First All Grain - Blackish Sediment in Wort?

Tried my fist all grain yesturday. I am using the batch sparging technique. I dedcided to brew Edwort's Haus Pale Ale due to the fact that everyone seems to like it on the board and the cheap cost of ingrediants.

I used the batch sparge method. I crafted my own Mash Tun using Flyguy's SS braid method w/ a 10 gallon round cooler. I hit all of my temperatures and my post boil SG was 1.049 instead of 1.051, so I guess my efficenciy was not all that great.

After I chilled my wort down to 70 degrees I siphoned it off into the carboy. In the brew kettle the wort apeared to have a 'normal' amber color. When it got all mixed up going into my carboy it had this blackish color to it.

Now that the wort has had time to settle out if is the normal color again, the black crap has fell out of it.

The wort is ferminting normally as I write this.

Anyone have any idea what the black stuff might be? I have never seen it before when I am brewing extract. Is it just what all grain wort looks like or did I screw something up?

Did you "recycle" the first 1-3 pints that you drew off your mash tun? Once you are ready to drain it after mashing, you open up the valve and a ton of sediment will flow out with the first 1-3 pints, but after a bit, the grain acts as a filter, and catches the sediment crap. You are supposed to draw off wort until it runs clear, then carefully add that grainy wort back on top of the grain bed (without disturbing it). If you can see floating bits of crap in a pint glass in your wort, then its not clear enough.

Disclaimer: I am still a n00b and in fact just did my first all grain (or nearly all grain) batch with a real mash and a real sparge 2 days ago. Thus making me an expert

This could also be the cold break. If it settles out pretty quickly thats most likely what it was. I just brewed a double chocolate stout, and let me tell you, the last couple of quarts I was syphoning out was like syrup. :rockin:

Did you "recycle" the first 1-3 pints that you drew off your mash tun?

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I did do my Vorlauf (sp?). I think I did 4-5 quarts of Vorlauf on each sparge so I am pretty confident that i got most of the free radicals that made it through my braid from the grain.

I have read that some people use Rice Hulls. I did not use these, should this be something I should be adding to my shoppping list from now on to prevent this type of thing?

This could also be the cold break

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What I was seeing was definately part of my cold break, but my main concern was the color. Normally it appears to be more brown, this was black specs mixed with brown. Almost like like black specs of sand floating around in the wort.

Maybe some wort got burned on the bottom of the kettle? I don't know, and I haven't had that happen -- I'm just trying to guess. Does the wort taste good? If it does I wouldn't worry,

Congratulations on your efficiency! You only missed the gravity by a couple of points, I think that's great!!

I guess it is possible that some might have burnt on the bottom of the kette, but I would only think that would happen if there was some more solid parts in the wort. Since this is an all grain batch and not an extract I would think the mixture would be pretty homogenous and that wouldn't be an issue unless I had some solids make it through my SS braid? Also, after the kettle was empty I didn't see any signs of scorching on the bottom of the pot.



The wort tasted fine (sweet and could taste some of the hop) and is ferminting normally. I guess I will know if I screwed something up or not when I go to taste it in a couple weeks.

In my next batch I will be super careful about the way that I Vorlauf in case I got any little grain particles in there and those burnt on the bottom or something.