Today, many home brewers use the step-by-step malt mashing technique. Step-by-step mashing allows you to control the process of preparing the wort, allows you to consistently increase the temperature of the mash, get dry or sweet beer, control what kind of beer you get at the end, empty or velvety, sour or sweet. The number of different temperature pauses allows you to very finely tune the taste of the future product and make the cooking process homemade beer repeatable and predictable. Knowledge of chemistry, organics and biochemistry allows brewers to draw up the correct schedule for temperature increases and plan temperature breaks.
A bit of malting theory
A key process in brewing is malting. Mashing malt and using temperature breaks in brewing is just a special case of malting, one of its stages.
The main task that must be achieved during malting is the start of barley growth. After the barley has begun to grow, it is dried to stop the sprouts from growing. It is this stage of malting that is the most important and most responsible, because it is responsible for the foundation and creation of enzymes, which are basic.
In addition, this stage is the beginning of the breakdown of glucans in cell membranes, as well as the beginning of the breakdown of proteins. This allows you to saturate the product with the amino acids necessary to start brewing, which are the main reason for the growth of yeast. In addition, it is this stage that is responsible for the absence of turbidity in the finished beer, as well as increasing the biological stability of the finished drink.
The degree of breakdown of glucans and proteins is nothing more than a modification. Today, most of the malt sold and available is modified. That is, glucans and proteins can be broken down to such an extent that you just need to start the process of converting starch into sugar, and there is no need for additional modification. On the other hand, unmodified malt (or slightly modified malt) allows for more precise control over the brewing process of both the wort and the finished beer.
Typically, modified grains have a soft shell, while unmalted grains are quite hard. Malt producers often sell both malted and unmalted barley. If you have malt of unknown quality, then in this case you need to use the step-by-step mashing method, or, as it is also called, the decoction method.
Enzymes and the optimal temperature range for their operation
Enzymes are special proteins that act as catalysts and accelerators of fermentation processes. Enzymes and other proteins are long amino acid molecules that can have up to 87 thousand units. Some amino acid molecules are coiled, some are sheets. As a rule, all proteins are quite weak from a molecular point of view and are quickly destroyed; they maintain their shape solely due to Van Der Waals forces. Such molecular forces are very weak, and they can simply break due to changes in the acidity of the environment or an increase in temperature. An enzyme, to speed up the breakdown of starch, simply attaches to a specific element of starch and speeds up the process of its breakdown into two sugar molecules.
The breakdown process itself is hydrolysis, however, without water, hydrolysis (that is, destruction) of the protein would take a very long time. The enzyme amylase attaches itself to two molecules that will become sugar and speeds up the reaction between the OH base of water and the H molecule of water. As a result, the starch molecule breaks apart, forming two sugar molecules, and the enzyme is released and goes to “look” for another starch molecule.
If the enzyme itself is damaged, then it cannot work to break down starch molecules and is completely deactivated. In this case, they say that the enzyme has denatured, that is, destroyed. OH can be destroyed by excess temperature or too high or low acidity of the environment. Denaturation is an irreversible process, and a damaged enzyme cannot return to its state again. Each enzyme has its own optimal operating temperature, and the vast majority of brewing books have information about the “operating temperatures” of various enzymes.
The average brewer does not need to know the detailed working mechanism. You just have to understand that enzymes are a kind of mechanism that work on their own, without being consumed, but only within strict temperature limits (temperature pauses). At the same time, the work of the enzymes is unrelated to each other, and each of the enzymes works independently. Each enzyme operates at any temperature not exceeding the destruction temperature. The brewer's job is to raise the temperature so high that the enzymes work as efficiently and quickly as possible, but not so high that the enzymes are destroyed. At the same time, you need to understand that the system is quite inert, and the enzymes are destroyed at lightning speed. Thus, Alpha-amylase is destroyed at a temperature of 65 degrees Celsius, however, it will take about an hour to completely destroy all molecules.
Thus, the rate of fermentation depends on the concentration of enzymes, on its density in the wort, on the temperature and acidity (i.e. pH) of the wort. To control the mashing process, you can operate with any of these four factors, and you can work either separately with each factor or together with several factors.
Acid rest during brewing
An acid rest is used immediately after soaking. Moreover, it can be carried out using almost any method of mashing malt. During an acid pause, the pH of the wort decreases to the desired values, and glucans are completely destroyed, which can turn the wort into a paste. As a rule, during this temperature pause the temperature ranges from 35 to 45 degrees. In this case, the phytase enzyme completely destroys the phytin molecule, resulting in the release of phytic acid, which increases the acidity of the environment (that is, lowers the pH of the wort).
It is worth remembering that the phytase enzyme is very sensitive to excessive temperature, so the vast majority of molecules are simply destroyed by heat during malting. Phytase is present only in those types of malt that have undergone minimal roasting. It works very actively only when the malt has not been roasted, and sufficiently soft water was used during malting. The acid rest lasts about one hour, and to be honest, many brewers simply skip it and ignore it, immediately raising the temperature further. Indeed, with enough strong drying There is simply no point in maintaining an acid pause for malt, since all phytase is simply destroyed.
Another process that is characteristic of this acid pause is the breakdown of glucans, complex carbohydrates, which are contained in grains along with starch. Most glucans are found in rye, wheat and oats, as well as in lightly modified malts. It is beta-glucans that are responsible for making beer cloudy. If you want to get crystal clear beer, then, in addition to mandatory filtration, it is worth maintaining an acid break in brewing.
Protein break in brewing
The protein pause is a pause at a temperature of about 45-59 degrees. The protein temperature pause is characterized by the work of two enzymes at once - this is the work of proteinase and peptidase. These enzymes belong to the class of hydrolases, which directly break down amino acids in proteins. As a result of its work, proteinase breaks down long amino acids into many medium-length amino acids, and also cleaves off terminal amino acids from protein molecules.
To create beer, long amino acid molecules are not needed, because a large number of long and undigested proteins lead to cloudiness in beer. And the beer itself will be very unstable. At the same time, medium-length amino acids allow beer foam to achieve stability and durability. Peptidase works optimally at 45-53 degrees, and proteinase at 55-58 degrees. Maintaining a pause of 15-20 minutes at 55-58 degrees can significantly reduce cloudiness in beer, without having any effect on the foaming of the drink and its taste. It is not worth carrying out a protein break at a temperature of 45-52 degrees, since in this case there will be big problems with the foaming of the future beer. A temperature pause of 55-58 degrees is also convenient because it reduces the viscosity of the future beer.
A protein pause is very effective if the wort is thick, where there is only about two liters of water per kilogram of malt. After the protein break, the malt can be slightly diluted clean water, make it more liquid. In this case, it is better to pour malt hot water, while simultaneously increasing the temperature of the wort.
It is worth noting that the work of beta-glucanase from the acid pause is still observed, however, the speed of this enzyme is too low.
A distinctive feature of this pause is that the amount of finished wort depends on it. In addition, excessive stirring and holding time directly affect the finished aroma of the drink and the extract of the mash.
Saccharification
It is worth noting that this is the only temperature pause that cannot be avoided during brewing. If fully modified malt is used, this is often the only pause left for the brewer. The main purpose of the saccharification step is to convert starch into sugar. This is done using two enzymes called diastatic enzymes.
The first enzyme is beta-amylase, which bites off the ends of the starch molecule to form maltose. This enzyme works at the beginning of the temperature range of this pause. The second enzyme, alpha-amylase, operates in the 68-72 degree range and its main job is to break apart the starch molecule in random places. The enzyme is very long and bulky, resulting in the formation of unfermentable sugars, dextrins. They are what makes beer sweet. A short rest of 20 minutes in a heavy mash makes the beer sweet and dense. It is at this stage that the main emphasis is placed by brewers who make beer from malts with low diastatic activity, for example, pale.
The saccharification pause lasts about two hours because the enzymes need time to break down all the starch molecules, and these molecules are quite long. However, you should not take a long pause at the beginning of the range, as this will make the beer very dry and contain very little sugar. Working at a temperature of 66-67 degrees, enzymes form a moderately fermentable wort, which is the most popular among home brewers. Working around 68-70 degrees will produce a full-bodied, sweet beer without being too overbearing.
The saccharification pause is carried out at a temperature of 61-71 degrees, or, if a narrower range is needed, at 66-70 degrees. Small temperature surges in one or the other direction are allowed and do not affect the taste of the drink.
The better the saccharification stage is carried out, the more sugar there will be in the finished wort, and, therefore, the better the fermentation process will be. You can check the quality with an iodine test - take a drop of wort, drop it on a white plate, and then add a little alcohol solution of iodine, which is probably found in every home. If the iodine turns blue, it means that saccharification needs to be continued, and there is still a lot of starch in the wort. If the color has not changed and remains brown, then all the starch has turned into sugar.
Mash-out
Optional temperature pause of five minutes at 76-77 degrees. This pause allows you to achieve the desired fullness of taste of the beer. Filtered beer should not cool below this temperature. The mash-out pause allows you to reduce the viscosity of the wort and make the wort more liquid. From a purely technical point of view, this pause is convenient in that it increases the fluidity of the wort and, therefore, significantly speeds up the process of subsequent filtration.
Somehow about 8 months ago, on a warm September day, I wanted to hit it, my dear husband and I decided to brew our own beer - what to do, times are hard, the crisis, everything is going on, it’s time to switch to subsistence farming :)) And besides, in Belarus it’s still , alas, it is rare to find our beloved IPAs.
Therefore, saving drowning people is the work of the drowning people themselves. And the thing, that is, the beer, began to boil.
People who are “in the know” don’t laugh too much at the text, I tried :)
Here is the result - the penultimate bottle of the batch, opened after a painful (for us) 7 months of maturation. And the process was long, I would even say very long. Because, due to the lack of experience in brewing, we simply treated all production defects with aging. Sometimes this is said to help.
Since our capabilities were more than modest - a 30-liter saucepan (which, according to its Chinese manufacturer, was supposed to become the mother of moonshine, but something went wrong), we organized a technological process called “cooking in a bag”.
Bag in in this case there was a piece of organza fabric from the store, but some people successfully use old curtains for these purposes :)
The bag was boiled with water, and then we poured 6.1 kilos of Belarusian Pilsener malt into it with the addition of 0.44 kg of Melanoidin and Carared for a nice color. Total 7 kg of malt. Thanks to the guys from BrewTeam for customizing raw materials for us.
I wasn’t good at chemistry at school at all, but now I’ll show off my mathematical abilities :)
Hydraulic module(ratio of malt bill to water) should be 1/3 or 1/4 for light beer(for dark 1/2). Accordingly, we initially filled in 21 liters of water.
The volume of malt is taken to be approximately 0.7 to its weight, i.e. in our case 4.9 liters. (this is calculated so that excess volume does not pour into the mash, otherwise there will be trouble).
After mashing, the spent grain is removed, and it takes with it water in a volume of approximately 1-1.2 times the original weight of the malt.
It turned out that it will take 7-8.4 liters.
(Many brewers carry out all calculations on raw materials, processes and performance characteristics in BeerSmith program you can use it there ready-made recipes or contribute your own, and in general there are a lot of opportunities to practice various kinds of beer mathematics, but we are not looking for easy ways, I mainly counted manually and in online calculatorson that website .)
Formula for calculating rinsing water "from the reverse": define required quantity finished wort in the fermenter (we hoped for 24 liters).
To this volume we add:
- 1-2 l - bruch (sediment) at the bottom;
- the volume that will evaporate during the boiling of the wort (10-15%) - 3-4 l;
- the volume of water absorbed by the grain is 7-8.4 liters;
- non-drainable volume (here everything depends on the design of the mash) - everything that remains in the filter system and everything that your tap cannot reach - let’s say, 1 liter.
Total 36 liters.
We take away the initially poured water and get rinsing water (+ boiling water for topping up) - 15 liters.
We boiled a pot with this volume in reserve and took water from there to achieve pauses and rinse the spent grain.
But in fact, the losses turned out to be greater - it was necessary to take all values to the maximum, and not to the minimum.
I'm not much of a mathematician either :)
A small lyrical digression. The theory of mashing pauses.
In different sources, the temperature ranges and pause times are slightly different; to better understand their action, you need to actively train in practice, but also have a little knowledge of biochemistry.
All these alpha- and beta-amylases, not to mention glucanase, proteinase and peptidase, at first made me faint with just their name, so I wanted to urgently close the abstruse articles and give up the bad business.
But if you are still interested in who bites off which chain from whom, let’s talk about the principles of enzyme operation. I recommend!
Acid break(35-45 °C) - to lower the pH of the mash and reduce turbidity. This pause is relevant when using slightly modified malts, as well as unmalted malts - rye, wheat, oats.
When cooking wheat beer a pause at 45°C gives better aromatics (brings clove tones).
Protein break(44–59 °C) - to reduce turbidity (the lower the pause temperature, the greater the transparency). But it is believed that it is better to do it in the range of 56–58 °C (15-30 minutes) - this also reduces haze, but does not affect the foam formation or body of the beer, and reduces the viscosity of the mash. A protein pause in the lower temperature range can ruin the foam.
Temperature ranges for saccharification pause:
-- “dry”, “empty” body (lots of fermentable sugars - maltose, more alcohol in the output) is obtained when using low temperatures mashing 64.4-65.6°C;
-- medium body - at average temperatures (66-68°C);
-- dense malt body (lots of unfermentable sugars - dextrins) - at the top temperature conditions mashing (68.5-70°C).
We made only 2 pauses in the saccharification range in both brews, since now there is an opinion that modern malts are all highly modified (contain little protein), and a single pause mashing is enough for them. But adjusting the temperature many times by adding boiling water is still a chore.
But after reading the theory, we came to the conclusion that we’ll try to do a protein break during the third cooking, since we now have smart automation in our hands. Let it work :)
So, we mixed the malt well and left it to mash at 68°C for 60 minutes ( saccharification pause, or maltose). This is the most important part in making beer. And the most difficult one.
Taking the malt temperature to be 20°C, we calculated that to obtain an average pause of 68°C, the temperature of the mash water at grist should be about 75°C.
Since our conditions are more than artisanal, it was assumed that during this hour the temperature of the mash could drop, which is not good. Therefore, we carefully, like our own daughter, wrapped the saucepan in two blankets of respectable age.
An hour later, we carefully mixed our mash again, topped up hot water(about 80°C) to increase the overall temperature to 72°C ( post-saccharification) and left for 20 minutes. So we wanted to achieve some fullness (both ours and yours, so to speak).
But if you really need a dense beer with a malty taste, then you should reduce the time of the “lower” maltose pause (or remove it) and increase the time of the “top” (70-73°C).
During pauses, be sure to periodically stir the mash, this increases extractivity.
After a pause, saccharification is done iodine test, to find out whether all the grain starch has been broken down into sugars.
To do this, drop a few drops of iodine onto a surface, preferably white, and add wort very close by. The drops mix, and if the liquid acquires a blue-violet hue, the pause must be extended.
After several brews, as they gain experience, some brewers do not do an iodine test, but simply taste the spent grain - if it is neutral, everything is ok, if it is sweet, the pause needs to be extended.
Our spent grain was tasteless, but the iodine test was correct. It's time to wrap things up.
Then we added hot water again, raising the temperature of the mash to 75.5-76 degrees for 15 minutes. This process is called mash out (enzyme inactivation).
Mash out temperature range is 75-78°C.
After that, we took out the spent grain in the bag and started making it hot water rinsing(filtration). The temperature during filtration should not drop below the mash out temperature, otherwise the enzymes will continue their work in the collected wort.
It is believed that when the overall temperature of the mash rises to 80°C and above, there is a risk of tannins being washed out, which subsequently leads to headaches after consumption (I was happy that a way had been found to completely get rid of the hangover, and you can abuse it as much as you like, but no) .
We hung the bag on my brand new tripod, let the wort drain, lightly (!) squeezed it out, and washed the spent grain as best we could with the rest of the stored water.
As you can see, we got a lot of wort - 27 liters.
We measured the initial density - it turned out to be 1059 (it should have been at least 1050).
It's time to start cooking.
We loaded this bandura onto the stove (not without incidents; already during the lifting process we spilled a liter of precious wort:), waited with trepidation for it to boil, and the process began...
We brewed it for a total of 90 minutes (inspired by the American DogFish 90 Minute IPA). Imperial, of course, didn’t work out, and it couldn’t have - the initial density was too low, but definitely more boiled away than the initially planned 3 liters.
We aimed for a vigorous boil, since the DMS evaporates in the process ,
which gives very undesirable tastes and smells of boiled corn in beer, sauerkraut(Fu Fu Fu).
The calculations take into account that 10-15% boils away during cooking, but in practice it varies, it depends on many conditions, even on the temperature and humidity of the surrounding air.
It gurgles a lot!
While we were cooking, Aleska ran past, whom her alcoholic parents had sent her to play alone with empty bottles and invent her own entertainment for the whole evening.
Well, she came up with the idea of playing a fashion show))) Where would a modern young lady be without some extravagance.
Next we have one of the most important events for hopheads - hopping.
We, like all novice fans of American styles, did not skimp on the hops, but on the contrary, we filled them with all the conceivable flaws of the technical process. As a result, the IBU turned out to be as much as 115, and the bitterness was somewhat excessive.
But we didn’t draw the right conclusions and during the next boiling the hops swelled even more. The result is so-so.
By the way, I read that in America there were 2 main schools of brewing: East Coast IPA and West Coast IPA.
The East Bank brews a balanced malt and hop beer, while the West Bank brews an aggressively hopped beer with minimal body. So far we are clearly gravitating towards the Wild Wild West, but it’s time to master the balance, otherwise you won’t be able to get enough hops with the current shortage of Americans on the market and, accordingly, the harsh prices for them.
Our scheme for adding hops (minutes of addition are counted from the end of boiling):
60 minutes - 40g Citra for bitterness
45 minutes - 40g Citra (bitterness/taste)
15 minutes - 60g Amarillo (flavor/aroma)
At the zero minute for aroma, we did not add hops, as we planned the so-called. dry hopping.
In the future, we want to reduce the bitterness of the hops, shift most of them to later hopping, and, of course, leave the dry ones too.
A glass, by the way, from the craft beer festival in Riga" Metenis"and already died the death of the brave.
In the first brew we used only American hops, p.ch. We read that this makes the beer more “American” and has a nobler bitterness.
In the second brew, they decided to cheat a little and added Magnum first, and in vain - it gave a very rough astringent aftertaste. Redneck is punishable)). In addition, it has a high alpha acidity, and it gives off bitterness. Be healthy, you should not use it fanaticism.
To clarify the wort, Irish moss is added at the end of boiling, but we have not tried it yet.
So, the beer was brewed and went to the bathroom to freeze.
At the beginning of cooling it is recommended to do whirlpool- i.e. strongly spin the hot wort (T=80 °
) and further cool this whirlpool.
We didn't have a chiller, we just had to cool it down cold water. It's pretty slow.
Why is the saucepan covered with film? To avoid contact of the wort with an unwashed bathtub and unsterile environment as much as possible.
Here we need to dwell on the pain of all home brewers - sanitation. As long as the wort has a temperature above 60 degrees, no microorganisms or wild yeast he is not afraid. But as soon as it begins to cool down, a non-illusory danger of infection appears, and it (danger!) really poisoned the process for us. How we disinfected all the devices we used, how many cans of iodine we transferred, and still with such an imperfect technological process there is always a chance of infection, and we were preparing for the inglorious death of our brainchild in the toilet :)
At a temperature of 25-30 degrees, you can pour it into a fermenter (fermentation container) and pitch the yeast. I didn’t take pictures of this process, because I was afraid to even breathe again so as not to shake the terrible contaminated air :))
We carried out the overflow through silicone hose from the dropper, since our saucepan does not have a tap. It was inconvenient and nervous, in the end we stirred up the bruh at the bottom, and a whole heap of wort did not overflow, but went into the toilet.
Now I think that pouring out such a product is the last thing, you could filter it at least through cheesecloth, boil it and pour it into a fermenter, or at worst, freeze it and then use it as a primer for carbonation or a starter for fermenting yeast (which is what I actually did with the remains of the wort after the new boil).
By the way, about yeast. We used dry ales, which are very common in our penates. Safale US-05, suitable for American styles. In general, a lot depends on yeast, I didn’t even know before that each style needs its own yeast, how much progress has come.
There are two ways to add dry yeast - simply scattering it from a bag over a foamy head (and there should be a head, since the overflow is done from a certain height - for the aeration necessary in this process) or rehydrating the yeast in advance.
Both methods are actively used, each has pros and cons.
But there are also liquid yeast, and also in brewing it is practiced to take already used yeast from the fermenter and, provided proper storage use them several times and develop new generations based on them - that’s all for us for now aerobatics. What a field for savings!
In general, as it turns out, brewing is a science for a well-rounded person, so study, children, at school, and don’t be a fool - you never know where life will take you! If you need to navigate biochemistry when mashing, then microbiology comes into play when it comes to yeast.
The first three articles are for very curious nerds, this one is simpler.
Important Note: Use full malt wort to prepare the starter. The starter should consist of maltose, not simple sugars. Yeast that fed big amount simple sugars, they stop producing enzymes capable of breaking down maltose, the main sugar in beer wort. Yeast easily learns to be lazy, and this leads to the fact that we end up with unfermented beer.
We pitch dry yeast, but I see an obvious advantage of rehydration in that the yeast enters the fermenter already “awakened” and immediately begins its work, absorbing oxygen, releasing CO2, lowering the pH of the wort and thereby reducing the risk of reproduction of “savages” that have entered the tank. .
A rapid decrease in pH also promotes lightening.
Well, if the yeast doesn’t wake up, then this is also clear in advance, and you don’t have to worry about whether it will ferment or not for another day.
In addition, all this helps to combat under-seeding, which is especially important for us.
Therefore, we will most likely rehydrate in the future :)
Due to the difficulties of pouring into the fermenter, we got a very meager volume, about 15 liters, while we were counting on 22-24. Sadness( 
An important point - fermentation temperature.
Top-fermenting yeast works best at 15-25°C. At the upper limit of temperature, fermentation proceeds faster, but the yeast does not have time to utilize its waste, and the taste and aroma are rougher (this is the sin of commercial breweries, especially cheap ones). We tried to maintain a temperature of 18-20°C, and it wouldn’t have risen even higher in the off-season and lack of heating, but lower it’s easy :)) But then the beer ferments longer.
Water seal in operation.
On the 8th day we did dry hopping, but in fact it should be done 5-7 days before bottling, i.e. at the very end of fermentation, and we were in a hurry. The overall aroma was not bad, but it could probably have been stronger.
Of our two hops, Citra has citrus aroma(and the name hints at this), and Amarillo is floral and fruity, but Citra is a much stronger hop. So when dry hopping we added 40g Amarillo and 20g Citra. Nevertheless, in fact, fruits/citruses dominate, and “flowers” are not particularly noticeable.
Dry hopping is another homebrewer's threshold that carries an increased risk of contamination from mold spores, bacteria, and wild yeast.
We threw in hops without any bags or disinfection with vodka/alcohol. After hopping, the beer suddenly began to ferment more actively, and we still didn’t understand whether we had a slight contamination or whether it was just CO2 that began to escape more actively from contact with the hops.
Our IPA fermented for a month in total. We did not pour for secondary fermentation, because... firstly, we did not have additional capacity, and secondly, modern sources doubt its necessity. Plus this is also an additional possibility of infection.
Both methods - both with and without overflow to the secondary - continue to be used, and the choice of each of them has also already become the subject of a holivar :)
But finally the hour has come... Day bottling.
The last chance for a brewer to infect his beer with quality :) And, it seems to me, we didn’t waste it)))
Although Misha worked for a long time and stubbornly inside with a brush, then we filled the bottles with soda solution up to the neck, and just before bottling we wiped the necks with alcohol (not ours, but the bottles!).
Significant bottling process
It was supposed to happen in bottles carbonization(saturation of young beer with carbon dioxide), for which we added a primer made from glucose syrup to each bottle (it is preferable to use it than sugar).
Fermentation in these bottles extra sugars increases total alcohol by about 0.5 degrees.
Calculation required quantity carbonation primer different varieties we did it in an online calculator.
For 14 liters of beer we needed 80.6 g of glucose and 140 ml of water (at the rate of 5 ml per 0.5 liter).
Estimated CO2 level for American ales according to the table in online calculator - 2,2-2,7.
We chose the value 2.3 (at T=20 g), because for IPA, the carbonation needs to be rather low, and we were afraid that the bottles might get bombed :))
And finally, capping. For these purposes, Misha ordered a special device in the Czech Republic and a set of crown caps.
One of the bottles was plastic to give some control over the carbonation process. When pouring into plastic, the bottle is specially squeezed a little to release the air, and if everything is ok, then after a few days it is inflated to the limit and becomes hard as a stone. This is what happened :) But before that, we periodically selflessly shook the old bottles to persuade the remaining yeast to work a little more.
Carbonation takes about 7-10 days, then it begins maturation. In total, our beer stood at room temperature, and then continued in the refrigerator (ideally, ripening should be carried out at a temperature of 11-14 ° C, but we don’t have a basement).
The first sample was taken a month after the spill. In general, the lower the ripening temperature, the longer the process should take place, but you shouldn’t speed it up with hot conditions either.
The taste and aroma of the first bottle were satisfactory, but it was interesting to see how things developed after longer aging.
Some of the bottles went to a group tasting of homebrewers and Beer Bros after a 2-month wait, and many of them showed signs of contamination. Others were quite good, from which we concluded that the process of washing the bottles did not go perfectly :).
The final density was intended to be as much as 1017 (should be 1010-1012) even after a month of fermentation. It looks like there was some poor growth, possibly due to under-seeding. Or is it a measurement error with a refractometer.
(In the second cooking, by the way, the final picture is the same).
However, the taste was noted as being overly dry, either due to mashing issues or wild yeast.
The beer turned out to be quite strong - the calculated alcohol content, taking into account the glucose added for carbonation, was 6.2%, IBU 115. Formally, we were in style.
Alcohol calculator
We named our beer first-born (I remember Bender from Futurama with his BenderBrau) without these craft perversions of yours, briefly and clearly - " Pershae"- here it is in Untappd.
The penultimate bottle was opened after 7 months of aging (yes, after so much time you won’t be tempted - it’s just an excellent aging, I’m brushing!), and I must say that in our perception the beer has improved its taste characteristics - the bitterness and body seemed to be rounded and became a little more balanced :)
The foam is also quite durable.
The smell is more or less noble, fruity and slightly citrusy, but there is still something foreign, maybe herbaceous. True, I’m not particularly good at the subtleties of tasting; I can’t find shades of araucaria or casuarina, even if you shoot :))
Well, we decided to let the last copy sit for a year as an experiment and see what it turns into. We're still waiting.
Head brewer "Pahonya_HB" tasting what his playful hands have created :))
The process of artisanal brewing in a bag itself turned out to be painfully labor-intensive, there were failures both in terms of sanitation and in the efficiency of cooking, not to mention our epic overflow to fermentation.
I’m generally silent about the economic effect - well, you understand, it wasn’t possible to save money :))
But it’s interesting - creepy!
Therefore, after this experience, we uncovered the “coffins” and purchased an automatic brewer - a Russian clone of Braumeister, which we had already tried - with it beer production became incomparably simpler and more enjoyable, but more on that some other time :)
Reading the BeersFun.ru Forum gave us a lot of valuable information, and there are plenty of educational articles there. True, it takes a lot of time to read everything :))
Mashing malt for beer is one of the most complex processes and perhaps the most important home brewing. It is he who forms the basis on which our future beer - wort - will be based. It can be avoided by using ready-made ones, but such freedom in choosing a recipe and such opportunities to influence the final taste of the product is only given by grain brewing, which cannot be done without mashing. It is connected with this that usually grain brewing inevitably becomes the next step in the evolution of the brewer after extract brewing, which has to be done despite all the difficulties, financial and time costs. Also, to carry out mashing, certain knowledge is needed, especially in the theory of so-called temperature pauses. This will be discussed in this article.
Mashing malt- This is the process of preparing beer wort, in which the ground is mixed with water and kept at certain temperatures. This is done to activate various enzymes in order to break down glucans, starches and proteins. The activity of various enzymes depends on temperature, and they need a certain time to complete their tasks. This is related to the need for temperature breaks. The exact duration of all temperature pauses depends on the beer recipe and the type of malt. In total, there are 4 types of temperature pauses:
1.Acid break(35-45°C, 15-70 minutes). It is named so because during the acid break the pH of the mash decreases to the desired values. True, a noticeable reduction in acidity is achieved only after 60 minutes of cooking, and even when using modern and various additives to water that can affect the pH, this is no longer necessary. Therefore, this pause is often ignored by brewers.
But in addition to reducing acidity, these temperatures also destroy glucans, which turn the mash into a paste. Most glucans are found in rye, wheat, oats and lightly modified malts, and when using such ingredients, it is advisable to pause for 15 minutes. Glucans are known to be responsible for cloudiness in beer.
2.Protein break(44-59°C, 10-15 minutes). At these temperatures, protein breakdown occurs. This has a beneficial effect on foaming and the stability of beer foam, and also increases the extract of the wort. It is worth noting that two enzymes are involved in this pause.
At a temperature of 44-50°C, proteases work, breaking down proteins into amino acids, which will subsequently be nutrients for yeast.
And at a temperature of 50-59°C, other proteases break down the protein into substances that promote beer clarity and foam formation.
3.Saccharification(61-72°C, 50-120 minutes). A key pause for any type (degree of modification), which cannot be avoided. It is responsible for converting starch into the sugar needed for fermentation, which is reflected in its name.
This pause also involves two enzymes (alpha-amylase and beta-amylase). They also operate at slightly different temperatures and have different effects on the final product.
At 61-67°C beta-amylase is activated, the longer this enzyme works, the drier and stronger the beer. A fairly long pause is required (about two hours) for the enzyme to work completely and produce a fairly dry beer.
When the temperature rises to 68-72°C, another enzyme comes into action - alpha-amylase. It forms unfermentable sugars that form the body of the beer, making the beer sweet, but the alcohol level in the beer will be lower because the concentration of sugars suitable for the yeast to be processed into alcohol is reduced.
4.Meshout or mash-out(77-79°C, 5 minutes). Not quite a temperature pause in the definition that we gave above, since during it the work of enzymes does not take place, but on the contrary, it serves to stop it. Performed before washing the malt to reduce the viscosity of the wort and increase the filtration rate, which is especially important in cases where the mash and boiling of the wort is carried out in various containers and the wort must be drained from the mash. Rinse water should be used at the same temperature to prevent the enzymes from continuing to work. And at temperatures above 80°C, tannins will begin to form in the wort, which makes the taste astringent.
Very popular, especially among novice brewers, is o dnopause mashing(66-67°C, approximately 60 minutes). This method is suitable for modified malt and varieties without special malts such as rye and wheat. It will be especially convenient for brewers who do not have automated equipment and will allow them to obtain beer of moderate strength with a noticeable body. This is achieved by keeping the temperature in the range in which both enzymes responsible for saccharification work at equal strength.
And I need to say a few words about the modification of malt, namely, that the majority are modified. This means that most of the glucan and protein have already been destroyed and to obtain good wort It is enough just to convert the starch into sugars. Modification of malt is carried out at the malt house and does not involve any negative consequences for human health or beer quality. All this makes the use of such malt preferable and allows you to omit a significant part of the temperature pauses, which will significantly reduce the cooking time and simplify the process.
The topic of mashing and temperature pauses can be discussed in more detail on our forum.
And it makes no sense to fake it. The production process itself seems very simple, almost “just add water”, and the rest nature will handle itself.
- Can't be! - you say, but partly it is true. Brewers, in essence, simply create favorable conditions for the occurrence of all natural processes: grain dissolution, disinfection, further ripening.
Thus, in order to dissolve grain substances, it is necessary to maintain a certain water temperature, and over time it must change with pauses.
Mixing the ground grain with water at the right temperature to dissolve the extract is called mashing. So what are the mash temperature rests for beer?
Any grain contains a set of enzymes that are activated at a temperature specific to each one. Why is it so difficult? The answer is simple, sugars are “encrypted” in the form of a long starch molecule. This molecule is “hidden” in granules, and the granules are in protein shells that are located under the aleurone layer of the grain. All this is “stored” under layers of films and outer shells of the grain, protecting it from external influences.
In this case, water acts as an energy carrier; it penetrates through the shells, activating enzymes in the aleurone layer, which “clear” the path of the liquid to the protein shells. At this stage, enzymes activated by water are “connected”, which ensure the breakdown of protein and open the way to starch granules. When exposed to water, starch granules swell and burst, providing access to the “holy of holies” – starch. Water, as a source of life, awakens the grain from hibernation, stage by stage it starts physical and chemical processes in the grain in order to achieve the complete and unconditional breakdown of the starch molecule into sugars. Temperature pauses during mashing for beer are important here.
- – Does grain destroy itself when exposed to water?
- - Yes.
- - For what?
- – To break down starch into sugars.
- - Why?
- – Because sugars are a source of nutrition for the future sprout, and the brewer, in turn, uses them for his needs. Therefore, grain contains enzymes, like the locks of closed doors, and the key is temperature and the duration of temperature pauses.
Such a long introduction will make it possible to understand the reasons for the processes occurring during mashing and the immediate meaning of gradual temperature pauses.
Now let's talk about how you can regulate the composition of wort sugars and the taste of the finished beer with temperature pauses.
The first stage is the breakdown of polysaccharides of grain films and its protein structures. Optimal temperature these processes begin from 35-37 C° . Water at this temperature penetrates the shell structures and activates the cytolytic enzymes of the grain, triggering the splitting mechanism.
Why 35-37 C°? This is the specificity of their action. The films contain starch, but of a different structure. Enzymes break it down into polysaccharides, which are not always desirable in beer because they increase the drink's astringency level, color, and viscosity.
Currently, this pause is practically not used, since grain films become quite permeable even at the malting stage. This happened thanks to the modernization of malting technology and the use of new agronomic techniques in the cultivation of barley.
At this temperature, lipoxygenase enzymes are also active. These are fat-soluble enzymes. They release fat that is located in the fetus. He uses it as fuel to grow. During the brewing process, fat is harmful because it oxidizes and imparts unwanted flavors to the beer.
This pause can only be found in classic recipes. Czech beer with decoctions, but we'll talk about that later.
Further heat the mash to a temperature of 45-55 C°. At this moment, the proteolytic enzymes of the grain are activated. They break down its protein structures. Cell walls and connective tissue consist of protein molecules, and inside the grain there is a protein that is completely susceptible to dissolution.
Proteolytic enzymes of grain are specific; each acts on a protein structure strictly defined for it. The result of this “activity” are peptides, polypeptides, as well as soluble protein and free nitrogen. Polypeptides in beer are the building blocks for foam, and free nitrogen and soluble protein provide nutrition for growth and development. Also, the presence of dissolved protein can have a positive effect on the fullness of taste.
So, the water has already “reached” the starch, heat it to 62-65 C°. This temperature pause during mashing for beer is very important and the longest. At these temperatures, a complex of enzymes associated with protein breakdown operates. The main role during this pause is given to the action of beta-amylase. As mentioned earlier, the starch molecule is a long chain of branched molecules. Beta-amylase destroys it, leaving large molecules of maltodextrins amylose and amylopectin, which no longer give the iodine staining characteristic of starch. These molecules are already sugars, but they are too large and inedible for. The maximum activity of the enzyme at this temperature is approximately 30 minutes, but if you increase its duration, the reaction rate will slow down, but will not stop.
Beta amylase prepares the “soil” for alpha amylase . In this case, we heat the mash to 71-73 C°, activating it. Alpha amylase acts on the starch molecules at the edges, breaking off small pieces of mono-, di-, tri-sugars. Highest value has the resulting disaccharide maltose.
Maltose is the main source of nutrition for beer; the more of it, the stronger and richer the beer will be. The amount of maltose depends on the initial amount of maltodextrins on which alpha-amylase acts, as well as on the duration of the reactions, that is, the longer we allow amylases to act on starch, the more sugars we get, and the greater the yield of extract the brewer will get.
To summarize, we see that Brewers use three main temperature breaks when mashing for beer. This:
- protein 45-55 C°;
- maltose 62-65 C°;
- and saccharification 72-77 C°.
The maximum mashing temperature for beer is 78 C°. At this temperature, the action of enzymes stops due to their destruction. Therefore, if the brewer wants to prolong the digestion processes, he should not exceed this level.
However, they are not always available highest quality, in turn, low-quality grains contain few active enzymes, therefore, even after standing for a considerable time at all required temperatures mash, it will be under-sugared. In this case, enzyme preparations can be used.
These are the same enzymes, but obtained as a result of the vital activity of fungal microorganisms. In this way, all types of enzymes are synthesized, which different stages break down starch. What can I say, human saliva contains a complex of amylases that break down starch.
Such enzyme preparations are often heat-stable; when using them, there is no need for strict adherence to temperature pauses and their duration. They help break down even the starch of unmalted grains, helping the brewer achieve his desired extract yield.
What's the matter? Why does one beer have a dry aftertaste, while another tastes sweet? The secret lies in the duration of exposure of the enzymes at the selected temperatures.
The ideal jam is one where everything is split. It is unlikely that we would drink such beer, because it would not have foam, it would have a dark color, like old beer, it would be very strong, dry, and sour. Exactly because of this reason protein break so short - up to 20 minutes, because it is necessary that the peptides for the foam remain. In some cases, it is skipped altogether.
The maltose pause is from 30 to 60 minutes, so that there is not too much dextrins, and the saccharification pause is reduced to 20 minutes, so that all the dextrins do not have time to break down into maltose.
It all depends on the preferences of the brewer, the quality of the raw materials used, and the chosen style of drink. If the raw materials are of very high quality, then with short temperature pauses a large amount of starch can break down. In this case, it is recommended to reduce the duration of pauses or, in general, eliminate some of them.
If the brewer is using unmalted grain, he will increase the maltose rest to the limit to ensure saccharification is successful. Well, if you need to brew beer for diabetics, you should ensure more content difficult to ferment dextrins, after reading this article you already have an idea of what to do in this situation.
Choosing your beer's mash temperature rests is fundamental to creating the best beer. If you still have questions, be sure to ask them at
Most new all-grain and extract brewers start with a one-step infusion mash. The process consists of heating water to a certain temperature, slightly above the target temperature, and then adding crushed grain. If the calculations were done correctly, the temperature of the resulting mash is usually in the range of 64.4-68.9°C. At this temperature, a combination of alpha and beta amylases breaks down the high molecular weight complex sugars found in barley into simple sugars, which are easily fermented. Temperature changes also affect the body of the resulting beer. This process usually takes from 30 to 90 minutes. To maintain temperature, a cooler or insulated vat is often used, as well as more complex systems using a recirculation pump and heating element. At the end of the mashing process, the mash is flushed with hot water through the grain bed and filter device to separate the hot wort, and the resulting wort is then boiled.
Multi-step mashing, history of the issue
In a multi-step mash, pauses are made at different temperatures, usually in a sequence from lower to higher. high temperatures, until a temperature of 63.9-69.9 ° C is reached, at which complex sugars are broken down, and then decantation is done. In earlier times, multi-step mashing was standard, but has largely been abandoned in modern brewing. Historically, the use of multi-step mashing was driven by the need to create enzymes optimal conditions to improve the process of hydrolysis of starches. Before the processes of malting and roasting were well understood, most malts were, as we now say, unmodified. As a result, they had relatively low enzyme content and additional steps were required to improve their performance.
Here are some typical steps (also called pauses) used in multi-step mashing, along with their formal description:
- Phytase or acid rest 30-52.2°C – slightly lowers the pH level of the mash. Lowering the pH has a number of benefits, but the phytase rest is rarely used by modern brewers because there are other ways to control the pH of the mash.
- Cytolytic pause 35-44.4°C – helps increase the solubility of starches, for some malts increases extract. Beta Glucanase Rest 35-45°C – Breaks down sticky high molecular weight starches, which improves consistency and extraction rates, especially for high protein mashes and adjuncts such as wheat.
- Protein rest 45-55°C – produces free amino nitrogen, which improves fermentation.
Do you need to use a multi-step mash?
If you are using sufficient quantity modern light malt, most styles of beer do not require a multi-step mash. Modern base malts have very high diastatic strength ( high content enzymes), and this makes the use of traditional multi-step mashing unnecessary. 95% of the time when brewing most styles of beer, a single mash step is sufficient. The only exception that comes to mind is if you are working with a mash that contains a large percentage of unmalted constituents, such as raw grains, unmalted wheat, or a large percentage of non-traditional grains. . In such cases, it may be necessary to apply a suitable rest period to prepare or gelatinize the grain constituents, or switch to using prepared/gelatinized ingredients instead. For example, you can use torrefied, or crimped, wheat or barley instead of untreated. Can be applied cereals instant cooking instead of raw oats. Preliminary processing, flattening or torrefaction of unmalted grains allows them to be used in one-step mashing.
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