Commercial brewers will monitor the specific gravity of the hot wort coming out of the mash tun and stop when it reaches approximately 1.010 to avoid off flavors and tannins associated with low wort concentration.ĭuplicating a traditional fly sparge at home does create some challenges for the homebrewer. This gives a continuous flow, ideally with the flow in matching the flow out. Traditionally brewers use a fly sparge, where hot sparge water is continuously sprayed over the top of the mash tun to replace the hot wort as it is drained from the bottom of the mash tun. There are three techniques for sparging: the fly sparge, no sparge and batch sparge. We will then take the sugary wort, add some hops, boil it and ferment it to make our favorite beverage: Beer. The purpose is to extract the sugars created by the mashing process and dissolve them into hot water to form wort. Sparging (or lautering) is done at the end of the mash process, before the boil. Batch sparge techniques have become very popular with homebrewers recently, primarily because batch sparging requires less time and less equipment than traditional techniques at minimal added cost. Today we look at traditional fly sparging, batch sparging and no-sparge brewing techniques. I personally recommend a 20 minute dough in at a temperature between 100-112F for maximum impact.īrad Smith Follow BeerSmith on Twitter and Facebook This will generally lower your pH slightly, and improve your mash efficiency by a few percent. Usually done at a temperature between 100-120 F, the dough in allows the grains to soak and saturate as well as allowing the key various lower temperature enzymes to begin chopping up longer chains of molecules. The other popular step used by modern brewers is the dough-in rest (protein rest). Alpha amalyse completes its work more quickly than beta, so a slightly shorter step time can be used. Less of the sugars will ferment, leaving lower yeast attenuation and additional body in the finished beer. Mashing at the high end of the range (154-158F) activates alpha amalyse, resulting in not only maltose but other unfermentable sugars. It does generally take a bit longer for beta amalyse to do its work, so a longer conversion step at low temperature is needed. Maltose is the primary sugar preferred by yeast, so a lower mash temperature results in a larger percentage of sugars being fermented resulting in a clean beer finish with higher attenuation, slightly higher alcohol content and less body overall. Mashing at a lower temperature of 148-152F activated more beta amalyse, resulting in more maltose conversion. The bulk work of mashing is done by the alpha and beta amalyse enzymes, both of which are active to some degree in the normal 148-158F conversion step range. Mashing at the higher end of this range produces more unfermentables and therefore more body in the finished beer.įor single or multi-step mashes, the main step is called the conversion or saccrification step. Alpha Amylase (154-162F) – Produces a variety of sugars, including maltose and also some unfermentable sugars.Beta Amylase (131-150F) – Produces maltose, the main sugar fermented in beer.Pepidase (113-131F) – Produces free amino nitrogen, which can aid in fermentation.Beta Glucanese (95-113F) – Breaks down the gummy heavy starches, which can help improve stability and extraction, particularly for mashes high in proteins and adjuncts such as wheat.Debranching (95-112 F) – Helps to increase the solubility of starches resulting in increased extraction for certain malts.Lowering the mash pH has a number of benefits, though a Phytase rest is rarely used by modern brewers. Phytase (86-126 F) – Lowers the pH of the mash. Here’s a summary of the major enzyme groups found naturally in malted barley and their active range: Crushing the grain before mashing increases solubility making it possible to extract a larger percentage of the sugars and starch. Further, as these starches are heated they become more soluble in water, making it possible to extract the sugars and create the sweet wort extracted during lautering. Beta-glucanese and proteolytic enzymes divide branches of complex sugars into shorter chains.ĭuring the mash, the heavy lifting is done by diastatic enzymes that break down the protein and carbohydrate chains that lock up fermentable sugars. The process starts during malting when the barley grains are germinated and dried. Several enzymes that naturally occur in barley malt play key roles in breaking down these sugars. We covered the basics of infusion mashing in an earlier article.Īt its essence, mashing converts long chains of starches into much shorter sugar chains. At its heart, the mashing process uses hot water and natural enzymes to convert complex sugars from malt into simpler sugars that can be readily fermented. Mashing can be a mystical process for first time all-grain or partial mash beer brewers.
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