The "Sweat" from the mash

[Likefully]

I did my first all grain batch a few days ago and used the "toilet line in the cooler box" mash tun. After sparging and draining enough for the boil I closed the cool box and the tap on the pipe from it and put it outside and went on with the boil.

When I got back to the mash tun about 3 hours later it looked like the grain had sweated a whole lot of water and I could get about 6 litres of lightly coloured pre-boil wort from it. I didn't have the equipment or ingredients to do anything with that, but wondered if it is worth trying to brew something with that wort or if discarding it is the best thing to do?


P.s. I am not sure how else to describe this and therefore not sure how to search for it, so if this has been discussed elsewhere then please forgive and re-direct.

 

[CastleHollow]

Depending on your mash technique, those runnings usually come in somewhere about 1.030. You can use them as the base for a small beer, or reserve them in sterile jars for yeast starter.

 

[DrunkleJon]

If you do decide to save it for later, be sure to bring it to a boil first to denature the remaining enzymes and kill off any nasties that came in on the grain.

 

[betzbrew]

What you have just suggested is called "Parti-Gyle." Some people complain about a grainy taste from using just second runnings and claim that adding just a coupe more pounds of grain to the old mash helps smooth all the flavors. Generally people use this technique to make a big beer followed by a small beer. Go for it!

 

[cluckk]

It depends on how high your initial the gravity is on your batch. For example, if you are doing a barleywine, RIS or IIPA there are often enough sugars left in the wort to make a nice (though much smaller) beer. If you are making a regular strength batch then the second runnings are probably going to be too weak or have too high of a pH to make anything useful.

I have a system where I run off a big beer (usually in the 1.090 OG range) and another beer (usually in the 1.050 OG range) from the same mash tun (a parti-gyle). The mash (for two 5.5 gallon batches) involves 28 pounds of base malt and a ten gallon MLT filled to the top.

When you have this left over, check the gravity of the wort left in the mash tun. For a regular sized batch it is likely so low that it is useless (unless you had a very inefficient extraction).

 

[Likefully]

Awesome thanks, i kept some for a starter. Next time I will make plans to freeze the whole lot for a future batch.