Thick porridge like wort

[user 200985]

Hi everyone I started my first brew with a friends new brew kit he bought. We tried to make a rye ipa. First we boiled 10 gallons of water and poured half into our bucket with a false bottom, containing 20lbs. crushed rye malt. It steeped for one hour.

First problem: we had not added the grain to the water but added the water to the grain. The grain soaked up all the water and nothing drained out unless we perpetually scraped at the false bottom to keep it from clogging.

We had saved the other 5 gallons of water for the sparge but ended up adding all the water to supplement the original drain as most of the water was absorbed by the grain.

We got 7 gallons of thick wort but strode on thinking we would just have more settling on the bottom which could be siphoned off later. We boiled for an hour with our hops and racked them into our fermenting buckets. After one week it is still so thick it would barely siphon out, and the hydrometer can't even give us an accurate reading. We have given up on this batch.

Any thoughts on how all this went bad, And what we should do differently next time? Thanks

 

[Ski12568]

Sounds like your strike water was way too hot. Should have been around 152F, depending on the recipe, and held there for about an hour.

Unless the process is different when making a rye.

 

[Ski12568]

You do not boil the grains, just the wort you drain after you mash.

 

[RM-MN]

Welcome to the world of brewing with rye. Rye is full of beta glucans and they will gum up the works if you use too much. The big malting house of Briess makes a rye extract and they only use 20% rye and they still have problems with it getting too sticky.

Try another rye beer but this time, do a beta glucan rest at about 104F for 20 to 30 minutes to break up the glucans. Limit the amount of rye to no more than about 30% and add a handful of rice hulls to help make a filter bed since rye grains have no husk to make the filter. When I do a rye beer, I use a paint strainer bag for the filter material and it still is a sticky wort.

 

[RM-MN]

Here is a good (free) resource to learn more about brewing. www.howtobrew.com I have the second edition (printed, not free but worth it anyway) that I use for a resource.

 

[user 200985]

OK so I will strike at a lower temp and only use 30% rye. RM-MN can explain the beta glucan rest in a bit more detail? I'm still not clear on what it is and what it does. Thanks!

 

[dude3516]

The grain absorption on that plus dead space would call for more than 5 gallons I would think. Probably need a 7 or 8 gallon mash, with 3 sparge at 20lbs.

A beta rest helps to break down betaglucans which are what lends to the sticky, thicker properties you got in your beer. In certain cases those can be desirable in say a stout.

This should give you a better understand of mashing. http://www.howtobrew.com/section3/chapter14.html

 

[Yooper]

You did a beer with 100% rye? If so, yes, that would be porridge. And while I LOVE rye beers, I find that over 25% rye makes something fairly undrinkable. I had a 50% rye beer, made by a friend, and I could not get it down.

Maybe I read your post wrong, and it wasn't 100% rye but even at 25% rye it's very hard to lauter and needs some specialized processes usually. A large grain bag to hold the rye can be very helpful with lautering.

 

[okiedog]

Like Dude3516 said, you needed to add more water. 5 gallons of water (20 quarts) added to 20 lbs. of grain would give you a liquid to grain ratio of 1:1. That indeed would give you a porridge like mash. That may be okay for mash in at say 104F. For saccharification (conversion of starches to sugar), you need a minimum of 1.25 quarts water per pound of grain, up to 2:1, depending on mash temp and beer style. If you are not sure how much water to use, 1.5 quarts per pound is a good comprimise for most home brewing.

 

[user 200985]

yes it was 100% rye. We added 10 gallons of water so that would have been 2:1. At least our pigs loved it...Live and learn eh? We will try again. thanks for all the advice!

 

[okiedog]

You could have saved it if you added the same amount of barley malt and some rice hulls. That would have given you 2 batches of Roggenbier. It isn't bad if you like that grainy rye flavor. Some people don't care for it, some do. But on the other hand, fattening up your pigs has benefits too.

 

[RM-MN]

You could have saved it if you added the same amount of barley malt and some rice hulls. That would have given you 2 batches of Roggenbier. It isn't bad if you like that grainy rye flavor. Some people don't care for it, some do. But on the other hand, fattening up your pigs has benefits too.

Mmmm...bacon!