DME Foaming

[davidabcd]

When I add a substantial amount of DME (4#) at 5 minutes, it foams for a bit and rises when stirred. The foaming stops after a short-ish amount of time and I remove from the heat.
Is that foaming called anything, specifically, and what causes it?
Thank you very much.

Note: this is not a procedural question I have.

 

[VikeMan]

My guess is that it's mostly the a result of adding a powdery substance to boiling water, creating nucleation sites.

Some would say it's the "hot break," but I disagree. With extracts, the hot break (or most of it) already occurred when the extract was manufactured.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Is that foaming called anything, specifically, and what causes it?

It would be interesting to see a picture. What brand / style of DME where you using?

About six months ago, I brewed a couple of "hop sampler"-ish batches using two different brands of "light" DME. The primary objective was to explore brewing salt flavor additions. A secondary objective was to watch how DME 'behaves' when added at flame-on. One of the brands was boring, it was like watching water heat to a boil. With the other brand, flakes started showing up around 140F.

 

[davidabcd]

It would be interesting to see a picture.

I think I might be able to give you a decent enough account so you can diagnose. I started the 60 min. boil with 9g Burton's water salts, 1# Briess Sparkling Amber, 3# table sugar and 3# Breiss Pilsen light DME. The gallon marker was at 3 gallons at this point. This dropped by over a quart-plus after an hour, maybe.
I did a hop schedule, IBU's below 20 AAU in total. I added 1/2 t yeast nutrients at 10 min.
At 0 minutes I added 4# of Breiss Pilsen light DME. Those 4#s obviously killed the boil.
That's a total of 11#'s of fermentables now by the time this story begins. So there were chunks everywhere which is not an alarming situation as I know they'll melt. As the temp rose and the chunks dissolved, a very tight beige foam began but did not climb. This tight foam only climbed when I stirred. My pot is graduated so it was easy to see and the foam would go up by 2 quarts. Melted chocolate ice cream in a bowl describes what the foam looked like well--the bubbles were that tight/close.
I stirred, the foam rose. I backed off, the foam receded. Eventually, the foam receded and disappeared to where it was just boiling wort with hardly any foam and that's when I cut the heat.
Thanks for your help; I totally appreciate it.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

a decent enough account

You did.

"a very tight beige foam began but did not climb " - Did the foam look something like this?

The 'flakes" I mentioned (in my post above) are similar to this

In my experience, the timing of hop additions seems to be a factor. If I add DME and hops at the same time (either at 140F or just before the boil starts), I typically will see (less or no) foam/flakes.

 

[davidabcd]

Yes, that's what the foam looked like. It expanded and was intimidating to a five gallon pot where the contents totaled three when I stirred and the foam wanted to rise and rise.
The whole pot (5 gallons) was steady at three gallons and rose quickly and went up to the four gallon mark at an alarming rate until I stopped stirring. Then, as I said, that "wore out" and the foam stopped appearing, everything went back to normal--straight liquid boiling. That's when I turned off the heat.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

My take away from brewing with two different brands of light DME (with some process variations) is to consider each brand (and probably style of DME) to be different.

A brand/style of DME may foam/flake/'hot break' during the boil (or it may not).

Each brand/style of DME is likely to have different flavoring salt additions to produce a "best" result.

Impact of the boil on color may be different based on liquid/dry characteristics - product freshness is definitely a factor with liquid produts, and it might be a minor factor with dry products as well.