First time decoction

[dogslapbrewery]

I'm making my first Oktoberfest brew and I'm a little hung up which decoction I should use?
Here's what I was thinking per a recipe from BOY

*mash in at 145 for 45-60m
*pull thick mash boiled for 20-30m
*return to mlt to 158 for 20m
*pull thin mash and boil for 30m
*return to mlt to 168 and start sparging.

or the tradional German two-mash Zweimaischverfahren?

 

[JosephN]

What is a "thick mash" and "thin mash"?

 

[brewshki]

What is a "thick mash" and "thin mash"?

I have never done the process, so feel free to take this with a grain of salt. When you mash, you have a mixture of grains an water right? The thick part is the watery grains and the thin part is the wort with no grains. Pulling the thick part generally means getting a big scoop and draining a lot but not all of the liquid wort and transferring that to a kettle. Thick means mostly grains and a little liquid.

 

[dogslapbrewery]

Thick mash is just enough wort so it won't scorch. Mainly just the grains, you shouldn't be able to see any wort on top. Thin mash you have a lot of wort mainly because at this stage your mashing out at 168 so the whole idea is to stop the enzymes from converting and bring the rest of the mash up to 168.

 

[dogslapbrewery]

The mash from BYO seems like a simple step mash and a simplified decoction to get all those tasty flavors. The traditional German mash seems over kill with all the dough in, acid, and protein rest. Anyone with decoction experience have feedback? Is it not wise to skip protein rest or acid?

 

[SeraW]

You did something similar to what I did last week. I based mine off of Kai's Hochkurz mash - a maltose rest at 140 for 60 minimum plus a dextrinization rest at 160 for about 60. He argues that this is better to get the decoction flavors you want on modern malts. Acid rest is only necessary if you have to make pH adjustments, and protein rests are probably bad with modern malt. The product so far (sampled just before D rest) tastes amazing, so I dig the result, but that's just one data point with no comparison.

 

[dogslapbrewery]

The mash from BYO seems like a simple step mash and a simplified decoction to get all those tasty flavors. The traditional German mash seems over kill with all the dough in, acid, and protein rest. Anyone with decoction experience have feedback? Is it not wise to skip protein rest or acid?

Yeah I definitely think this modern version of decoction would fit better with today's malts. Did you adjust your ph levels in the first infusion or the second?

 

[Cyclman]

+1 on Kai's Hochkurz mash: http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Decoction_Mashing

I just finished my Maibock, did it using this schedule. I think this beer could win awards, it is so delicious, so go for it.

 

[dogslapbrewery]

Nice! I've listened to a Kai couple times on basic brewing and that man is definitely on point. Can't wait to start this brew tomorrow morning.

 

[D-Train]

I'm making my first Oktoberfest brew and I'm a little hung up which decoction I should use?
Here's what I was thinking per a recipe from BOY

*mash in at 145 for 45-60m
*pull thick mash boiled for 20-30m
*return to mlt to 158 for 20m
*pull thin mash and boil for 30m
*return to mlt to 168 and start sparging.

or the tradional German two-mash Zweimaischverfahren?

That's a good schedule you have above. It's usually a good idea to rest the decoctions at each step, meaning heat to 158, hold there for 20 minutes, and then heat to boiling. You can also pull the first decoction much earlier that way, like after 30 minutes, because you're still allowing it time in temp ranges where conversion can still take place.

 

[SpeedYellow]

Three comments:
1) why boil the decoction for 30 minutes? I don't see the point of that. 2-5 mins seems plenty.
2) IMHO the mash-out decoction is a waste of time. Mash out doesn't do much.
3) I don't see any reason why you can't do a 2 step decoction in 1 hour total. Mash in at 140-145, pull your decoction at 20, return it at 30, then hold at 160 for 30 mins. Decoction doesn't need to take forever!

 

[Qhrumphf]

Three comments:
1) why boil the decoction for 30 minutes? I don't see the point of that. 2-5 mins seems plenty.
2) IMHO the mash-out decoction is a waste of time. Mash out doesn't do much.
3) I don't see any reason why you can't do a 2 step decoction in 1 hour total. Mash in at 140-145, pull your decoction at 20, return it at 30, then hold at 160 for 30 mins. Decoction doesn't need to take forever!

Boiling the decoction is where you get the FLAVOR of the decoction. If you're not going to both doing that, then don't bother doing a decoction at all, because it won't do anything an infusion mash won't.


I typically only decoct my Weizens, and primarily my Hefeweizen, and there I do an ferulic acid rest decocted to a very short protein rest decocted to a conversion rest decocted to mashout, but yeah, if you're not intentionally trying to bring out ferulic acid for the yeast to synthesise into 4-vinylguiacol (which obviously you wouldn't be doing with an Oktoberfest) and you're not using a bunch of wheat or other adjunct grains, and you're not using a malt you know to be severely undermodified (some German Pils malts are undermodified and still may benefit from a protein rest, don't recall which though, I've found with Weyerman's regular pils and boho pils it's not necessary, same with Dingemans pils), then yeah, no point in doing either rest. What you've got sounds good.

My suggestion, pull much more for the decoction than you think you're going to need, and then add back slowly until you get the right temp. Otherwise you're going to undershoot your temps, guarantee it.