Steeping grains and a full boil

[Bozo]

Hi all.
I'm going to do a full boil with an unhopped malt extract can etc and also add a small amount of specialty grains.
My target after the boil is 5 gallons so pre boil will be 6-6.5 gallons.
I will steep the grain in a small amount of water in a separate pot and add to my main pot buy my question is do I add the steeped grain liquid to room temp water, boiled water or water with my malt already dissolved in there. I can't seem to find any information on this.
Thanks

 

[ChelisHubby]

WHen I was doing extract I would deal with the steeping grains first and then add that water to what I was going to boil, so it could boil together and mix flavors well.

 

[eadavis80]

Steep the grains in your brew pot with the 6.5-6 gallons of water at 155 or so. AFter the 20-minute steep, remove the grains and bring your wort to a boil and then add your extract and hops.

 

[Bozo]

WHen I was doing extract I would deal with the steeping grains first and then add that water to what I was going to boil, so it could boil together and mix flavors well.

Yeah that's what I was thinking but I just wasn't sure about them temperature

 

[Bozo]

Steep the grains in your brew pot with the 6.5-6 gallons of water at 155 or so. AFter the 20-minute steep, remove the grains and bring your wort to a boil and then add your extract and hops.

I've read lots of different things and one is the water to grain ratio and I wanted to do it that way.
Cheers

 

[RM-MN]

Yeah that's what I was thinking but I just wasn't sure about them temperature

With steeping grains in an extract batch the temperature isn't critical. Any temperature between room temp and boiling will work to extract the color and flavor from them. Two things to consider for that it that if your water has enough alkalinity that the steeping grains cannot bring the pH of the larger volume of water going with full volume steep, the temperature higher than about 170 can extract tannins from the grain husks. Keep the steep cooler can avoid that as can steeping in a smaller amount of water.

The second thing I like to mention is that many extract brewers turn to all grain later on for differing reasons. When you do all grain the enzymes to convert the starch to sugar only work within a smaller range of temperatures so practicing steeping within this range will set you up if you should decide to go all grain. I like to encourage steeping at 152 to 155. If you can keep the steeping temperature in this range consistently, you can go all grain.

 

[flattie]

I've only done two extract kits with specialty grains. Both times the instructions were to add the steeping grains while heating the water. Stir or move the bag of grains around in the water periodically until you hit 170 degrees then pull the bag and let it drain while continuing to heat the water to boiling.

As the other poster noted - steeping grains are mostly for color and temp isn't as important since you aren't looking to extract sugar from the steeping grains. I think the part about pulling the grains when the temp hits 170 is to avoid any risk of extracting tannins from the steeping grains.