To squeeze the grains or not.

[penguin69]

So I have a question. In extract brewing you are told not to squeeze the specialty malts while draining. Yet in all grain I see some people squeezing the base malts to get out all the liquid.

Questions is does the difference in base malts to specialty malts the reason for not squeezing one malt vs the other? Or are the people squeezing the base malts doing it wrong?

Kind I confused

Thanks

 

[Minbari]

difference in what is being done.

steeping specialty grain is simply washing the sugar off the grain, like steeping tea. the starches are already converted and you are steeping in very hot water.

In mashing base malts you are converting the starches to sugar. mashing is done at 150-155° F (generally). squeezing gets all the sugary wort out of the bag.

 

[NedStackey]

I don't squeeze any grains, I'm guessing you are talking about BIAB style they are squeezing them? When you're doing all-grain the mash water and sparge water combined become the wort and generally no need to top off with more water, where extract brewing it's common practice to only create a small volume of wort and then topping off with bottled water or something. They may be squeezing the all grain bags in order to get to proper boil volume?

 

[pricelessbrewing]

Squeezing used to be thought of contributing to tannins, but it's since been debunked.

In extract brewing squeezing isn't necessary since the grain isn't contributing any sugars. You'll just get some of your volume back. Doesnt matter much since most people top off to full volume into fermentor.

In all grain, the specialty malts are contributing sugars as well as taste/color so squeezing/sparging releases most of the sugars stuck in the grain.

tldr; Squeeze it if you want to, won't hurt anything.

 

[hunter_le five]

[purely anecdotal & unscientific]
I have never noticed any ill-effects from squeezing grain, whether in extract+steeping grains brewing or all-grain.
[/purely anecdotal & unscientific]

Though with my current process, I don't find myself needing to either.