Double Dough In?

[Bribie G]

BribieG is back at Skool with Palmer's How to Brew and I'm thinking of how to best convert cereal adjuncts whilst still getting a good whack of fermentables. Reason is that I have been using wheat adjuncts in my Aussie Pale Ales and getting hazes - and I think this is also worth getting a handle on for ricez and stuff in general.

To sum up Palmer.

• Alpha Amylase chops up starches into branched chains that Beta Amylase can then go to work on to turn into sugaz. Works best at 72 down to 67
• Beta Amylase chops up those smaller chains to maltose (fermentable). Works best 65.5 down to 55
• This is why a temperature range of around 66 is recommended as a working compromise.

There are also pH considerations that I'm not complicating things with at the moment.


So if chopping up starch from ricez, polenta, flaked goods, flour etc it's best to head for at least 67 degrees.
However Palmer says that above 67 Beta Amylase tends to fall apart, so even if you let the mash drift down to the lower working range, much of the Beta diastatic power is gone.
Beers mashed in that high range may have an alpha-optimum wort will not have a high percentage of maltose but instead will have a random distribution of sugars of varying complexity

Great for a beer such as a Mild which is full bodied but not too alcoholic.

However a beer mashed at the low range will have more fermentables and therefore turn out drier and thinner but a beta-optimum wort is not a very fermentable wort, leaving a lot of amylopectin starch unconverted; alpha amylase is needed to break up the larger chains so beta can work on them

So for a beer such as an Aussie Pale Ale, mashed at around 64 degrees (Beta-optimum) I'm not doing myself a favour by putting in starch adjuncts such as Semolina or Flour into a Beta-optimum mash . <_< so I think I've nailed where the haze is coming from. Not too important for a Sparkly.

I'd like to make better use of my adjuncts in Aussie and Euro style lagers but at the same time mash a little lower so I don't end up with an over sweet beer and I'm thinking of two methods of doing this.

#1 Using my new UrnyNator double urn BIAB system, :icon_chickcheers: do an all malt mash in one urn at Beta friendly temperature, and do a malt + adjunct mash in the other urn at Alpha temp. Drain, boil and combine both in the 2 nochill cubes

#2 Split the malt bill in 2 - mix half with the adjuncts and dough into the 2 urns at, say 69 degrees and rest for 30 mins or until the mash is getting to the bottom of the Alpha range. The ricez etc should be converted (30 mins according to Palmer)
Then dough in the second half of the pure malt to bring it down into to the Beta range and rest for a further 30 - 45 mins. Drain, boil, and each one into its own nochill cube. (This method is also suitable for a single batch brew whereas #1 depends on 2 mash tuns / urns on the go)

I guess that in the case of #2 the sudden fresh dose of Beta Amylase is going to attack the dextrins etc produced earlier by the Alpha and produce a thinner beer than #1?

Discuss :icon_cheers:


Quick edit: of course I fully appreciate that there is an overlap in the range of the 2 enzymes, it isn't a brick wall between those two temperature ranges, we are talking optimums for what we want to achieve

 

[under]

LOL

 

[Bribie G]

LOL

?

 

[warra48]

Go for it. You've got nothing to lose. Sounds logical to me, but I'm no brewing expert.

You might just be on the way to discovering the next great mashing regime.
Palmer will have to re-write his book and publish a 4th edition.

 

[Bribie G]

Go for it. You've got nothing to lose. Sounds logical to me, but I'm no brewing expert.

You might just be on the way to discovering the next great mashing regime.
Palmer will have to re-write his book and publish a 4th edition.

Yes with that and BIAB I've got him cornered :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[MVZOOM]

IMHO your logic is bang on, is the result of this also the reason that step mashing is popular? If you get a 'dry' wort and a 'full bodied' wort together, will the result be the same as a 65degC mash - but driving more efficiency of sugar extraction?

Cheers - Mike

 

[Bribie G]

Yes Mike, sort of divide and rule.

 

[MHB]

Briby this has been covered many times before, but once more won't hurt.

Any adjunct (rice, maize, wheat and barley etc) has starch in granules; these are grouped in little parcels surrounded by protein, to use the starch and convert it to sugar we have to get it into a state that lets the enzymes in the malt degrade it into sugar in the mash.
Analogies are rarely accurate but in this case might help get the idea across let's say you had a lump of concrete and that the part you want is the aggregate (sic the starch granules), if you dissolved the cement away with acid you would be left with a pile of gravel.
This is one of the things that happens during malting; enzymes like B-Glucanase breaks up the protein that surrounds the starch granules, like the acid dissolves the cement.

Next is to unravel the starch, it is stored in the corn* as tightly wound up strands, this is called gelatinisation. The starch takes up water and swells (ever cooked white rice? Then you know what I mean by swells up) and becomes available to the enzymes when you start mashing.
It's very important to note that different types of grain have very different gelatinisation temperatures. Barley gelatinises at mashing temperatures but most grains don't, this table gives the range of gelatinisation temperatures for some common brewing ingredients.
TableView attachment Gelatinization_Temperatures.xls
Now just because one end of the gelatinisation range is in the mashing range that doesn't mean that the grain you have will gelatinise at that end of the range, it will gelatinise somewhere in that range so you must cover all of the range.

One common practice is to slowly heat the adjunct with a portion of your malt (usually about 10%). The enzymes in the malt (like Glucanase) aid with the breaking up of the protein matrix, once you get to about 80 ^oC the enzymes are all denatured and you can pile on the heat and boil the mix until its fully gelatinised. Just follow the same procedure as you would if you were cooking rice for dinner. Actually mixing your rice and some malt together and throwing it in a rice cooker works a treat. Adding some malt isn't mandatory, just well cooked rice will work but including the malt works better.

If you want to do a boil you can use the boiled rice and water as part of your strike water, or you can prepare the adjunct in a rice cooker the day before and let it cool, then just use the solid portion as part of your grist, again not a right wrong thing, just what works out easiest for you.
The haze you are getting is likely to be starch haze from not properly preparing your adjunct, so you are gelatinising some of the starch in the kettle after the enzymes are no longer effective. The problem with what you're talking about doing is that you haven't fixed the cause of the problem.

Gelatinise the starch in the adjunct then get it into the mash at a temperature where the mash enzymes can act on the starch.


Hope this helps you on the road to clear beer

MHB

* a "Corn" is the name of any individual grain a Barley Corn is a grain of Barley, a grain of wheat can be called a corn of wheat...

 

[Bribie G]

Thanks MHB - this is almost definitely how I got the haze in the Aussies. But for my adjunct lagers I boil the grain adjunct ( rice or maize ) to a mush like the American breweries do with their 'cooker mash'.
However what I was discussing in the OP isn't so much the gelatinisation, but the effective digesting of the gelatinised starch by the A-Amylase which goes best over 67 degrees. As you say that won't happen as effectively at say 64 degrees. So the idea is to do the A-amylase mash of the gelatinised adjunct at say 68 degrees with a proportion of the malt, and do a separate cooler mash with the rest of the malt in the B-Amylase ideal range, then combine the two worts in the cubes.

I see in Palmer's recipes with USA malts he does a B-Amylase rest then ups the temperature to do an A-Amylase rest which makes sense to a certain degree. However I was wondering about doing both rests in parallel (as I have 2 mash tuns now) or do them the other way around in one mash tun but adding fresh B-Amylase in the form of a second dose of malt grain after I have done a A- rest first. :icon_cheers:

I have a hunch that this may work well with BIAB because of the thinner mash that will allow the various enzymes to 'perfuse' more quickly in the mash as opposed to a thicker mash in a 'passive' mash tun in a 3v system . Although a recirculating system should handle it ok as well I guess (not being familiar with HERMS).

 

[Thirsty Boy]

It'll work Bribie -- it just wont work very much better than normal mashing. Certainly not if the object of the game is to reduce haze.

Unconverted carbohydrates can cause haze... dextrins dont. So it really doesn't matter Jack sprat whether your Beta Amylase is all denatured or not... your Alpha amylase isn't, till deep into a mashout or even into the kettle - and it'll convert haze making starches into non haze making dextrins.

So your issue is unlikely to be unconverted, gelatinised starch --- it is more likely to be ungelatinised starch and or other cereal carbohydrates and/or protiens. Beta glucans etc.

If you just cook your cereal... you gelatinise the starch fairly well - BUT - if you follow MHB's advice and do a proper full cereal mash with a portion of malted cereal present, rising from a room temp mash in to a boiling finish - you will also be breaking down protiens, breaking down beta glucans and accessing extra starches... all of which gets the adjunct properly ready for the action of the Alpha and Beta Amylase enzymes. You mentioned the American Breweries preparing their rice adjunct... well, they don't just boil the rice to a mush - they do a cereal mash.

I personally would do a proper cereal mash on any beer where I was planning to use much more than a sprinkle of any unmalted adjunct grain, and in every case where that unmalted adjunct grain was rice or corn. Especially if haze is an issue... if you don't care about clarity, well it matters a lot less..

The combo thing will work OK though from a general mashing perspective - although the cooler mash might well take a bit longer to convert etc, I'd think about bringing both to a mash-out temp before lautering, for exactly the same reasons i have described in the past for why I think a stirred ramp to a mashout is important in BIAB. One of those reasons incidentally is to avoid carbohydrate haze.......

TB

 

[manticle]

^This interests me very much because the only time I used rice in a brew, the end result was hazy. Cooked the rice first but maybe I need to look closely at the above as I plan on using my ellerslie PoR flowers in the next fortnight to make a summer drinking aussie lager.

 

[Bribie G]

Aha - Cereal Mash . OK now I get you. Right I'll follow MHBs and your advice and do that next time - also I may have got the post off to the wrong start, in the case of my Polenta and Rice brews it's not a clarity thing:

It's more of a body / mouthfeel thing, to get a rich bodied nicely balanced lager without it being sweet or - at the other extreme - thin , and also to get the best bang for the buck from my grains.

However when doing Cream Ales and CAP style lagers (and Euro lagers which often use a fair whack of adjunct outside Germany) I'd much prefer to try and follow traditional industry type procedures (In the case of the USA they have been doing all this since 1850s so it's not modern megaswill stuff) rather than make up my own methods, so Cereal Mash it is :icon_cheers:

 

[Thirsty Boy]

oh sure thing then - you can do with a "mixed" mash, more or less what you do with a step mash, two vessels will give you more flexibility for sure. I suggest you have a look at some info on US adjunct/cereal mashes and also Euro decoction mashes, because with 2 kettles i both those cases, what they are doing is probably the closest commercial/industrial example that you will find to what you are propsing.

As I said though, just be a little cautious with the "low" temp half to make sure you hit all your starch and finish things out right. It wont hurt to finish them both high to make sure - as long as one spends most of its time low then you will still get the effect you are looking for.

You should most certainly be able to get that good body, non sweet thing happening without going to those extremes, sweetness and body are not inextricably linked... but you do have what would be a reasonable alternative to a step mash regime if you don't want to step, and a very close approximation of any industry normal 2 kettle cereal/decoction mashing system (if you can boil a decoction in the urn that is... I would have no idea if you can.)

Let us know how it goes Bribie, I'm certain with a bit of practise you could make it work.

TB

 

[aussiechucka]

Briby this has been covered many times before, but once more won't hurt.

Any adjunct (rice, maize, wheat and barley etc) has starch in granules; these are grouped in little parcels surrounded by protein, to use the starch and convert it to sugar we have to get it into a state that lets the enzymes in the malt degrade it into sugar in the mash.
Analogies are rarely accurate but in this case might help get the idea across let's say you had a lump of concrete and that the part you want is the aggregate (sic the starch granules), if you dissolved the cement away with acid you would be left with a pile of gravel.
This is one of the things that happens during malting; enzymes like B-Glucanase breaks up the protein that surrounds the starch granules, like the acid dissolves the cement.

Next is to unravel the starch, it is stored in the corn* as tightly wound up strands, this is called gelatinisation. The starch takes up water and swells (ever cooked white rice? Then you know what I mean by swells up) and becomes available to the enzymes when you start mashing.
It's very important to note that different types of grain have very different gelatinisation temperatures. Barley gelatinises at mashing temperatures but most grains don't, this table gives the range of gelatinisation temperatures for some common brewing ingredients.
TableView attachment 39777
Now just because one end of the gelatinisation range is in the mashing range that doesn't mean that the grain you have will gelatinise at that end of the range, it will gelatinise somewhere in that range so you must cover all of the range.

One common practice is to slowly heat the adjunct with a portion of your malt (usually about 10%). The enzymes in the malt (like Glucanase) aid with the breaking up of the protein matrix, once you get to about 80 ^oC the enzymes are all denatured and you can pile on the heat and boil the mix until its fully gelatinised. Just follow the same procedure as you would if you were cooking rice for dinner. Actually mixing your rice and some malt together and throwing it in a rice cooker works a treat. Adding some malt isn't mandatory, just well cooked rice will work but including the malt works better.

If you want to do a boil you can use the boiled rice and water as part of your strike water, or you can prepare the adjunct in a rice cooker the day before and let it cool, then just use the solid portion as part of your grist, again not a right wrong thing, just what works out easiest for you.
The haze you are getting is likely to be starch haze from not properly preparing your adjunct, so you are gelatinising some of the starch in the kettle after the enzymes are no longer effective. The problem with what you're talking about doing is that you haven't fixed the cause of the problem.

Gelatinise the starch in the adjunct then get it into the mash at a temperature where the mash enzymes can act on the starch.


Hope this helps you on the road to clear beer

MHB

* a "Corn" is the name of any individual grain a Barley Corn is a grain of Barley, a grain of wheat can be called a corn of wheat...

Hi MHB
Thanks for all this info. I gave this a go on my last BIAB and it seemed to work really well. What I did was to Boil the rice and 10% of the grain bill, once it got to boiling I turned it off and took it off the heat. Wrapped it all up for the night. When I woke in the morning and ready to mash that day it was already to go. The pot was still a little warm around 40 degrees. Anyway the mash went well and currently fermenting. This was my first use of rice so will see how it goes.
Thanks again for the info and I am sure I will let you all know how it turns out.
Cheers
Chucka

 

[manticle]

Forgot to do this with Friday's rice in an aussie lager. Cooked the rice to slush and did do a small protein rest with the overall grain so hopefully I turns out OK.

 

[aussiechucka]

My Latest larger turned out pretty good using the cereal mash. I also did Zwickel's Step mash to help convert the rice better. All in all I hit my SG's so was happy and have finally bottled. So will let you all know in a month or two how it goes for clarity and body. Can't wait to taste it.
Cheers
Chucka

 

[Bribie G]

I'm going to chuck my keg of American Malt Liquor into the kegerator today and will also report in a few days if I'm not incarcerated.