Steeping Grains

[Hopin-Josh]

Hello,

I really haven't seen much on the actual technique of sweeping grains. Most places just say put them in a bag and steep for 150 or so for about 30...but not much on the actual technique...

So with my latest batch I had 1 pound of pale malt and 1 pound of flaked barley. I steeped at 155 for 30 minutes in 5 gallons of water. I gave the bag a quick swirl and removed and continued brewing.

After I was brewing, I took a spoon of the spent grains and they were still kind of sweet. So should I have swirled the bag around more? I feel like I may have just thrown flavor in the trash can...I have read about the warnings of tannins and now I'm wondering if I went too far the other way and not getting the full flavor out of my grain. The other thought I had was maybe two pounds of grain was too much for my nylon bag?

Any thoughts?

Thanks!!

 

[peachwein]

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure steeping grains are more for flavor and color than anything. You probably don't have to worry about your "efficiency", and leaving behind sugars. Now if you were actually mashing, that is where you need to be worried about that kind of thing... I personally will pull the steeping grains out, hold them over my kettle, and pour hot water over the grain bag to help collect any of the goodness that might be holding on for dear life...

 

[dcp27]

you got all the flavor you were gunna get out of those grains, you just didnt get all the sugar out possible. sparging with hot water is the usual technique to do this.

 

[a10t2]

If you're using pale malt, then it's a mash, not steeping. Mashing at an extremely thin ratio (anything more than about 4 qt/lb - you were at 10 qt/lb) is when tannin extraction becomes a problem. On top of that, your enzyme content was so diluted that you probably didn't get full conversion in the mash, let alone do a good job of extracting sugars, which is why the grains were still sweet.

For mini-mashing, precision isn't really important. Keep it in the ranges 1-3 qt/lb, 150-160°F, for 30-90 minutes, and you'll be fine.