Am I crazy, or is this really a PG recipe?

[jsweet]

North American Clone Brews has a caramel porter recipe that I am considering using in a slightly modified form. You can view it on Google Books here.

The main recipe is partial grain, of course. On the side bar to the right, the give what they claim are all-grain and all-extract recipes.

Except the all-extract recipe calls for a pound of pale malt to be steeped along with the specialty grains. I thought pale malt always needed to be mashed. Furthermore, they appear to be relying on a fairly typical (for a grain brewer) efficiency from the pale malt in order to hit the listed OG.

So... that sounds to me like a PG recipe. Granted, you could brew it more or less like an all-extract recipe using steeped specialty grains if you keep the steeping temperature at a pretty steady 150F. (I normally don't worry about the temperature creeping up as high as 170F, but if I need to get fermentable sugars out of the pale malt, that ain't gonna work I don't think...) And it may all be a moot point, since I don't plan on brewing this until the fall at the earliest and I may be on to PG or AG by then.

But... am I crazy? Or is their "all extract" version just a "partial-er grain" recipe?

 

[janivar123]

Yes you are crazy

But i dont think your wrong

 

[unionrdr]

I was thinking partial extract...

 

[Yooper]

I thought a PG recipe might be like a PG movie- I clicked on this thread just to see what that might be!

While it's true that base grains must be mashed, I know that some manufacturer's do include base grains in an extract recipe. I believe AHS does that.

Usually an extract recipe will have a pound or two of specialty grains, while a partial-mash recipe will get many more fermentables from the grains. In a partial mash recipe, usually a portion of the extract is replaced by grains. In an extract recipe, the grains provide color and flavor but not much in the way of fermentable sugars as the extract provides the bulk of the fermentables.

So, yes, you can still have an extract recipe even if it has a pound or two of two-row. It's not that common, but it does happen.

 

[cervezarara]

I believe you're correct. The pale malt needs to be mashed, but the other grains don't. You could do this partial mash, but I doubt if it's worth it. Or you could substitute .8 lbs or even 1 lb of light DME for the pound of pale malt and steep the other grains per your normal schedule.

I looked through several other recipes in the book, and several "all extract" versions have this mini mash also. It's not too hard to do, but I wonder why their recipes are not really consistent with all-extract techniques.

 

[Revvy]

It's really common to have some two row tossed in with the steeping grains. If I recall even Austin Homebrew adds some to his recipes. The idea is that the 2 row helps extract more color and flavor from the steeping grains. It's been discussed on here quite a lot over the years.

It's still technically an extract with grains recipe. You're really not trying to convert the grains and get fermentables from the grain, still just flavor and color.