock with an original gravity of 18.5 Plato. That'll give you some mouthfull feel.

bctdi · 09-18-2010, 02:07 PM

funny this thread came up since I seem to be having the same problem.My beers seem to be missing the depth on the malt side that the commercial beers seem to have.I haven`t done a 90 minute boil yet, so next brew I will start.My pre-boil gravities seem a little lower than planned, but my post boil gravities come out correct...I boil off a lot though and compensate for that by starting with 8 gallons to end up with 5.5 gallons in the fermentor.I think maybe I`m boiling too vigorously ....so next brew I`m going to try using more malt to hit my pre-boil gravity, then do a 90 minute boil, but a much less vigorous boil.Also I`ve never done a mashout....so I plan on doing a mashout as well.Just curious if the OP was doing any of the same things I was and coming up with less malt depth because of it.It seems that I read somewhere that more boil off evaporation will concentrate the wort more , but doesn`t have quite the same effect as starting out with the correct amount of malt to hit your preboil gravity to begin with.Maybe it was on one of the brew strong episodes, but can`t remember exactly.

**pjj2ba** · 09-24-2010, 04:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hannable1975

bump for results of pjj2ba's experiment . . .

I had to go back and check my recipes to see which beers I mashed which way. Nothing conclusive yet. I've been testing too many variable at once, which as a scientist I should know better, but I just can drink that much beer.

Anyway, I can say that mashing in at 125F (mostly pale malt) and then immediately adding heat to get it up to 153 F (in about 20 min.) did not result in a watery beer. I can't say it added more body over skipping this step. This was for an IPA and I also tried a new hopback technique, which I did not like the results of and kind threw the whole flavor profile off.

I haven't brewed many ales in the past couple of months (except Alts and Kolsch with pils malts which I always step mash). I do have a porter about ready to keg, where I skipped the p-rest, but did do a 2-step saccharification (Pale malts). Mashed at 145 for 20 min. and then 20 min, at 158. I use this schedule (w/ a p-rest) when I'm brewing an Ofest or Helles with a lot of pils malt and it gives a good malty profile with lots of body