Adding your dark grains during the sparge

[i4ourgot]

I was listening to the beer smith podcast 39 from 5/31/12 and they talk about adding your dark malts after the mash but before you sparge. Has anyone tried this before? The reason behind it was the equivalent to leaving a pot of coffee on a warmer all day and getting that astringency. Is 154 F for one hour enough to draw this out. I am going to try this technique next batch but I was just wondering if anyone has noticed a big difference.

 

[balazs]

I believe that as long as your mash ph is in good range and your recipe is not overboard with high lovibond malts then there is no reason to separate the roasted grains. Brewers have been mashing it all together for years upon years. Control your process and you will not get unwanted flavors.

Sent from my SPH-L720 using Home Brew mobile app

 

[gbx]

Gordon Strong is an advocate of adding darks at sparge. He discusses it in his book Brewing Better Beer.

I've mashed darks, added them at sparge and steeped them separately to add in at boil. I don't notice any difference between mashing and adding at sparge (but i haven't done any controlled side by side batches). Steeping separately definitely extracts more flavour from the specialty grains. I usually do whatever is easiest: If its a huge beer that will fill the mash tun, I will pull out the specialty grains and steep separately. If its a last minute decision to brew, I'll grind up the basemalt first and start it mashing then add measure and grind the specialty grains to add at sparge. If its a reasonable strength beer and I've planned ahead, I will just mash it all together.

 

[Braufessor]

I have tried it..... To be honest, I found the beers I did this way to be "lacking". Controlling the pH of the mash and the process is more important. I now mash all together all the time. Just was not impressed with the results the other way. Not "bad"..... just that some of the flavor did not seem to come through and left the beers a little short of what I was expecting.

 

[Stauffbier]

I do this when I want subtle, mild roast characteristics in a beer, but when I want the bitterness and astringency that is typical in good stouts/porters I mash the dark grains like normal. FWIW, you can also cold steep the dark grain and add the dark liquor to the boil, which I also do from time to time.

 

[Phunhog]

I did this with a Black IPA and really liked the results. All the color but very, very little flavor (Carafa II).

 

[ScottG58]

I use this technique for dark beers. I really like the results. I have used it on a porter and on the house oatmeal stouts.

 

[kiblerjd]

I recently did this with a brown and it was the best brown i have ever tasted. I use brewers friend to calculate mash ph and it was incredibly low if i added the specialty grains at the beginning. I really liked the results but to be fair i don't know what it would have tasted like the other way.

I used to mess around with ph meters and i don't deal with that anymore. Now i do what brewers friend says and get great results every time.

 

[gbx]

I recently did this with a brown and it was the best brown i have ever tasted. I use brewers friend to calculate mash ph and it was incredibly low if i added the specialty grains at the beginning. I really liked the results but to be fair i don't know what it would have tasted like the other way.

I used to mess around with ph meters and i don't deal with that anymore. Now i do what brewers friend says and get great results every time.

Brewers Friend is definitely one of the better calculators out there. I too used to mess around with pH meters. I kept decent notes and plugged my numbers from my old batches into brewers friend and it came out really really close (<0.05 of a pH difference).

What sort of recipe was going to have a really low pH? I've yet to see one that I needed to worry about it being too acidic (and my water is practically RO)

 

[kiblerjd]

It was caribou slobber from northern brewer.

 

[i4ourgot]

nice I brewed one batch of stout with dark grains in the mash, and I am going to brew the same beer by adding the grains just before I start sparging. One is going to be a month older then the other but I plan on aging the two and then doing a side by side comparison.