Steeping grains left on the "tea" for a while OK?

I heated up some water to 165F and dumped my steeping grains in. I put them in and covered the pot and turned the heat off. Due to some time constraints, I put them in the fridge once it had reached room temp and then a few days later I filtered the wort off the grains. Is this OK? Will I get off flavors from the exposure of the grains for so long (even if not at a warm temp). Thanks...

 

No, in fact, your beer will probably be nice and smooth. Steeping grains have virtually all of the diastatic power roasted out of them. This means they just need to be steeped/soaked to extract their remaining sugars and flavors. No mashing required, although a lot of all grain brewers will still mash them. There are some brewers that make a tea from their grains in just this way by letting them soak for 48 hours at two quarts per pound of grain (and doubling the grain amounts) in cold water to make a tea.

The reason for this is that at warm temperatures (170 f and above), roasted grains can leach tannins and astringency compounds into your wort. If you've ever had a bitter stout that tastes like a teabag, this is the astringency. To avoid it, some brewers have found success in making the cold grain tea.

Before you add the tea to your primary, it's a good idea to bring it back to 160 * f for ten minutes or so just to sanitize it, then cool it off and add it to the primary.

 

Thanks. It is actually much more convenient for me to do this way. We'll give it a shot.

 

Cool short article on the techniques: http://beersmith.com/blog/2011/11/17/brewing-beer-with-dark-grains-steeping-versus-mashing/