Thinking about partial mash

[kenpotf]

I've been reading a couple of threads on here and noticed that a lot of brewers use a turkey fryer for their mash. I'm thinking about starting partial mash for my next beer, but I don't know what equipment I need outside of what I already have.

Should I get a turkey fryer? And how much grain do you normally start out with? What other equipment outside of my extract brewing equipment should I need? I should probably try to find partial mash recipes to get an idea of how much and what types of grain should be used. I'm assuming that I'd still use extract? Can I do all of the above without a turkey fryer and what is the minimum size of pot that I would need for mashing? I have a 4 Gal pot that I do my steeping in now.

 

[weirdboy]

It's a bit tight, but you can do a full 5 gallon AG batch in a turkey fryer.

But setting aside mashing considerations, I would recommend getting a 7+ gallon pot (10 would be better for 5 gallon batches) just so you can do full boils.


If you are making smaller batches you can easily do a partial mash or AG in the pot you have...probably as big as 2.5-3 gallons I would guess. Invest a buck or two in a 5 gallon paint strainer bag from your local hardware store, Home Depot, etc. to mash the grain in.

 

[huge1s]

My turkey fryer is 30 quart (7.5 gallons) and does a full boil (6.5 gallons) just fine. I agree, that you should go bigger if you have the means though.

 

[david_42]

You can do partial mash and partial boils in your current equipment. Pick recipes that have 3-5 lbs of grain. Make a thin mash (5:1 to 7:1) water:grain by weight.

 

[kenpotf]

By making a thin mash, does that affect the body of the beer? Also, I'm assuming that the mash is done in place of steeping the grain?

After I finish the mash, do I then bring it to a boil and then add hops, etc. in the same boil pot?

On a partial mash, how much extract do I use?

Do I put specialty grains in with the mash grains or is that done separately?

 

[weirdboy]

Thin mash doesn't really affect body IMO. What you need to worry about to control body is mash temperature.

If you are doing BIAB you would mash in the same pot, pull out the grains (maybe you sparge, or maybe you just mash the full pre-boil volume), and then bring it to a boil. If you are doing FWH you would put hops in after pulling the grains out, otherwise just like with an extract batch you'd wait until the wort is boiling.


There is no set amount of extract to use in a partial mash. If I am designing a PM recipe for BIAB, I use two different strategies depending upon what type of extract I'm using.

For recipes that use LME, usually due to needing specialty malt extract that is not easily available as DME, I will design the recipe to use 1 or more multiples of a "container" of LME. That is just because I find trying to measure out odd quantities of LME is not worth the hassle. I would rather just dump in a full container and not worry about having to measure it, save some for another batch, etc. because liquid extract is a bit awkward to work with. So, I would do something like use one bottle of LME and then get the rest of the fermentables from grain.

For DME recipes, I try to use as much grain as I can fit in the mash, and then make up the rest to get to my target OG using extract. DME is easy to weigh out odd quantities, and stores for pretty much ever, so I don't have a problem just keeping some in a tupperware container in the cabinet and using it as necessary.


Put the specialty grains in with the mash.