What is mash thickness

Correct mashing and milling is required. My ex-Bass Master Brewer ran a 2. At a large brewery I have seen 3.

One of the plants I contract at is a mix of both as they mash into the kettle and pump to the lauter tun. Also sometimes is a bit of trial and error to see what works best. Head Brewer Rocks Brewing Co. Sydney, Aust scotty rocksbrewing.

Originally posted by scmorgan View Post. Originally posted by brewmaster View Post. I think is good with a single infusion all malt beer. I would try to go higher if I am doing a wheat based beer if I were you.

We have a ten bbl direct fired system, no heat to mt except the hot liquor tank underneath. I keep a few bbls of water in the kettle boiling I turn it off once it boils - it is usually when I underlet to underlet into the mash. This works for a step mash, or on a more regular basis to mash out. I more often read of the mash water ratio affecting fermentability than efficiency, but I could see how the higher dilution with water would make the sugars flow more easily.

A thicker mash is more gentle to the enzymes because of the lower heat capacity of grain compared to water. A thick mash is better for multirest mashes because the enzymes are not denatured as quickly by a rise in temperature.

I've never heard of efficiency being at all affected by mash thickness either before that basic brewing video the latest on their website by the way. I think they got this information from a conversation they had with someone else regarding attenuation one of their podcasts At any rate, I'm wondering how much it really impacts efficiency and if their results are just an anomaly.

Having said that, the fermentability issue is interesting. So I guess if I want a drier higher alcohol beer I should go thin but a maltier, more full bodied beer I should go thick? So, now this really begs the question, does a high temp, thin mash, say around or a thick low temp mash cancel each out?

Quote from: Wildrover on December 05, , PM. Would checking for starch with iodine work as well? In a laboratory setting this would actually be the real heat capacity of the grist, but in a practical setting this becomes a fudge factor. It combines the heat capacity of the grist and the mashing vessel, as well as the effect of slight evaporative cooling as the strike water enters the vessel. Because every system is different, this parameter needs to be determined experimentally.

This means that if you have detailed records of past brews, you can actually estimate what your system would typically have as a heat capacity. Once you know this value, you can accurately hit a desired mash temperature for a given thickness by calculating what your strike water temperature ought to be. If you are just starting out in all-grain brewing, you need to trust the recipe you are using and make careful notes on how your system behaves differently than what the recipe describes.

Over time you will be able to adjust your mashing with a great deal of control. A very important point to consider is the inherent imprecision in your measurement of strike water volume and temperature, as well as the grist weight.

When making calculations as described here, do not bother to take your values to the 20th decimal place, because your calculated quantities can be no more precise than your methods of measurement. See Calculations at end of article. The characteristics of carbohydrate in wort are determined in large part by the critical interplay between mash thickness and mash temperature.

Two enzymes in malt are primarily responsible for the degradation of starch, the most important carbohydrate in the brewing process, to fermentable sugars and dextrins, which are non-fermentable sugars. These two enzymes, alpha-amylase and beta-amylase, each have a very specific role in the mash.

The alpha-amylase cuts up starch molecules at many different points along its length. This produces dextrins and also some fermentable sugars. The beta-amylase takes these fragments of the original starch molecules and clips off maltose units from one end. It does so in a very precise manner, one maltose molecule at a time. So over time during the mash, as alpha-amylase yields more and more dextrins, the beta-amylase has more substrate on which to work.

These two enzymes, though they work in concert, behave differently in response to changes in mash thickness and mash temperature. This is because of the difference in their stability at high temperatures.

High mash temperatures favor a less fermentable wort because alpha-amylase is a lot more stable than beta-amylase is at higher temperatures. This means that there will be less production of maltose as the activity of beta-amylase diminishes. Thick Mash Read times. What is the difference in extract production between a thick vs. Which is better? I have been mashing at 1. Joliet, IL All good things come to those who show patients and perseverance while maintaining a positive and progressive attitude.

German Brewers use 2. Brewin a bag? Some use all of the water for the batch in the mash. I don't brew with a BIAB set up, so someone can say what they do. I found that as I increased my liquor:qrist ratio, my extract increased.

Life begins at I use 1. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk. Rocket City — Huntsville AL. AFAIK, there is nothing inherently good or bad about mashing at any specific ratios. There's nothing magical about the ratio. Not the mash ratio, but the volume after mashing that you then have left to sparge with to reach your intended pre-boil volume. Volumes matter. But not the ratio.

For high gravity beers more than about 1. Big sparge, big volume, better efficiency. This just ensures a very good rinse of sugars out of the grains, that's the reason I do it. Less rinsing could be leaving behind precious sugars.