# Looking for Balance in Vienna Galaxy SMaSH



## neal.p (3/4/18)

Hi,
Interested to hear thoughts on this recipe. Particularly the DIPA malt/hop/alcohol balance. There are two yeast listed as I'll do a split batch.

What about switching out the DME for dextrose? And up it to 10% of the bill (to dry it out a bit and reduce Vienna)?

I'm also not sure if I should mash at say 66 rather than 68? Will it make a big difference?

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 29.00 l
Post Boil Volume: 25.00 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 21.00 l 
Bottling Volume: 19.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.083 SG
Estimated Color: 12.1 EBC
Estimated IBU: 129.6 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 82.3 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU 
7.00 kg Vienna Malt (Weyermann) (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 94.6 % 
40.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min Hop 2 56.1 IBUs 
0.40 kg DME Golden Light (Briess) (7.9 EBC) Dry Extract 3 5.4 % 
150.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 30.0 Hop 4 73.5 IBUs 
1.0 pkg American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) Yeast 5 - 
1.0 pkg Vermont IPA (Giga Yeast #GY054) Yeast 6 - 
100.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - Dry Hop 1.0 Days Hop 7 0.0 IBUs 


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Full Body
Total Grain Weight: 7.40 kg
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperat Step Time 
Saccharification Add 33.28 l of water at 74.0 C 68.0 C 60 min 
Mash Out Heat to 76.0 C over 7 min 76.0 C 10 min


----------



## MHB (3/4/18)

Vienna will provide plenty of body, I would probably mash a little cooler (62-63oC), I suspect a full body mash might be just a bit too full in this case, especially as you aren't doing any Glucan/Protein rests.
76, isn't really a mashout, 77+ or even better just under 80oC
Funny when I finger count you strike water I get 62.5 (assuming 7kg of malt at 20oC)
I am also a bit suspicious of your gravity calculation, 7kg of W/Vienna with an as is yield of ~78% would give 5.46kg of extract + the 0.4kg of DME gives 5.86kg.
You are looking at a post boil of 25L @ 1.083 or 20.75oP, so the mass would be (25*1.083=27.075kg) as oP is %WW
27.075*20.75% = 5.618kg, boils down to you needing 5.61/5.86*100= 96% over all efficiency, it's possible but pretty hard.
Mark

PS, you cant get over about 103IBU, cool the beer to serving temperatures and more Alpha fall out, max would be closer to 85IBU.
M


----------



## neal.p (3/4/18)

Thanks MHB. Thanks for your thoughts.

I use a Braumeister 20 (+BAC Brewing filter) with Beersmith. It's giving me a bit of drama at the moment as I'm having to add approx. 300-500g of DME to get post boil gravity. So something is off.

I started to my fake mashout (lol) recently as a couple of recipes called for it and I was wondering if it would make a difference to efficiency. Something about the extra heat . Normally I just raise the Braumeister tube and park in a bucket to drain while the vessel heats up. Maybe I'll ditch the mashout.


----------



## MHB (3/4/18)

Well if you are using a Braumeister you should have no trouble step mashing.
For an all Vienna I would seriously just mash in at tap-water temperature (~20oC) and just let it ramp up to your first rest. This will take you through a protein/glucan rest (rises at about 1oC/Minute)
Set your first rest at 62-63oC for 30-40 minutes
Second rest at about72oC for 20-30 minutes
Mashout at 78-79oC for 15 minutes.
Should give you a better yield and a more attenuateive wort.

I still think you have your efficiency set a bit too high in beersmith, that's why you are falling a bit short on your extract.
Leave the malt pipe in the BM until its finished.
Mark


----------



## neal.p (3/4/18)

Cheers mate. I'll give that a shot.

Just curious, what's the reasoning behind leaving the pipe in?


----------



## MHB (3/4/18)

As the wort recirculates, it is heated, it heats the malt in the pipe...
Rather the whole point of a recirculating system.
Mark


----------



## yankinoz (4/4/18)

Vienna malts work in American ales. How well is a matter of taste, but I do it from time to time. Re mash temp I always go with a Hochkurz mash when I do this, 61 or 62 for 40 minutes and then up to 71 for 40. High conversion efficiency at the right pH, good body but restrains sweetness a little.

As for balance in Vienna, here's an example from a carnival there:


----------



## Coodgee (4/4/18)

Mark, honest question, why does vienna add so much more body to a beer? from the Wyerman specs sheet, it's just a regular kilned malt at 6-9 EBC, which is within the range of some ale malts. I did a honey lager recently which was 80% vienna, 10% munich and 10% honey and it was very smooth and rich. why do you think vienna adds so much body that we treat it almost like a crystal type malt?


----------



## MHB (4/4/18)

Its part of a family of malts that are "Stewed". Traditionally late in the sprouting phase the malt was heaped into mounds and covered with tarpaulins, this caused the temperature in the malt to rise, accelerating the formation of Melanoidins.
Melanoidins are a condensation product of protein and sugars/carbohydrates. Odds on some of the protein is protein that wouldn't become soluble in normal malting.
You get an increase of the typical flavours associated with Milliard reactions, the same ones you get when you make toast, bake bread, cook biscuits... those warm rich bready toasty notes, without much if any increase in the sweetness you get from the crystal making process.
There are a few malts in the "Stewed" spectrum Vienna, Light and Dark Munich, Melanoidin, Imperial, Aromatic, Honey Malt...
All good fun malts, and great for putting a spine into a beer!
Mark


----------



## TheSumOfAllBeers (4/4/18)

So this body that you are talking about is the protein derived sort not residual sugar kind?

Body in beer is a complex topic, and mashing to bias amylase activity is only a part of it.

When I read this thread I thought that MHB had confused Vienna with something like cara Pilsner.

A 100% Vienna recipe is completely diastatic and will attenuate consistently with your yeast strain and equivalent base malts; but you are talking about mashing low to increase attenuation and lower FG derived body to compensate for increased protein derived body.

Have I summarised this correctly?


----------



## MHB (4/4/18)

Mostly close
The extra body comes from Protein/Carbohydrate complex, being bound together that Carbohydrate cant be converted into fermentable sugars so subject to the same mash regime you will get less attenuation.

To increase fermentability (make it more attenuateive) you want to bias toward Beta activity, you will still get plenty of body from the complexes, body yes - just not as sweet as you would get from a hotter (Alpha) biased mash.

As colour goes up the amount of available enzymes goes down. The definition of a Base Malt is one that has enough enzymes to at a minimum convert itself. By the time you get to about 20EBC you are right up against this limit, Dark Munich is about the limit in terms of Base malt, but the amount of enzymes available falls with rising colour, for the purposes of this conversation Pale/Pilsner > Ale Malt > Vienna > Light Munich > Dark Munich > Melanoidin Malt (no enzymes).

Another point is that a "standard commercial pilsner" 12oP wort is about 63% Fermentable extract 37% is unfermentable, the OP was talking about an OG over 20oP so there will be proportionally a lot more (nearly double) the amount of unfermentables, this will increase the FG, using all Vienna will increase it further - unless the brewer takes steps to maximise the fermentability the finished beer could very easily be very/too full bodied.

Given that Vienna has less enzymes (diastase) I would be looking at a slower step mash to solubilise and convert as much of the malt as I could, a Glucan, Protein, Beta peak, Alpha peak, Mashout will I think give a much better balanced beer.

Balanced beer was the question being asked.
Mark


----------



## TheSumOfAllBeers (4/4/18)

MHB said:


> Given that Vienna has less enzymes (diastase) I would be looking at a slower step mash to solubilise and convert as much of the malt as I could, a Glucan, Protein, Beta peak, Alpha peak, Mashout will I think give a much better balanced beer.
> 
> Balanced beer was the question being asked.
> Mark



But a lot of other questions got answered too. Good post.


----------



## neal.p (10/5/18)

Cheers. So I changed the recipe a bit before brewing. Reduced 1kg Vienna with 700g of sugar, removed DME from the boil, and then added 250g DME post boil to hit FG (approx 1014). I was at 1056 not 1066 pre-boil. I use the full-volume no-sparge BIAB method which means the vessel is filled pretty much up to the brim (pump prob struggles?). I may try mashing with 25L next time and set aside the rest for sparging.

BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: 2018/01 = Vienna SMaSH
Brewer:
Asst Brewer:
Style: Double IPA
TYPE: All Grain

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 27.96 l
Post Boil Volume: 23.96 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 20.00 l 
Bottling Volume: 18.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.080 SG
Estimated Color: 10.9 EBC
Estimated IBU: 166.3 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 80.5 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU 
6.00 kg Vienna Malt (Weyermann) (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 89.6 % 
30.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min Hop 2 45.1 IBUs 
0.70 kg Sugar, Table (Sucrose) (2.0 EBC) Sugar 3 10.4 % 
30.00 g Galaxy [14.00 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 4 19.9 IBUs 
30.00 g Galaxy [14.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 5 14.6 IBUs 
30.00 g Galaxy [14.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 6 8.0 IBUs 
150.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 30.0 Hop 7 78.8 IBUs 
1.0 pkg American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) [124 Yeast 8 - 
1.0 pkg Vermont IPA (Giga Yeast #GY054) Yeast 9 - 
100.00 g Galaxy [14.30 %] - Dry Hop 1.0 Days Hop 10 0.0 IBUs 


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Light Body
Total Grain Weight: 6.70 kg
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperat Step Time 
Saccharification Add 33.30 l of water at 19.8 C 20.0 C 0 min 
Mash Step Add 0.00 l of water at 63.0 C 63.0 C 40 min 
Mash Step Add 0.00 l of water at 72.0 C 72.0 C 40 min 
Mash Out Heat to 79.0 C over 7 min 79.0 C 15 min


----------



## Schikitar (10/5/18)

Wow, @MHB, you know your stuff, thanks for the thoroughly good read (of what I'm sure is only the tip of the iceberg of your knowledge)! 

It's times like these I wish I knew/understood more science!


----------



## MHB (10/5/18)

Thanks, I've been studying brewing (as a science) for a fair while. I like to think I know just enough to know how little I really do know.
I've had the the pleasure of talking to some master brewers (IBD Master Brewers PhD Equivalent ) they are really scary, especially when you put up what you think is a good idea and the say "hum but of course then..."
Mate really just a decent grasp of the basics is all we need aspire to, I just like knowing why stuff happens.
Mark


----------



## Coodgee (11/5/18)

I tend to think of brewing with darker malts + cane to sugar a bit similar to using ice and hot water to produce tap water.


----------

