Easy Partial Mash Brewing (with pics)

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DeathBrewer said:
1) If you use TOO MUCH sparge water, you can extract tannins from the grains. This method uses 2 gallons for mash and 2 gallons for sparge...you could probably go up to three and be fine. It also uses a partial boil. If you want to do a full boil, add water after the sparge is complete and the grains are out (and, obviously, you'll need to use a bigger pot)
Click to expand...

Does this mean "too much sparge water at any given time"? Because I think in a full AG system, wouldn't I constantly sparge until I had enough water for my boil? In this system, the difference is I can only sparge with one batch of water... so here I end up having to top off with fresh water in order to hit my boil volume.

Saying it this way, it would be "if the ratio of water to grain ever gets too high, bad stuff happens, so always keep the ratio at ..." Could I theoretically have a 2nd pot with sparge water in it, and soak the grains in that too? Would the now "weaker" grains mean the 2nd pot should have less water than the 1st pot for a correct sparge, or does it not matter if the grains have already been rinsed or not?

Just trying to understand the theory a little more...
 
You have to cool it. a 1 liter mug with ice water works well for a sample vessel. I use a refractometer for that type of stuff so I only need a small sample.
 
msujay said:
I am preparing to brew two 5-gallon recipes this weekend and wanted some help in converting the AHS mini mash instructions to this partial mash method. I'm also trying to figure out how to set up Beersmith to help calculate temperatures, volumes and hop additions. I can either use a 5-gallon pot for a partial boil or a 10-gallon pot to do a full boil. Here goes...

AHS 1492 Pale Ale
3 lbs. 2-Row Malt
8 oz. Crystal 40L Malt
4 lbs. Extra Light DME
4 oz. Malto Dextrin
1 oz. Columbus 60 mins
1 oz. Columbus 15 mins
1 oz. Columus dry hop
OG -1.052
FG - 1.012

AHS mash instructions: 2.5 gallons to 160 degrees, mash for 45 minutes at 155 degrees. Pour 170 degree water over grain bag using 1 qt/2 lbs grain. Allow bag to drip until nearly all water has dripped out, then return to heat for boil.

Questions:
1) How do I convert to partial mash method?
2) Should I change the amount of water used?
3) I prefer to do a full boil, do I just add enough water after the mash to reach my pre-boil wort amount?

Stella Artois Clone
2 lbs. Belgian Pilsner Malt
0.5 lbs. Vienna Malt
0.5 lbs. Cara Pils Malt
5 lbs. Extra Pale LME
2 oz. Saaz 60 minutes
1 oz. Saaz 15 minutes
1 oz. Saaz Flame out
OG - 1.047
FG - 1.008

Same AHS mash instructions as the Pale Ale. The instructions also suggest a cold fermentation for 10 days at 50-55 degrees, which I can accomplish using my kegerator. It then states to raise the temp to 60-70 degrees for 2 days before racking to the secondary for 3-4 weeks at 40 degrees.

Questions:
Same as the Pale Ale, except I also want to get some feedback on the fermentation process recommended by AHS.

Thanks for your help!
Click to expand...

I thought I would clarify my questions...I'm trying to convert the AHS mini mash recipe to a full boil version of DB's partial mash method. I plan to use my turkey fryer to do a full boil to 5.25 gallons. My question is how much water should I use for each recipe for the mash and sparge? My other question is how should I change my hop additions given the full boil versus the mini mash per AHS? I'm brewing in the morning and trying to figure this out! What a noob! :cross::mug:
 
I would use 1.25 quarts per pound of grain in the mash and then whatever additional water needed to get to 6 gallons pre-boil for the sparge
 
jigidyjim said:
How do you go about taking efficiency ratings with hot wort? So for example, after the mash, do i just scoop out some, put it in a tube and drop my hydrometer in right away? Will my hydrometer reading be at all accurate at those temps?
Click to expand...

If you know what the temperature is, you can calculate what the gravity would be at lower temps with a conversion tool.

link below has a chart

http://www.howtobrew.com/appendices/appendixA.html
 
Hardleft said:
I would use 1.25 quarts per pound of grain in the mash and then whatever additional water needed to get to 6 gallons pre-boil for the sparge
Click to expand...


DeathBrewer said:
1) If you use TOO MUCH sparge water, you can extract tannins from the grains. This method uses 2 gallons for mash and 2 gallons for sparge...you could probably go up to three and be fine. It also uses a partial boil. If you want to do a full boil, add water after the sparge is complete and the grains are out (and, obviously, you'll need to use a bigger pot)
Click to expand...


Hmmm 2 conflicting points of advice... anyone want to offer a 3rd? I'm thinking of doing a PM recipe with 3 lbs of grain, which means what... um, not even a gallon of mash water (1.25X3, though I guess if I do closer to 2 quarts I should have over a gallon), so I'll need to have somewhere around 5 more gallons in my final pot...
 
jigidyjim said:
Hmmm 2 conflicting points of advice... anyone want to offer a 3rd? I'm thinking of doing a PM recipe with 3 lbs of grain, which means what... um, not even a gallon of mash water (1.25X3, though I guess if I do closer to 2 quarts I should have over a gallon), so I'll need to have somewhere around 5 more gallons in my final pot...
Click to expand...

This is what I continue to struggle with. I prefer to do a full boil but don't want to use too much sparge water if it could be a problem. I have a 3.5 lbs grain bill, so call it 1-1.5 gallons of water. My sparge would be 5-5.5 gallons, which seems too high based on what I've read here. The other issue is hop utilization. My recipe calls for 1 oz. Columbus 60 minutes, 1 oz. Columbus 15 minutes and 1 oz. Columbus dry hop in the secondary for a week. According to Beersmith, that would be 78.2 IBU's, assuming a 6.63 gallon boil and 5.25 gallon final batch. This is an American Pale Ale (AHS 1492 Pale Ale), so IBU should range from 30-45, based on what Beersmith says.

Any help is appreciated.
 
Listen to DB before me! If you aren't sure, sparge with about the same amount you used to mash.

I think the issue is that most people who can do a full boil are also doing all-grain. I didn't even consider that you might be talking about a 5 gallon sparge.

Your recipe also isn't based on a full boil, which is why you are correct to question the hop amounts. Play around in your calculator to get the ibus where they ought to be. You can always dry hop or make a hop tea if it isn't hoppy enough.
 
Hardleft said:
Listen to DB before me! If you aren't sure, sparge with about the same amount you used to mash.

I think the issue is that most people who can do a full boil are also doing all-grain. I didn't even consider that you might be talking about a 5 gallon sparge.

Your recipe also isn't based on a full boil, which is why you are correct to question the hop amounts. Play around in your calculator to get the ibus where they ought to be. You can always dry hop or make a hop tea if it isn't hoppy enough.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the feedback. I end up mashing in at 1.5 gallons (3.5 lbs of grains). My initial temp when I added the grains was 160 degrees but I was able to get it quickly down to 155 degrees by adding two cups of cool water. I hope I didn't mess up. It's holding at 154 degrees for about 30 minutes. I'm getting ready to heat up the 2.0 gallons of sparge water and hope to hit the 170 degree sparge temperature. I'm sticking with a partial boil (I don't want to mess around with changing the hop adds) and will fill up to 5 gallons in the fermenter.
 
If you want to do a full boil, just top off with some water after you do your sparge. That way you're not over-sparging the grains.

Using all your water for the sparge will work well with all-grain (it's a little more difficult to oversparge with so much grain) but with the small amount of grain you are using with partial mashing, you can easily oversparge with too much water.

Hope that is more clear.

EDIT: Thanks for the calculator...i'm making a spreadsheet now that I have a brewing laptop...less relying on promash, more understanding the math! :)
 
msujay said:
Thanks for the feedback. I end up mashing in at 1.5 gallons (3.5 lbs of grains). My initial temp when I added the grains was 160 degrees but I was able to get it quickly down to 155 degrees by adding two cups of cool water. I hope I didn't mess up. It's holding at 154 degrees for about 30 minutes. I'm getting ready to heat up the 2.0 gallons of sparge water and hope to hit the 170 degree sparge temperature. I'm sticking with a partial boil (I don't want to mess around with changing the hop adds) and will fill up to 5 gallons in the fermenter.
Click to expand...

Into the fermenter it goes...overall it went well for my first partial mash batch. I'm curious to get some opinions on missing my mash temp, although I was able to recover to 155 degrees within a few minutes of starting off at 160 degrees. I was able to keep my mash in the 153-155 degree range for the entire 60 minutes but noticed that my temp starting getting up to 157-159 when I started heating up the sparge water.

OG was 1.053 compared to targeted 1.051-1.052, so feel pretty good about that.
 
DeathBrewer said:
Did you use this calculator?

http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

That will help you hit your mash temp better than my silly "170°F" guideline. I've modified the original post to reflect this.
Click to expand...

I did use that website and was about 5-7 degrees too high. I think it's just getting used to my equipment and stove. My efficiency ended up at 71%, so that is good.
 
DeathBrewer said:
That's odd. Are you sure you had your ratio (grain/water) correct?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I had a 3.5 lb. grain bill, used 1.5 gallons, so 1.71. Grain temp was 68 degrees. 155 was target strike temp. Result was 168 degrees. I turned off heat at 170 degrees, waited until the temp hit 168 degrees, mashed in and the initial temp was 160 degrees. It's possible the temp was off or was in a hot pocket (or lean pocket, if you are worried about your weight), but I got it down to 155 degrees within a minute or two and held it at 155 degrees for the 60-minute mash.
 
Just tried this for the first time today with Orfy's hobgoblin clone. I enjoyed the process. Biggest difficulty was maintaining my mash temp for 90 minutes in my dinky, thin-walled, "economy" pot. It just doesn't retain heat well.

Can't wait to taste this one in 6 weeks or so!
 
Wrap it in some towels next time...I use towels and bungee cords sometimes.

msujay, I would venture to say that the thermometer was just hitting a hot spot. It can be a PITA sometimes. If it's off and it doesn't make sense, I usually will stir it up, let it sit and take another reading.

Better safe than sorry, tho, if you're mashing too high...better to hit it with some water and get it lowered.
 
DeathBrewer said:
Wrap it in some towels next time...I use towels and bungee cords sometimes.

msujay, I would venture to say that the thermometer was just hitting a hot spot. It can be a PITA sometimes. If it's off and it doesn't make sense, I usually will stir it up, let it sit and take another reading.

Better safe than sorry, tho, if you're mashing too high...better to hit it with some water and get it lowered.
Click to expand...

DB, thanks for your help (any anyone else who helped) and for this thread. I'm going to start doing all grain with my next batch and plan to use your stove top method and a turkey fryer for my boil. Thanks again!
 
Hi all ..I have a few comments...i have been reading the Aussi forms.and they have been BIAB for years...which means "brew in a bag" A page back you talk about having to much sparge water and releasing to much tannins ect...now they use full volume mash and dont have any mention of this..has any one been reading the BIAB stuff..they do AG brewing with this technique..Jeff
 
RC4U12 said:
Hi all ..I have a few comments...i have been reading the Aussi forms.and they have been BIAB for years...which means "brew in a bag" A page back you talk about having to much sparge water and releasing to much tannins ect...now they use full volume mash and dont have any mention of this..has any one been reading the BIAB stuff..they do AG brewing with this technique..Jeff
Click to expand...

Deathbrewer actually has an All Grain forum of BIAB. This is BIAB, just you are mashing less and using extract to boost it, but for all purposes, this is BIAB. Deathbrewers version of the AG method has you sparging with the same method he has here, dunking it in the sparge water. I have been doing it that was and I get 71-3% efficiency, and I don't have a problem with tannins. Usually I just sparge with however much I need to get to a full boil amount, but you can do it with less.

Also, you can do BIAB without sparging in a seperate vessle if you can remove some of the wort and pour it back on top of the bag. You pretty much have the same control over the tannins as you do mashing in any other method.

Personally, I don't see the fuss people have about separating this mash technique from the traditional ones. I mean, what you have here IS a traditional mash, just with the bag as a false bottom that wraps around the whole kettle.
 
Oversparging is pretty difficult with a regular all-grain beer. It's basically when you rinse the grain with water that is too hot and/or use too much water. At that point, you are no longer extracting sugar, just running water over the grain husks, which extracts tannins (like tea.)

Because you are using only a small amount of water with this method, if you do a full boil and use all your water, it is POSSIBLE to extract tannins. That's the only concern.
:mug:
 
well since i'm new seems like contradicting terms..but may be that i just need more reading..heres my flips... from one site below

"In layman’s terms, BIAB can be summarised as follows. For a standard beer. The brewer brings around 35 litres of water to mash temperature (62 to 70 degrees depending on the beer) in a large pot. The pot is then lined with an extrememley fine mesh bag into which the grain is poured. This temperature is maintained for 60 minutes. At this stage, the bag is drained and removed, and the water that now tastes sweet (hence called sweet liquor) is brought to the boil and held there for 60 minutes. At various stages during the boil period, hops may be added to affect bitterness, flavour and aroma. After the boil, the resulting liquid (now called wort) is chilled rapidly to the correct temperature for the pitching of the yeast. All other stages of the brewing process should be familiar to those who have done some kit brews.

and here it's said,, heres quote "If you use TOO MUCH sparge water, you can extract tannins from the grains. This method uses 2 gallons for mash and 2 gallons for sparge...you could probably go up to three and be fine."

can you see where i'm trying to see both ?? I know theres something just not clicking in my thoughts..and you will show me the light.. Jeff
 
This may have been covered, but I don't recall catching it in the 79 pages of replies. :)

Is there a reason you add the original wort from the mash to the sparged wort? Can you add the sparged to the original? I am thinking from my equipment standpoint it may make more sense to add the sparged to the mashed. Should this make a difference?

Ernpac
 
ernpac said:
Is there a reason you add the original wort from the mash to the sparged wort? Can you add the sparged to the original? I am thinking from my equipment standpoint it may make more sense to add the sparged to the mashed. Should this make a difference?
Click to expand...

I think I commented on that a few pages back, but it might be in the AG forum instead. I do what you mentioned. It makes sense for me to add the sparge to the mashed. It's just easier with the equipment I have, and in addition to that I get more control over pre boil volume. If you happened to sparge too much, you can always withold from adding the whole sparge amount. You wouldn't want to withold some of the mashed wort to comensate for volume because that is where all the sugars are. This happens a lot when I am brewing small volumes of beer. I still want to sparge with enough water to draw the sugars off, but I may not need much extra water with a thin mash.

What this forum (and DBs AG BIAB as well) are all about is doing it the way that makes most sense to the brewer. Often extract brewers think of mashing as a complex system that rules need to be followed stricktly, and there is no room for mistakes. I admit I was guilty of this too, but what this forum is all about is the basics, no matter what equipment or methods you use, the general rule is the same. Before I did this method, I thought mashing was something I didn't have the equipment or space to do it in, but what this is all about is what makes sense and is easiest for the brewer.
 
agenthucky said:
I think I commented on that a few pages back, but it might be in the AG forum instead. I do what you mentioned. It makes sense for me to add the sparge to the mashed. It's just easier with the equipment I have, and in addition to that I get more control over pre boil volume. If you happened to sparge too much, you can always withold from adding the whole sparge amount. You wouldn't want to withold some of the mashed wort to comensate for volume because that is where all the sugars are. This happens a lot when I am brewing small volumes of beer. I still want to sparge with enough water to draw the sugars off, but I may not need much extra water with a thin mash.

What this forum (and DBs AG BIAB as well) are all about is doing it the way that makes most sense to the brewer. Often extract brewers think of mashing as a complex system that rules need to be followed stricktly, and there is no room for mistakes. I admit I was guilty of this too, but what this forum is all about is the basics, no matter what equipment or methods you use, the general rule is the same. Before I did this method, I thought mashing was something I didn't have the equipment or space to do it in, but what this is all about is what makes sense and is easiest for the brewer.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. I kinda figured it didn't matter, but Deathbrewer is the man for posting this and I thought there might be some method to the madness. Sorry for making you repeat yourself.

There is a metric crap-ton of knowledge in this thread alone. Thanks to all of you and espeically DB!
 
ernpac said:
This may have been covered, but I don't recall catching it in the 79 pages of replies. :)

Is there a reason you add the original wort from the mash to the sparged wort? Can you add the sparged to the original? I am thinking from my equipment standpoint it may make more sense to add the sparged to the mashed. Should this make a difference?

Ernpac
Click to expand...

The reason is because the bigger pot is the sparge/boil container in this method. As agenthucky mentioned, there are many different ways to brew and no one system is the right one.

Why would it work better the other way with your setup?
 
DeathBrewer said:
The reason is because the bigger pot is the sparge/boil container in this method. As agenthucky mentioned, there are many different ways to brew and no one system is the right one.

Why would it work better the other way with your setup?
Click to expand...

In my crazy way of thinking, I would rather do the brewing in my stainless 5 gallon because of the width to height ratio than in the larger pot which is skinny and tall and a little harder to measure things like temp and all that in. I use it only if I have to. I intend to get a better larger stainless pot at some point.
 
I used this again last night and everything went really well I think.

3kg of two row
.5kg munich 100L
.5kg vienna
1kg light dme

mashed in at 155 (I think, I was trying to correct with some cold water) for sixty minutes with 3 gallons, only lost four degrees. sparged 2.5 gallons, then boiled for sixty minutes.
1oz cluster 7.5% aa at 60 mins
1oz cluster at 30 mins
.5oz goldings 4.5% aa at 15 mins
.5 goldings at 5 mins

I got an SG of 1.069, or thereabouts. The wort tasted fantastic and I even found decent yeast, safale-04. I don't know exactly what my post boil volume is though, it looks like it's nearly five, but did lose a bit more than I thought last time, so maybe 4.75.
 
Nice. That looks tasty.

You got about 75% efficiency, according to my calculations. If you wanted a bigger volume (and lower gravity), you could add some distilled water (or boiled and cooled water) at kegging or bottling time.
 
Well, whatever volume I ended up with was fine so long as I had more than fourish. The gravity was more or less what I was shooting for since I'd like the beer to end up 7.5-8%. If my fg comes out at 1.013 I'll hit 7.5.

Thanks again deathbrewer, I'd have never guessed how easy this would be. I did this with a buddy last night, and he's hooked off the first batch.
 
I am having a really hard time reproducing the "Blue Moon Clone PM" recipe using your guide.

I have a 23 qt pot that I am using to do my partial mash in.

I'm using 2.2 lb of flaked wheat for my PM, which I mash in approximately 2.75 qts of water. After about 20min into the mash the water is so thick from the flaked wheat and the temp goes down significantly (below 140 F). Due to this I end up battling with the temperature and just for my own sanity I mash for around 1.5 hours just to accommodate for the large temperature changes :(

I am wondering if this is normal? Or should I up the water when using flaked wheat?
Also, should I think about switching to mashing my flaked wheat in some kind of camping cooler? I'm also using a grain bag, if I switch to a camping cooler should I ditch the bag and simply filter the grains when I pour the finished mash to the pot?



Really want to make this beer but I am having a lot of trouble.

Your expertise is appreciated!

Thanks :)
 
You can't mash flaked wheat by itself. You need some base malt (pale malt, pilsner, etc.) that contains the enzymes necessary for converting the starches into simpler sugars. Flaked wheat doesn't contain any of these enzymes.

As for maintaining temperature, use this calculator to mash in at the correct temperature:

Strike Temperature Calculator

Then wrap your mash in blankets or towels to maintain the temp as best you can. If it drops, it's not a big deal. Most conversion takes place very quickly and would happen before the drop, plus if it drops in the 140s, you're just going to have a nice, dry beer...it won't hurt it.
 
DeathBrewer said:
You can't mash flaked wheat by itself. You need some base malt (pale malt, pilsner, etc.) that contains the enzymes necessary for converting the starches into simpler sugars. Flaked wheat doesn't contain any of these enzymes.

As for maintaining temperature, use this calculator to mash in at the correct temperature:

Strike Temperature Calculator

Then wrap your mash in blankets or towels to maintain the temp as best you can. If it drops, it's not a big deal. Most conversion takes place very quickly and would happen before the drop, plus if it drops in the 140s, you're just going to have a nice, dry beer...it won't hurt it.
Click to expand...

So should I mash the flaked what with my dry malt extract next time?

Previously I added the DME after the mash and just before the boil.

.
 
No, you need malted grain, not malt extract.

Use a portion of one of these:

http://ebrew.com/beer/base_malts.htm

Malt extract is dried or liquid extract from a mash that has already taken place. When you are doing a mash, you are "starting from scratch"...extract means the work has already been done for you.

This may help: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mash_ingredients

The primary type of mash ingredient is grain that has been malted. Modern-day recipes generally consist of a large percentage of a light malt and, optionally, smaller percentages of more flavorful or highly-colored types of malt. The former is called "base malt"; the latter is known as "specialty malts".
Click to expand...

Base malt is light malt that has the enzymes necessary for conversion.
 
crud!

ill have to re-do the recipe again then. if i were to re-do the PM version then how much grain will i need? is there a conversion calculator specifically for flaked wheat?

i think ill just do the AG for the "blue moon clone" rather than attempt a PM.

thanks for the help!

cheers!
 
Well, I'm assuming you are trying to mash the flaked wheat because it cannot be steeped and you are using extract for the rest of your recipe.

If this is the case, just add a pound of pilsner malt to your mash and subtract 0.5 lbs of extract from your recipe and you've got yourself a partial mash.

I could help more if you post your recipe, too.
 
here is the recipe (from beermuncher)


This should be a good base:
3.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract (3.0 SRM)
1.00 lb Wheat Dry Extract (8.0 SRM)
2.00 lb Wheat, Flaked (1.6 SRM)

1.49 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00%] (60 min)

0.75 oz Coriander Seed (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
0.75 oz Orange Peel, Bitter (Boil 10.0 min) Misc

1 Pkgs Belgian Witbier (Wyeast #3944 or White Labs WLP400) Definitely want a Belgian Wit yeast though.

Mash your flaked wheat at 155 degrees for 60-75 minutes (the longer will up the efficiency and ABV%)

Strain the wheat grains out and bring wort to boil, add extracts and you know the rest...
 

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