200 degrees! Yikes!

[beertoole]

I was doing a Mini-Mash IPA yesterday. The instructions that came from my local home-brew store came WITHOUT and temp to mash the grains. So, I went online and from some other recipes that I had seen an average temp of about 158-160 seemed to be the average.

Question 1: How do I figure out what temp to mash at when I'm creating a new recipe of using one that left that info off?

Next, once I got the water temp near 160, I dumped the grains and went inside to, of course, grab a fresh beer. When I returned outside about 120 seconds later, my wort was upwards of 200 degrees. I finished the batch with a frown on my face, and added the yeast starter....This morning I have full blown fermentation, a nice 1 inch yeast head on the beer.

Question 2: Did that 200 degree burst of heat kill the flavor of my beer? Am I doomed?

Thanks so much
Beer Toole

 

[cheezydemon3]

Did it boil? Upwards of 200, you are damned close.

It will be fine. You may not have gotten any fermentables from the grains, but you probably got flavor from any specialty.

Regardless, it will be beer, and probably good beer.

 

[beertoole]

I would say that is was getting really close to boil, but it was shy of an actual boil.

Thanks so much for the help! I've been a member for 10 minutes and you guys are already helping me a great deal!
Thanks!!

 

[devilishprune]

It's too late to do anything now. Just bottle it up in a few weeks and taste it once it has had some time to condition. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you're going to be perfectly fine.

To figure out your own mash temperature, you have to think about what is style appropriate (or just what you want) for your beer. If you want a thicker mouthfeel then mash high, and vice versa. I've used temps anywhere from 149-159 for my beers, but you can go lower than that (and maybe a little higher) if you so choose.

 

[Shinglejohn]

Download beersmith, there are tools on there for figuring that.

 

[ReverseApacheMaster]

At that temperature you definitely denatured the enzymes and didn't get conversion. You should have still gotten some flavor out of the specialties and maybe some bitterness from extracting tannins at that temperature.

Your mash should be between 149-159. The lower end will produce more fermentable sugars, the higher will produce more unfermentable sugars. Unfermentable sugars will produce a sweeter beer because the yeast will leave them alone and ferment everything else.

 

[IrregularPulse]

2 minute rise time from 160 to 200!? Of a thick mash? Hell of a burner. I'm assuming this is a direct fired mash tun. Next time, after you dough in and hit your temp, turn the burner off