First attempt at partial mash...thoughts?

So I'm in the middle of my first PM batch. It's carl_g's conversion of Biermuncher's Centennial Blonde.

Problems...I checked my mash temp at 18 or so mins and it was too low...145 deg or so. Added some boiling water and got her back up. Did I screw this one up bad?

Next, I am using DeathBrewer's stovetop method so sparged in separate 5 gal pot at 168...only temp got out of hand when I added the grain bag and spiked to 180. Coming down now.

Am I screwed?

 

No harm done in starting mash temp being a little low. High sparge water temp could cause tannin extraction from the grains though. As long as you caught it early and corrected you should hopefully be ok.

 

Temp variations aren't ideal and will impact the final product to some degree. Beer is pretty hard to screw up, but at the same token it is pretty hard to make an awesome award winning beer. You don't want your grains to see 180 as it will extract tannins and you cannot get rid of those once they are there so get the temp down asap.

 

Thanks for the feedback. That's what I was afraid of. Oh well, this is my first attempt with sparging so live and learn. We'll see how it turns out.

 

Update...so I ended up hitting my target OG (provided by BeerSmith). I guess my only issue are the tannins. I'm assuming they're not harmful since they're common in wine...that's my story, anyway. What should I smell/taste for to see if they made it in?

 

Tannins will cause some astrigency in the beer. If you got the temp back under 170 within 10mins or so you should be safe.

 

a while ago someone posed the idea of heating your oven to 150 and sticking your pot (if thats what your using) in there while the grains are mashing and that should prevent any heat loss. Just remember to take out the oven racks when they're cold

 

Thanks for the info. I was only sparging for 10 mins total so should be ok then. It wasn't over 170 the entire 10 mins.

With respect to using the oven when mashing that's actually what I did. I think my problem was not getting the grain in on time once my water was ready at 168. My 5-year old "assistant" was asking a million questions and very curious about the process so I probably let too much heat out before getting the pot into the oven. When I checked it at 20 mins (even in the oven), it was below 155.

 

You'll have slightly higher fermentables and slightly less body than if it was just 155, which isn't such a bad thing for a blonde. Since its a PM I doubt you'd notice much of the difference.

 

Although tannins will not mellow out, using gelatin as a fining agent will remove them. It's a common procedure in making red wine.

 

Should I add when racking to secondary? Or at bottling time? How much for 5 gallon batch? I used Irish Moss the last 10 mins of my boil. No issue with having two agents in one batch?

Thanks a ton, guys.