minimash 1st time

A little help please. I recently ordered some minimash kits and it was a mistake. Did not realy know what i was getting into. I think I can do it the way deathbrewer shows in the "Easy Partial Mash Brewing" tutorial.

I can get water for free that is sidiment filtered, carbon filtered, reverse osmosis, carbon filtered and finaly ultraviolet treated. I have no idea what I get out of the tap though. And if I buy bottled what type should I get?

Where can I get a mesh grain bag to hold the grains on short notice?


Am I missing something?

Water that is too pure will not have the minerals in it to make the beer taste good. Just use tap water if it is drinkable in your area, or use regular bottled or filtered water.

For the grains, get a paint strainer bag from Home Depot or Lowes (or you local hardware store). These are the bags pros use to strain paint before they put it in a sprayer. A 1 gallon one is big enough for a couple of pounds of grain at least; a 5 gallon one is huge.

And don't worry. Have a homebrew! PMing is easy if you follow Deathbrewers thread!

you could also just add the grain right into the water in the pot and then dump it through a strainer/collander into another pot at the end of the mash. Then slowly pour the sparge water over the grains in the strainer to sparge.

thx. i only have 1 pot though so realy need that strainer. as for bottled water will what is better, "filtered drinking water" or "spring water"?

I just recently did my first PM. One thing I had a problem with was maintaining the mash temp throughout the entire hour (likely because I kept opening the pot to check the temperature to make sure it wasn't dropping, which made it drop further ). Best thing to do? Heat your water to the strike temp, dump in the grain, stir, cover with the lid and wrap a towel or blanket around it and leave it for an hour. You can check it after an hour to see how much the temperature has dropped and will know if you need to adjust the heat next time.

You may have already read up on this, but if not, it might save you an hour's worth of stress.

Good luck! :rockin:

On your water question, honestly, I'd go with what's cheaper. I use tap water and never had a problem with anything.

Thnx Guys!

I use tap water and just boil it for a while to drive off chlorine before using it for my mash. Then I use bottled spring water for my top up. Works just great as far as I can tell.

I can't use my water during certain points of the year do to chloramines. If you do have any type of chlorine in your water, you'll want to boil it off before you mash. Chloramine does not boil off.

I use bottled water right now...my filter is not installed at my new place. Any spring water should be fine. I usually use distilled water to top off, whether it is before or after fermentation.

Hophazard said:

I just recently did my first PM. One thing I had a problem with was maintaining the mash temp throughout the entire hour (likely because I kept opening the pot to check the temperature to make sure it wasn't dropping, which made it drop further ). Best thing to do? Heat your water to the strike temp, dump in the grain, stir, cover with the lid and wrap a towel or blanket around it and leave it for an hour. You can check it after an hour to see how much the temperature has dropped and will know if you need to adjust the heat next time.

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or you can pre-heat your oven to 200 degrees while you get your mash water up to temp. Then shut the oven off, put a lid on your mash pot and stick it in the oven for an hour. The warm oven will keep your mash temp steady.

One other tip - make sure you stir your mash water occasionally when bringing it to temp. Otherwise you'll could overshoot your desired temp. Evidently the pot heats from the bottom and when you take a temp from the top, you don't get an accurate reading if it's not well-mixed.

another option for treating chlorine in your water is campden tablets (metabisulfite); it will take care of both chlorine and chloramines

OK so for the water issue Bottled water and well filtered tap water to top off.

ivanavich said:

OK so for the water issue Bottled water and well filtered tap water to top off.

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You must be worried about your tap water? Do you drink it?

my tap water is great in taste compared to other neaighborhoods and I know it has clorine so can be boiled away. I just want to be sure to have a good batch.

I would use the tap water personally, but if it has a bunch of chlorine (If you can taste it bad) you may want to try campden tablets. All I use is my tap water, but it tastes good too. I had thoughts of filtering out suspended solids if I try a true pilsner, but . . . why would I want a pilsner with no flavoring, I would want to add . . . . CHILIES?

I used my water just fine for about a year. Then they changed up the chemicals, and BAM! 5 batches of bad beer.

My extract batches weren't that bad at the time. I think it's more the chemistry during the mash than it is the presence of chloramines in general. If you're going to use tap water for mashing, boil and/or treat it FIRST.