Mashing - Water or Grain in first?

[dicko]

I used to stir mine during underletting and at the beginning of the mash to prevent the stratification of temps that will occur.

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

Agreed, I suspected limited denaturing of Beta was part of the result as I found it hard to produce dry beers even though mash saccharification temps were low and for 90 minutes. The major problem was more due to some Alpha conversion occurring in highly modified malts during the time required for the mash to cool to saccharification temp. Changing the process so that temp was just above the required sacch temp before adding grist resulted in drier beers, that was the result I was after. Brewing is all about results, not numbers on thermometers.

Cheers,

Screwy

Maybe underlet at a lower temp and ramp up? Not sure.

I'm in the mash in, calc mash in temp. Brewmate does it, and on Monday, I hit my temps perfectly. I was surprised that I didn't lose any heat during a 90 minute mash in my esky, despite the headspace.

I have in the past, with less reliable equipment (BIAB on the stovetop), often been over and had to quickly add cold water to adjust down. Did end up with higher FG using that. So I under cooked the strike water and had a boiled kettle (81 degrees IIRC) and adjusted up. Problem fixed.

 

[mje1980]

Dump the strike water on top of the grain and use my huge forearms, biceps and a chefs whisk and no problems in about one minute. I use an esky tun.

 

[Spiesy]

Water first. Then grain.

 

[JaseH]

I have a 3V without HERMS/RIMS. I pre-heat the mash tun by pouring in 1 - 1.5l of boiling water, then throw in the grain(this amount of boiling water settles under the false bottom), then underlet with the rest of the strike water. My strike water is generally around 72C to get a target temp around 65-66C. I stir the mash well once my desired strike amount is in, then check the temp in a few places with a digital probe. I like to stir it well because even then I usually get around 1C or more variation in temp for various parts of the mash. I take an average and adjust if needed by adding cold/hot water.