Saving Wort

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Moonshae

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By the time I get home from work, I don't have enough time to do a full brew in the evening, with the time it takes to mash, etc. Since I brew on the deck, it gets pretty dark and difficult to see what I'm doing, even with a little light out there. What I'd like to do is complete my mash/sparge, and then keep the wort overnight to boil the next day.

Since it's getting cold at night here (high 40s/low 50s), I figured I could bring it up to a boil to kill any nasties already present, then leave it sit out overnight and cool (with a lid), move it into my kegerator in the morning to keep it cold, and then bring it back out to finish the boil the next day. Or I could not boil at all just move it into the kegerator while it's still warm/hot, but I'd prefer not to do that, just to avoid the risk of spilling 7 gallons of hot wort all over myself.

Am I risking any kind of off flavors by letting it cool down (slowly) and then heating it back up to boil temps? I can't imagine anything would really be able to get a foothold to grow in it that quickly.
 
Cooling it down slowly would worry me, prehaps chilling the wort after sparging, then putting it in your kegerator to keep it cold, and then heating it up the next day.
 
ive hear of people canning their wort but i would just dress warm and finish it up the same day. Get a big light for your deck. If you let it sit overnight i think its risky but thats just me. Even if you plan to reboil the next day your hop addition times are going to be throw off...
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I have a hard time figuring where the best break between two days would be. If you save the runnings overnight, I'd really want to make sure I hit 168F for a full denaturing. If you brought it up to a boil, then I'd say what's another 60 minutes? If you don't use pils malt, you could decide to increase your hop additions and cut the boil down to 30 minutes.
 
I have a hard time figuring where the best break between two days would be. If you save the runnings overnight, I'd really want to make sure I hit 168F for a full denaturing. If you brought it up to a boil, then I'd say what's another 60 minutes? If you don't use pils malt, you could decide to increase your hop additions and cut the boil down to 30 minutes.

But if you didn't boil the night before, you're asking for a lacto infection.
 
But if you didn't boil the night before, you're asking for a lacto infection.
Not true. You only need to get the mash up to 160-170 like Bobby says. You just need to stop the enzyme activity otherwise you will end up with a corn-on-the-cob taste. You can boil the next day, thus eliminating any possibility of an infection...
 
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