BeerSmith™ Recipe Cloud

Notes

STEEPING The Procedure: 1. Choose a grain. Determine what flavor you're aiming for and pick appropriate specialty grains to complement your recipe. A great way to focus on the steeping procedure is to use only one type of grain — crystal in the 60° to 80° Lovibond range, for example — in an all-extract beer you have made before, writing down the exact amount used. By adding steeped grain to a recipe you have tried before, you'll really be able to focus on how the grain changed the flavor. 2. Prepare the grain. Have the grain milled when you purchase it, or crack it with a rolling pin at home. (This is less messy if you crack it a handful at a time in a plastic bag.) Don't use a coffee mill; it's important to maintain most of the integrity of the husk. This will keep sharp-tasting tannins in the husks and not in your wort. Put the cracked grain, now known as grist, into a cheesecloth or nylon mesh bag and tightly tie the top. 3. Prepare the water. Put water in your kettle and turn the heat on just as you always do. Depending on the size of your kettle, you'll be heating 2.5 gallons of water or more. When the water gets hot — hotter than a hot tub, so that you can dip your finger in but not hold it in there — you'll be ready to add the grain. 4. Add the grain. Gently drop in the grist-filled bag and turn the heat down low. 5. Steep. The goal here is to make a grain infusion, similar to tea, by holding the grain in the water between 160° and 175° F for 20 to 30 minutes. Do you need a thermometer? It helps, but you can proceed without one, too. Your beer will be fine if you put the steeping sack in at 130° F but keep the water below 180° F so that those tannins in the husk don't get dissolved into your wort. If you think the temperature is getting too high, pull the bag out. If you wish to take an additional step, you can use two kettles: one with a gallon of steeping water at 160° to 175° F (this smaller volume will have a lower pH and will do even more to keep those tannins out of your wort) and the other kettle with two or more gallons of water for your main wort boil. The second kettle can be fired up to a boil as you steep in the other kettle and will save a little time. The steeping temperature range (160° to 175° F) happens to be one that triggers some starch-to-sugar converting enzymes. Why not use some of those malts that contain unconverted starch and active enzymes, and go for some conversion? Because steeping isn't as effecient as mashing. Also, the enzymes would be dispersed too widely in the ratio of water to grain. In a mash, grist and water are held at these temperatures in a ratio of one to two quarts of water per pound of grain. We are using far more water with steeped grains. 6. Pull the bag. At the end of a 20- to 30-minute steep, pull the grain bag out with tongs or a strainer. Don't squeeze the bag (remember, husk integrity will help keep those tannins out of the wort), but give the bag a rinse with some 150° to 170° F water that you have ready in your teakettle. Once you've removed the grain bag, you can fire the heat back up to high and proceed with the rest of your brew just as you've done in the past: add extract and hops, cool, pitch yeast, and ferment. As you wait for your water to boil but before you add extract, dip a sample of your lovely grain infusion out of your kettle for evaluation. Look at all the color you got from, say, a pound of crystal malt. Smell your sample; taste it; roll it around in your mouth. Malty, huh?