pineknot

Recipes 

I am pretty new to the brewing process, so, please forgive me if this question is elementary. What is the hot break? And, how do I recognize it?

JohnnyO

Recipes 

Hot break is the material that happens when your wort hits a rolling boil. When it is building up to that point, you see a thick foam develop on top of your wort. Once it hits a rolling boil, you see material floating around in your wort that you did not put in there yourself. That is hot break material.

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Fermenting: Saison
Drinking: IPA, Hefeweizen
On Deck: TBD

ArcaneXor

Recipes 

There's usually not much of a hot break with extract brewing, unless you used lots of steeping grains or did a partial mash.

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The Fiesty(sic) Goat Brewery est. 2007 & Clusterfuggle Experimental Ales est. 2009
Planned: Fat Man Brown Porter (Pro-Am #2), WLP 351 Hefeweizen, WLP 860 Munich Helles
Primary: Centennial Falcon IPA (Pro-Am #1), sLambic I
Secondary: Flanders Red
Kegged:Himmel un Ääd Kölsch #8, Farmhouse Session Saison Pilot Batch, Chocolate Milk Stout, Pale Ale, Chili Smoked Porter, Berliner Weisse w/ Brett #3

pineknot

Recipes 

Thank you JohnnyO! Is the hot break an indicator that I should start or stop something? What is the purpose of watching for it?

Cranny04

Recipes 

Hot break is what will boil over if your not careful

two_hearted

Recipes 

Its an indicator that your boil has begun once it breaks. Once the proteins fall to the bottom of the kettle, I throw in my 60 min addition and start the timer (unless your doing a 90 min boil).