Mid-Mash- Uncrushed grains in mash- what to do?

[jonny24]

Grain bill:
8.8lb Maris Otter 4kg
1.1lb Crystal 40 .5kg
.55lb UK Brown .25kg
3.5oz Wheat malt 100g
1.8oz Roasted barley 50g

In the middle of mashing a bitter. Was weighing out my grains and realized that my 1 lb of crystal 40 wasn't milled. Forgot to get them to do it at the store. Not a big deal, I thought, I can continue.

After adding half the MO and all the specialty grain to the strike water, I started pouring the second 2kg bag of MO in, but realized it wasn't crushed either. I have over half my grain in water at this point, so I quickly ran the bag through my blender a handful at a time, and added it and shut the cooler.

I read on a thread here that Briess tested and got 24% efficiency with unmilled grain. Do I attempt to predict my efficiency (usually 65%) and bring my hops down to keep the same intended balance? Figure the grain will do nothing? I have maybe 300g of DME, try to fix it with that?

Either way I'll take a hydrometer reading, but it won't be the OG since it's pre-boil so I'll have to rely on math and predicted boiloff to use it.

It's been mashing around 40minutes now. Figure I'll do 90 to try to get some more sugars out.

 

[Double_D]

I'd just adjust your OG with the dme and chalk it up to a learning experience. And also use this as an excuse to justify a mill to swmbo.

 

[jonny24]

Lol, no swmbo, just finances right now!

I'm leaning DME way as well. I just need to make sure I do the math right.

1. Drain and sparge, mix together, take SG reading and adjust for temperature.
2. Use my running boil-off calculator to predict final volume, and use that to predict OG.
3. Add enough DME to raise OG- using 1.043 for DME?

 

[kh54s10]

If what I found is correct you might get about .005 increase if you use all of the DME.

If you can't afford a roller mill, look into a Corona style mill. About $25 - $35 on Amazon. You can hand mill, or if you have a fairly heavy duty drill it is easy to add. I found a bolt that fit, just screwed it in then cut of the nut head, chucked on the drill motor. Milled away. About 10 minutes for an average grain bill. I've been using mine for 5 years.

 

[jonny24]

A mill was on the Christmas list, so I'll see how that plays out then go from there.

Okay, all drained and sparged. 6.25 gallons at 1.033
If I boil down to 5gal, I'll be at 1.041
I have 425g/.937lb of DME
.937*(1.044-1) / 5 gal = .008

Brings me up to 1.049. I then need about .3 lbs of sugar to get me up to intended OG of 1.052.

Hops can remain unchanged.

 

[RM-MN]

If you are only getting an average of 65% you need your own mill anyway so having one would have avoided this problem entirely. The Corona mills can do a decent job for any system but you might look hard at going to BIAB. By milling the grains finer for BIAB you will increase the efficiency, probably the high 70's to low 80's. With that kind of efficiency you need to reduce the amount of grains to get the right OG so that will reduce the cost per batch and make the mill pay for itself. If you can buy your base malts in bulk, the mill will pay off even sooner.