Im getting ready to do my first batch next week. I have all the ingredients. Im going to do a partial mash with 5 lbs of grain in a 3g cooler. Im a bit confused on the mash/sparge though. Im going to do a batch sparge.
I calculated that I will need around 6-6.25 quarts of water for my mash. Once that sits for an hour at around 150-155 F, do I drain (recirculating a bit to filter out the bits) that and then sparge with half of my sparge water (roughly 1 gallon). Or do I add the sparge water to the mash and then drain all of it and then sparge again?
Mash In and rest for an hour
Recirculate a bit until clear
Drain off all the first wort
Close the drain
Dump in all of your sparge water. For 5lb of grain you'll want about 2.5 gallons of sparge water.
Stir well let the grain bed settle for a few minutes
Recirculate until clear
Drain off sparge water.
One more question. Am I adding grains to the water or water to the grains when I mash in? Should I stir up the mash before I seal it up and let it rest for an hour?
with the small mash you are doing, it shouldnt matter adding water to grains or grains to water. With bigger mashes, its easier to add some water, then some grains and stir, add some more water and some grains and stir ect.
You want to stir the mash to make sure that there are no dry spots within the bed of grains. And some people stir every so often through out the mash, and some people just leave it be after the initial stiring.
Some people put a small amount of hot water in to pre-warm the tun to mitigate thermal loss. the temp of your tun can vary a great deal if you do this outside. Especially when comparing suymmer to winter.
starting a partial Lagunitas IPA today wish me luck brews...my recipe calls for mashing at 150 for 90 mins..does that sound weird to anyone? . iknow this thread is old but whatever..
Noob Mash/sparge questions (partial mash)
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