Mini-mash ingredients with an All-grain method

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ryser2k

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Luckily today I picked up a turkey fryer for $28 from Boscov's (local PA dept store), completing my all-grain setup. (I got a 10% discount because it was a floor model.)

Anyway, I've got 2 mini-mash kits from Austin Homebrew left. I was thinking that maybe I could use all-grain methods to brew up these kits so that I can get a little experience with this process and maybe a little better beer while I'm at it too.

Any suggestions on how I can do this? The kit comes with 3-4 pounds of grain and 5-6 pounds of liquid malt extract. Should I just mash the 3-4 pounds of grain as if I was doing all grain? Should I use the full amount of water?
 
If the grains provided are adjunct grains like crystal, chocolate, and patent, then mashing them really does nothing. They have no enzymatic activity. With crystal especially (which is pre-mashed), steeping is really exactly the same as mashing in terms of sugars extracted.

You could "mash" the grains, but it wouldn't be anything other than a long steep. It would give you a good opportunity to try your hand at sparging, which is the most integral part of all-grain to get right. You wouldn't need to worry about the conversion that generally takes place in a mash of base malts.

If you wanted to do it, you's "mash" the grains, sparge them as normal, then add extract and water to the kettle to bring it up to volume. Good luck! :D
 
Hmm maybe I'll just steep the grains with the full 5 gallons.... that should at least get me some better beer, and it will let me take that turkey fryer for a test drive ;)

Think that's OK to do?
 
Oh yeah. That's ideal. Add them to the cold water in a grain bag, raise the temp to 160, hold it for 10 minutes or so and remove the grains. Then add extract, boil and proceed as normal. Cheers! :D
 
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