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St. Jon's Wort

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OK, I am planning on brewing a lager for my first all grain. As of right now, I am unsure whether or not I should go for a single infusion or for a step mash. My grain bill is rather simple:

9 lbs. Maris Otter
1.5 lbs crystla 60L

Will this benefit from a protein rest or would a single infusion mash work just as well? It seems that some people are saying that a good step mash is very difficult to do with a cooler MLT, which I have. Is this true?

I know this topic has probably been done to death on here, but the answer may be more specific with the grain bill I will be using and the fact that I plan to lager ferment.
 
For a point of reference, I think if you suggested brewing a single infusion beer out of 100% pilsner (the posterboy for a protein rest) for your first all grain, I don't think anybody here would have big issues with that. I think a lot of us here would think it would -benefit- from a step mash, and that point is where the debate might start.

My point is that multi-rest mashing isn't the difference between a 3/10 and a 10/10 beer... maybe 8/10 to 10/10 tops.

That said, Maris Otter is great for single infusion mashes anyway.

Good luck!
 
OK, I am planning on brewing a lager for my first all grain. As of right now, I am unsure whether or not I should go for a single infusion or for a step mash. My grain bill is rather simple:

9 lbs. Maris Otter
1.5 lbs crystla 60L

Will this benefit from a protein rest or would a single infusion mash work just as well?

British pale malt is low in protein. Doing a so-called protein rest on this malt is pretty much a waste of time. My first suggestion, if you haven't bought the malt yet, is to use a good German or Belgian Pils malt for this beer. If you already have purchased malt and are going to use the MO then if you want to try to get an effect on the beer from decoction mashing then do it post sugar rest using the decoction to raise the temp to mash out.


It seems that some people are saying that a good step mash is very difficult to do with a cooler MLT, which I have. Is this true?

Well if some people are saying that then by inference some people are not. ;) Are we still talking about decoction mashing here? If so you don't do a decoction in the mash tun, you use a separate decoction vessel. Therefore, a cooler mash tun is not an obstacle to decoction mashing. Infusion step mashing is another story. It takes a fairly large volume of water to raise the temp of a mash. In that case it can get problematic to do infusion step mashing in a cooler mash tun if you don't have enough room for the additional water. That would hold true with a mash tun of any construction if there was not enough space.

I know this topic has probably been done to death on here, but the answer may be more specific with the grain bill I will be using and the fact that I plan to lager ferment.

Re grain bill, see above. Re lager ferment, that is what makes a lager a lager. Follow the guidelines of using a good lager yeast, make a big starter, ferment at the appropriate temperature, give the beer enough time to finish fermenting (lagers work more slowly than ales), and give the beer enough time at cold temps after fermenting to let the real essence of a lager come through. Good luck and have fun. :mug:
 
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