Beer Forum

I'm formulating a partial mash stout. I am getting the bulk of my fermentables from LME, but I plan on mashing 2.4lbs of specialty grains in the kettle because two of them are a light Munich (.25lb) and cooked steel cut oats (.25lb). I'm concerned that the Munich won't have the power to convert the oats since the other grains are crystal/chocolate/roasted barley and don't contribute to conversion.

According to the formula on this site: http://beersmith.com/blog/2010/01/04/di ... your-beer/
it seems like all of 2.4 lbs specialty grains mashed together will be too much for the enzymes available. Unfortunately, I already have all my grains crushed together except the oats, so mashing just the oats and Munich isn't an option. If it won't all convert I may not use the oats, but I was really hoping to use them.

Anyone have thoughts/experience with this? Thanks.

Since you are using such a small amount of oats (.25#) and it is in a stout, I wouldn't worry about it. Mash all the grains together as you have planned and carry on with your brew in a normal fashion. All will be fine. Now if you said you were using 1-2# of oats in your recipe then I would think twice, but at such a small amount all will be good.

If you are concerned with it, you could always just toss a bit of 2-row in there with it (0.25-0.5lb) and you will have more than enough enzyme to do the job. Regular 2-row has so much diastatic power in it that you wouldn't need much at all to give you plenty enzyme no matter what you did.

+1 to both. You should be fine, but if you are losing sleep over it, just add another 1/4 lb of pilsner malt or 2 row to it to bump it up.
Your gravity won't be affected very much (you'll get maybe about 1.25 extra gravity points on your FG) and you won't notice the flavor addition.

HTH-

(at 70% efficiency, 32oz of grain boosts a 5 gallon wort by 10 points. So, at 70% efficiency with 4 oz, 10*4/32 = 1.25 points).

BDawg wrote:+1 to both. You should be fine, but if you are losing sleep over it, just add another 1/4 lb of pilsner malt or 2 row to it to bump it up.
Your gravity won't be affected very much (you'll get maybe about 1.25 extra gravity points on your FG) and you won't notice the flavor addition.

HTH-

(at 70% efficiency, 32oz of grain boosts a 5 gallon wort by 10 points. So, at 70% efficiency with 4 oz, 10*4/32 = 1.25 points).

Thanks to everyone for putting this in perspective for me. It slowly dawned on me that I was worried about converting a very small amount of grains. I think I was worried about negative effects if the .25 lbs of oatmeal didn't convert. Haven't brewed in a while want this first batch to turn out good.

Not sure I'll have time to get more grains, but if I don't I won't sweat it as much now.

I appreciate the info. Cheers!

Grainadier wrote:

BDawg wrote:+1 to both. You should be fine, but if you are losing sleep over it, just add another 1/4 lb of pilsner malt or 2 row to it to bump it up.
Your gravity won't be affected very much (you'll get maybe about 1.25 extra gravity points on your FG) and you won't notice the flavor addition.

HTH-

(at 70% efficiency, 32oz of grain boosts a 5 gallon wort by 10 points. So, at 70% efficiency with 4 oz, 10*4/32 = 1.25 points).

Thanks to everyone for putting this in perspective for me. It slowly dawned on me that I was worried about converting a very small amount of grains. I think I was worried about negative effects if the .25 lbs of oatmeal didn't convert. Haven't brewed in a while want this first batch to turn out good.

Not sure I'll have time to get more grains, but if I don't I won't sweat it as much now.

I appreciate the info. Cheers!

No problem. That will be $5 please .

...it should be 5 cents...
signed
Lucy VanPelt

brewinhard wrote:

Grainadier wrote:

BDawg wrote:+1 to both. You should be fine, but if you are losing sleep over it, just add another 1/4 lb of pilsner malt or 2 row to it to bump it up.
Your gravity won't be affected very much (you'll get maybe about 1.25 extra gravity points on your FG) and you won't notice the flavor addition.

HTH-

(at 70% efficiency, 32oz of grain boosts a 5 gallon wort by 10 points. So, at 70% efficiency with 4 oz, 10*4/32 = 1.25 points).

Thanks to everyone for putting this in perspective for me. It slowly dawned on me that I was worried about converting a very small amount of grains. I think I was worried about negative effects if the .25 lbs of oatmeal didn't convert. Haven't brewed in a while want this first batch to turn out good.

Not sure I'll have time to get more grains, but if I don't I won't sweat it as much now.

I appreciate the info. Cheers!

No problem. That will be $5 please .

Thought I would post that I brewed this yesterday and I was able to convert the cooked steel cut oats just fine with that amount of Munich. 2.5 gallons of water with 2.4lbs of grain at 152f for an hour with a kettle/bag. I used this water/grain ratio based on a BYO article I read. I'm used to a thicker mash when I did all grain, but this seemed to be fine.

Brewing is awesome, haven't done it in years. Thanks again for the info.