15 Min. Boil -- Steeping Grains to Avoid?

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tonyolympia

tonyolympia

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I'm an all-grain brewer, but I'm planning to experiment with 15-minute boil extract recipes, just for fun and to increase the pipeline.

Some sources (e.g. JZ's Brewing Classic Styles, the Briess website) are pretty liberal about the range of specialty grains that can be steeped for an extract-and-steeping grain recipe, but I'm wondering. Are there grains that could be steeped as part of a full 60 minute boil recipe, but that you wouldn't want to use if you were only boiling for 15 minutes, because...I don't know, because of unconverted starches that wouldn't precipitate during the short boil?

People seem to have success with crystal malts and a short boil, but what about something like Victory malt? Does none of this matter if you're only using a lb. or so?

Any thoughts and experiences would be helpful.
 
Most of what won't work as a steeping grain in a short boil won't work at all without some pale malt to convert it. Flaked barley, flaked oats, corn, etc., need enzymes to mash them or you'll wind up with a beer with an unpleasant texture.
 
sptaylor70 said:
Most of what won't work as a steeping grain in a short boil won't work at all without some pale malt to convert it. Flaked barley, flaked oats, corn, etc., need enzymes to mash them or you'll wind up with a beer with an unpleasant texture.
Click to expand...

So it sounds like what you're saying is that any of the grains that are listed as steeping grains by the maltster should be OK in a short boil. At Briess, they say the following about steeping grains:

"What malts can be steeped? It is not recommended to steep Base Malts, Pale Ale Malt, Munich Malts or other malts with a mealy endosperm because starch could be extracted which would interfere later in the brewing process. These malts need to be partial mashed or mashed, which activates the malt enzymes and converts the grain starches into fermentable sugars.

Briess malts suitable for steeping include:
Carapils® Malt (a unique dextrine malt different than other dextrine malts on the market)
Victory® Malt
Special Roast Malt
Extra Special Malt
All Caramel Malts (Crystal Malts)
All Dark Roasted Malts
All Roasted Barley"

...so any of these should be as good as another for a short boil. Correct?
 
tonyolympia said:
So it sounds like what you're saying is that any of the grains that are listed as steeping grains by the maltster should be OK in a short boil. At Briess, they say the following about steeping grains:

"What malts can be steeped? It is not recommended to steep Base Malts, Pale Ale Malt, Munich Malts or other malts with a mealy endosperm because starch could be extracted which would interfere later in the brewing process. These malts need to be partial mashed or mashed, which activates the malt enzymes and converts the grain starches into fermentable sugars.

Briess malts suitable for steeping include:
Carapils® Malt (a unique dextrine malt different than other dextrine malts on the market)
Victory® Malt
Special Roast Malt
Extra Special Malt
All Caramel Malts (Crystal Malts)
All Dark Roasted Malts
All Roasted Barley"

...so any of these should be as good as another for a short boil. Correct?
Click to expand...

The 60-90 min boil is for hop utilization, sanitization and to drive off DMS precursors (in all grain). You are doing 15 boil, so if you steep a lot of a base grain or lightly kilned grain you will have a lot of DMS potential. Victory and Biscuit are lightly kilned not in the Caramel or Roast Grain families. Rule of Thumb Steep Caramels and Roast, mash base and Light Kilned Grain. That being said you should regularly break the rules. Try the Victory, or try a experimental mini 1/2 cup victory in 1 1/2 cups of 150 water for 60 min. Strain cool and taste. Is it worth it? Maybe add some of the MO extract instead.

15 min of a boil will kill off any bugs. I also use the 15 min Extract boil when I don't have time to AG or BIAB. There should be a 15 min area in recipes.
 
Thanks for the input, everyone. I think I'm going to skip the Victory for the first batch, and just go with .5 lb C40. I remembered that I made an English mild recently that had .5 lb each of Victory and C40, and if I went with those grains again, the wort would look and taste pretty much like that mild did. It was an awesome beer, but I don't like to cover the same ground again without a good reason.
 

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