Steeping Grains

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Thanks.. In this case it would be for a stout.. I've read a little about it.. cold vs hot vs adding to wort at/toward end of boil, etc. Can be confusing. y min concern is the real dark grains like chocolate and Roasted Barley. I'd guess, as long as I keep my pH in order.. I'm good to go.. That is part of what concerned me.. as the dark grains are really known for lowering the pH. Don't want to go too low.. but, certainly I want to get down during the mash to that 5.4 range.

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Don't worry about this Bill for a few reasons...

1. Dark grains lower the pH less than crystal grains (latest knowledge).

2. In BIAB, you are full volume brewing (mashing and sparging simultaneously) so the grain bill has far less effect on the PH.

3. There is a difference between whether you just steep or mash and steep your grains but this is a new phenomenon and we don't have much info on it. You should assume however, unless told otherwise, that, in an all-grain recipe, all of the grains are mashed.

[NOTE: You'll see in BIABAcus PR1.3T, maybe before, that it allows the user to type in if they choose to steep a specialty grain rather than mashing it as well.]


PP

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Just something else to consider;

nilo over on HBT did (what seems to me) a very good experiment with steeping grains & fermentability. See the thread here.

For those that don't want to trawl through, this is the conclusion from (pg11) I didnt continue so it may have been edited further?

OK, I think I can make my final conclusions from what I learned with this test. I wish I had better equipment and time to do many more batches and get more data points, but hey, I gotta brew my beers guys

I'll comment first than show all images.

1)Table with all that was tested and results
2)Fermentation/Gravity chart of all that was tested. I excluded this last test I just did (test 16/17/18) to make it easier to understand the graph.
3)PPG or sugar extraction chart
4)Attenuation chart

This experiment bring simple conclusions, may not indicate accurate values due to the reduced data points and accuracy of tools used, but I hope it give us some light to what crystal malts do to our recipes:

A)Crystal malt have sugars but still hold starches that can be converted
B)The amount of sugars that one can extract from crystal malts would increase if mashed with a base malt since the starches will be converted. PPG showed to increase by about 20%, regardless of the kilning level of the crystal malt.
B)The sugars from crystal malts are VERY fermentable, contrary to what we knew. Fermentability will depend on multiple factors like:
-Steeping crystal malt alone will yield sugars that can be attenuated by 50% for crystal 10 and 40% for darker malts.
-Mashing crystal malts with base malts will yield sugars that are almost as fermentable as base malt itself. For the 50-50% rate used, sugars from crystal-10 malts were attenuated by 70% while crystal 40 and 120 by 52% minimums. For a 10% crystal to grist rate, I guess it could be treated just as a base malt, which means very fermentable.

The basic recipe guidelines would be:
1)If steeping crystal malts, expect lower PPG than when mashing. About 50% of the poits you get from the malt will be left to FG for light malts and 60% for darker malts
2)If mashing with a base malt, treat crystal just like a base malt, specially if using lowe amounts like 10 to 20%. So don't blame the crystal malt for a higher FG since most of its sugars will be fermented.
3)Regardless, crystal malts doesn't seem to be the best thing to use to add residual sugars to the final beer. Perhaps mashing at higher temp is the way to go, along with Lactose or Dextrin (that we believe is not fermentable. I may have to test that also)

Note.: All tests were done with mashing/steeping temp at 155F and fermentation with S04 at constant (really constant) 70F.

It may just explain a little more as to why we perceive differences when steeped or mashed.

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Thanks Mally.. It does look like a good experiment. I may modify my thoughts and only steep the real black grains. In this case, the Black Roasted Barley and the Chocolate Malt. I don't like the ashtray taste I've had when I've let them spend too much time in the mash.. I haven't decided whether to put those grains in at the end of the mash or simply steep them.

The other thing.. I thought I read something here that the new spreadsheet had a place to put "Steeping" grains. My thought was it might look like the choices one has in hops for Pellet, Flower, FO, etc. I did a search but couldn't find anything.

Did I imagine this? Maybe so.. My tired old brain has a lot of holes in it.

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Re: Steeping Grains

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