Bitte Ein Bit

[bmantzey]

I'm looking in my clone brew book at a Bitburger recipe. There are some interesting things to note in this recipe.

The description: "Only spring barleys (Alexis, Arena, and Steiner) are used in this double decoction Pilsner, which is lagered for three months. This light- to medium-bodied Pilsner makes a lively entrance with a big, well-balanced malt and hop nose. The flavor begins with malt bursting into a hop finish, and gently lingers with a dry hop aftertaste."

I looked up the double decoction and it looks like all that is, is a mash with a long protein rest, which shouldn't be necessary from what I understand.

Now, it says that it's lagered for three months, which makes me wonder, does that mean they let it sit in the primary for that long, or in the bottles? For this brew, I'm actually planning on making it my first kegged brew! What's the three months thing mean? Should I just disregard and proceed with the normal process? Thanks!!

 

[weirdboy]

EDIT:

Don't want to give people bad information, so I deleted this part.

 

[bmantzey]

Ooooh. I noticed that on the chart but wasn't sure what that meant. I'll read closer. At any rate, I shouldn't need to do that for this brew, should I? The reason I'm going all-grain is because I really enjoy the challenge of a more involved procedure and further enjoy the reward of success or even the lesson learned in a failure. If it's not necessary, I won't try it, but if there are advantages to it, I wouldn't be scared to try.

 

[menschmaschine]

A decoction is none of the things mentioned so far in this thread. It is taking a portion of the mash ("thick" or mostly grain), raising it to ~158°F for about 10 minutes, then raising it to boiling and boiling it for at least 5 minutes for lighter colored beers, longer for darker colored beers. It is then put back in the main mash to raise it's temperature to the next step. The only "thin" decoction (little grain) is done to achieve mash out temp and is the least beneficial of all the decoction steps. The only purpose it really serves is raising the temp.

You have to be careful doing decoctions with modern malts not to do a full blown protein rest. Stay at least in the upper 130s°F.

You don't really need to do a decoction with that beer. You could probably do side-by-side batches, decocted and equivalent step mash and not have a blatant difference in the final beer.

Also, I don't think that needs to be lagered for 3 months. A week for every 8 points of OG will get you everything you're going to get from lagering.

 

[bmantzey]

Hmm. Nice that you have that rule of thumb for lagering. 1 week for every 8 points of OG for lagers. What's the rule of thumb for ales?

 

[Mysticmead]

that is a great explanation of a decoction mash.. does it NEED to be done.. no, does it hurt to do it? not if you keep it above 130F as listed above (no protein rest needed). Does a decoction add a complex flavor that you can't get by skipping it? some say no, others swear by it. I did a decoction mash on my hefeweizen. Came out great. If you want to try a different way of mashing, then I say go for it. It will give you a sense of how the beer was made long before single infusion mashing was standard.

 

[bmantzey]

Great! Thanks a lot for all the helpful replies!