steeping munich malt

[Col_klink]

I have been reading some of the threads about steeping munich malt and had a couple of questions about this.

1) My grains are already milled and in a bag so I can't seperate them. I have 12oz of munich 8oz of aromatic and 8oz crystal. If I steep for a longer time say 50-60 minutes to get the munich to convert. Will I be introducing tannins from the other grains?

2) If I can steep longer will this eliminate the cloudiness I have read about?

3) If I can't steep longer, would irish moss eliminate the cloudiness from the munich malt?

Thanks in advance for help. This will be my first lager and I'm trying not to screw it up haha. Got my yeast starter going last night and plan on brewing Saturday.

 

[Pie_Man]

1) My grains are already milled and in a bag so I can't seperate them. I have 12oz of munich 8oz of aromatic and 8oz crystal. If I steep for a longer time say 50-60 minutes to get the munich to convert. Will I be introducing tannins from the other grains?

Probably not. The two most common reasons for tannin extraction is pH being too high (above 6) and the temperature being too high. 60 minutes is a standard mash time and will not, in itself, cause tannin extraction. Note, that since you're converting starches to sugars, you're mashing versus steeping (granted, the process is pretty similar, especially when mashing the grains in a bag). Also, I think the Aromatic malt needs to be mashed as well, https://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Malts_Chart.

2) If I can steep longer will this eliminate the cloudiness I have read about?

Cloudiness would result from uncoverted starches, so as long as the starchs are mostly converted to sugars, you'll be fine, so yes.

3) If I can't steep longer, would irish moss eliminate the cloudiness from the munich malt?

Probably not, I would mash for 60 minutes. You can test for conversion with an iodine test (search HBT). Note that that starch conversion doesn't necessarily imply fermentability of the wort, meaning the starches may have coverted to sugars, but the sugar chain is long and will not be completely fermented by the yeast. This is why a 60 minutes mash is standard.

Hope this helps.

 

[solbes]

Agree above, you are doing a partial mash. Maybe your first. 60 minutes is a good time to mash. Try to hold as close to 150-154F as possible during the 60 minute conversion.

If you like the process, this is a pretty simple step to take to expand in the hobby. I did 4 extract batches, 4 partial mash batches, and have been all grain ever since. I liked the mid step as it allowed me to learn and make improvements without any poor batches (most sugars were still provided by extract).

 

[Col_klink]

thanks guys! I will read up on partial mash then. But one question...will this ent ail a sparge of some kind then?

 

[freisste]

You don't have to sparge, but it wouldn't hurt. Pull the grain sack, put it in a colander over your brew kettle and rinse with water until you are at your boil volume. That's all there is to it. Some people say don't squeeze, but i like to. This process has been getting me 80% efficiency, which is by no means a record, but is nothing to scoff at either. Good luck.

 

[Pie_Man]

No need to sparge with a PM.

If you wanted to, you could remove the bag and rinse it over the brew kettle with additional water, or dunk sparge the grain bag in a separate container of water then adding the dunked water to the boil kettle. It's not necessary to use these techniques when partial mashing, but I thought I'd mention it since it is possible to sparge. These sparging methods are often used when doing brew in a bag (BIAB) all grain to increase efficiency. Efficieny meaning the percentage of sugars extracted from the grains during mashing; not as important when partial mashing.

Research partial mashing, you may also want to read the BIAB sticky on the all grain page as you're doing a partial mash with the BIAB technique used for the mashing portion.

 

[solbes]

You can sparge if you want to, but typically that is done to rinse off the sugars to improve yield. Say a ~5-15% increase in yields usually. Given the fact that you have 1.75 lbs of grains in your mash, I'd say you can skip the sparge if you want to. You may lose out on just a couple of gravity points by skipping it.

 

[Col_klink]

Great info, thanks a lot guys!!!