Scum After Mashing

[Shifter]

When I use pale malts or Pilsner type malts I always get this type of scum after the mash and before the boil. I generally scoop it up to remove it, do I really need to??

 

[Crusty]

Does it affect the taste of your beers? If not, I would just ignore it, forget about skimming it off.
It's hard to tell from that photo but you should get a bit of foamy scummy goodness from the malts after mashing & that's a good thing.
Worry not mister, carry on. B)

 

[Shifter]

Thanks, it only seems to occur with Pale Malt. With MO and GP it never seems to happen.

 

[donburke]

When I use pale malts or Pilsner type malts I always get this type of scum after the mash and before the boil. I generally scoop it up to remove it, do I really need to??

my mash tun looked like that after saturday's brew, all pilsner malt decocted

fair dinkum looked like a 3mm layer of concrete set over the entire grain bed

none of it made it into the boil though, 10 min recirculation kept in the mash tun

do you biab ? if so i imagine a lot of that 'concrete' would end up in the boil

 

[Mike L'Itorus]

Scum after mashing?.....There's a NickJD joke here, just waiting to get out.

h34r:

 

[bignath]

I get that all the time, and i mean all the time. Every single brew.

Because im a tightarse, i only use BB or Joe White base malts. I always scoop it out with a wire strainer colander thingy. Not because im supposed to, just because i dont like the look of it in my boil. It smells pretty average if you wiff the pot i collect it into at the end of the boil too.

No idea if this at the detriment to my beer or not, but i do skim it only because thats what ive always done.
Old habits die hard.

 

[fraser_john]

From what I recall of an old post, by Batz from memory (?????), this is protein coagulated and filtered by the grain bed. You should not get it with really well modified malts, but cheaper malts with a lot of protein will end up with more of it.

 

[Shifter]

Thanks all, I'll continue to skim it off, basically like BN, that's what I have always done.

 

[Wolfy]

From what I recall of an old post, by Batz from memory (?????), this is protein coagulated and filtered by the grain bed. You should not get it with really well modified malts, but cheaper malts with a lot of protein will end up with more of it.

Not all under modified malts are cheap, Wey Floor Malted BoPils is one of the more expensive malts available and I think fits into hat category.