Mash n' Ferment!

That's certainly one for the Brulosophy crew..... Interesting all the same..

Gerryjo said:

That's certainly one for the Brulosophy crew..... Interesting all the same..

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I think we already know what they'd say:
Only 7 (p=0.64) made the accurate selection, indicating participants in this xBmt were unable to reliably distinguish a beer fermented with the grains left in the fermenter from one with the grain removed.

Right you buggers! Rain is forecasted all day tomorrow (Saturday) so I won't be going down to London to see the Trooping of the Colours. Campervan passed it's MOT this afternoon, so I won't be working on that. An All Grain..... (wait for it please)... fermenting All Grain, brew is on the cards for tomorrow morning... watch this space! I have the ingredients.... I have the enthusiasm.... I have a strong beer inside of me!... Roll on tomorrow!

Gulpitdarn said:

Right you buggers! Rain is forecasted all day tomorrow (Saturday) so I won't be going down to London to see the Trooping of the Colours. Campervan passed it's MOT this afternoon, so I won't be working on that. An All Grain..... (wait for it please)... fermenting All Grain, brew is on the cards for tomorrow morning... watch this space! I have the ingredients.... I have the enthusiasm.... I have a strong beer inside of me!... Roll on tomorrow!

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Whole hearted determination.....

Isn't that the way they brew in some places in Africa? But that is actually for immediate consumption. I suppose the brewers (which are mostly women), always have an active starter on hand, so that it is fermented in the morning, and can then be sold on the market. It is something that I saw once on television.

Go for it, my boy. You might consider making a full-volume mash, mashing at normal temperature, sticking the hops in, raising temperature to approaching 80C to denature enzymes and kill most of bugs, cooling naturally and pitching when it reaches 30C or so. Strain into secondary after a week (or strain through teeth and cut out secondary altogether). Let us know how you get on.

I'm oddly fascinated by this, give us an update @Gulpitdarn

Me too. While doing my weekly mopping out of the cowshed (kitchen) I'm mulling over protein rests, making up a mash of normal thickness and chilling it with aerated and chilled water to oxygenate the wort (Half a big PET of clean water well shaken, squeeze air out, let air in and repeat a couple of times), or even making a hefeweissen version, since it'll probably be cloudy anyway!

I reckon that if you were to put out a challenge, Gulpitdarn, you might have a few takers!

Now that I have a clear head this morning, I'm wondering what I've got myself into, but, as I've nothing else planned for today, I'm keeping to my word and going to have a go, in a few minutes as a matter of fact!

The plan... Going to keep it simple and based on a SMaSH, a single malt, (Maris Otter 2kg) and single hops, (East Kent Goldings 20g) 10 Litres of Tesco Ashbeck natural mineral water. Mash grains high at 70*C in 6 litres of water for an hour, sparge with 4 litres then remove grains to one side while wort is boiled for half an hour, adding 10g hops at start of boil and remaining 10g at end. After boil add grains back to wort when switched off, and quickly cool down to 20*C, adding 4g yeast. All then transferred into a 2 gallon glass jar for observation. Porridge is now left to brew!

Photos to follow later...

I've mashed as normal and sparged wort at approx 80C and done a few different things with it in the past. A few times I've soured with LAB from various sources (probiotics, yoghurt) without great temperature control therefore it took an age to sour and a few (1 in 3?) started to show very minor signs of fermentation by day 5. They were relatively clean.

Other times I used grain with similar results and though the grain tends to be more aggressive in souring the risk of fermentation was about the same (1 in 3) the one time it did I got 5 points of fermentation by day 5. This was much more wild tasting.

Other times I've used co2 purging, high temperatures (40-44C) and bacteria from similar sources including grain. These were much cleaner and quicker and didn't show signs of fermentation because there is no day 5 business, souring is done by day 3. Grain souring can be relatively clean if you keep the temperatures in the range that encourage and promote LAB.

In all cases these worts were boiled and hopped before a regular fermentation. What is happening is the 80C sparge is enough to somewhat pasteurise the wort. I believe the phrase is to not eliminate, but reduce the presence of unwanted microorganisms to a statistically insignificant amount. By adding back the ones I want and controlling the environment I get the outcome I want before what survived the sparge produces too many off flavours. In the case of the grain souring I'm relying on the environment and the desirable organisms thus outcompeting the undesirable ones, but in all cases without boiling it as soon as I'm happy with it the end result would be an unpalatable progressing spoilage.

Back to the OP. If you mash in and don't reach a high enough temperature to kill off a significant enough quantity of the wild yeast and bacteria present on the grain you'll find that it starts to sour and eventually ferment. If you can keep it hot and prevent oxygen ingress you'll favour LAB and it'll sour, dissuade enteric bacteria and yeast and you are basically sour mashing which is a thing. If it gets too cold then you'll favour enteric bacteria, yeast, it might pull a vacuum as it chills allowing further contaminants to access it and it'll get gross. Mould is very common in the presence of oxygen.

The chances of mashing, allowing the mash to cool to fermentation temperature and letting it ferment out and getting something delicious is really really low. You've also the issue of the yeast doing the work having to grow up in the mash extending the window for which things get weird and most likely mouldy.

If you have these wonderful ideas it is sometimes worth figuring out what goals you are trying to hit here. If it is about making an otherwise clean brew, but fermenting using the yeast present on the grain it is better to culture up some grain, streak it out on plates, select yeast colonies, check you've achieved a monoculture, propagate up this yeast, perform fermentation trials, proceed to a full size batch. That way you've reached your goal, but not by rolling dice again and again to get there. If it was to make something a bit weird and funky you'd probably be better performing a sour mash, sparging and boiling and fermenting as usual with a known yeast. You'd have the flavour impact of the sour mash, but a reliable outcome. If you wanted to grain sour, you could just grain sour, the choice to boil afterwards is yours, but I certainly would if my bacteria source was grain.

I don't always boil my sours any more, especially if the bacteria source was clean. I am happy to consider a hot sparge as pasteurisation and sour under controlled conditions. Once enough yeast is in there and working everything else is outcompeted and the alcohol, low pH, co2 and maybe a dry hop do the rest. It is a bit more risky, they always taste a little more cheesy than my super clean boiled sours, but still beer.

For my clean sours I mash, sparge, boil, sour, boil, ferment. First boil is based on DMS potential of the grist and if I intend to use copper finings so 5 - 30 minutes. Second boil depends on hopping and evaporation goals so can be as long as an hour, but usually is just 15 minutes to sterilise.

All done! Pitched at 24*C Original Gravity reading 1.064 Just got to let it do its job now.

Sadfield said:

Isovaleric acid, IIRC from Lactobacillus consuming sugars in the presence of oxygen. The OPs mash should be hot enough to at least pasteurise everything, so any contamination should be reduced as long as fermentation takes off.

As you say, I'd expect some astringency and husky, grain flavours. Probably, some phenolic notes and a slight Yoghurt tang.

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Cheers, Sadfield! These will make excellent notes for the label, when this does grow to be a commercially successful beer.

So - " A vague, yet transient astringency and almost husky grain flavours. Ephemeral and phenolic notes, complemented on a sophisticated level, by a slight Yoghurt tang". Sure fire winner.

But I would do at most one gallon first, because it is actually not a great sounding idea.

Sometimes you guys totally lose me.

My recent imperial stout had a similar level of trub.

Whilst this is a great thread and I love the spirit, you are aware that grain has bacillus serious, botchalism and other nasty spores on them - which is why we boil. (Apologies for spelling)
Egyptians used to ferment on the grain, BUT, they cooked the grain as a course bread before adding water and letting it do its thing.

Nicks90 said:

Egyptians used to ferment on the grain, BUT, they cooked the grain as a course bread before adding water and letting it do its thing.

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Surely, that was to achieve conversion of starches into sugar. People have, and still are, happily making ales without boiling.

A 60 minute mash in the mid 60's °c will reduce bacteria to safe levels in the same way it does when pasteurising milk, etc.

Generally speaking, the acidity and alcohol of post fermentation will see off harmful bacteria.

Interesting development over night, although not yet started fermenting, (I have cling film held with elastic band around the top) The grains have completely moved from bottom of jar to top, there is also evidence of white shoots growing (on surface, see photo). I have an uneasy feeling that if and when fermenting does take place the bubbles and Krausen will try to push that raft of grains right out of jar.

Preparations are now in place for a messy brew!

Very interesting. You might think about using a tea strainer or spoon and colander to take the grains out before the head drops. They've got to come out some time!

I tell you what... it is immensely interesting. If I don't get to drink this stuff I'll have enjoyed just watching it work in the jar. Been watching it the last few mins and there is very slow movement in there, bit too cool out here in the shed (17.9*C) but it'll warm up during the day, usually gets to around 21*. I've not really given much thought about removing grains at a later date but I reckon I'm going to lose a lot of nice delicious fermented wort in the process.