First all grain mash, no sugar, no enzymes

Many like to post about a first successful ferment (or first all grain mash), or first still built/bought or first good run of the still. Tell us about all of these great times here.
Pics are VERY welcome, we drool over pretty copper 8)

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Jstnwht
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Joined: Sat Apr 22, 2017 7:47 am

First all grain mash, no sugar, no enzymes

Post by Jstnwht »

So I've done two previous runs, the first using corn meal, barley and sugar, and was run quickly just to produce backset material to start sour mashing. My next run was flaked corn and crystal malt barley, sugar, and enzymes for conversion, which actually produce some drinkable alcohol.
This run is a continuation of that sour mash and is all grain, no added sugars or enzymes.
I used heated 3 gallons of water to 180 and stirred in 6 lbs of flaked corn, bringing the heat to around 165. I held it there stirring every 5 minutes for 1.5 hours, then stirred in 1lb of flaked rye. I continued to stir and held at temperature for another 1.5 hours.
By this time i had something thicker than mashed potatoes. I really like how the flaked grains were cooking the starches so far. I let the temperature drop to about 145 and then stirred in 1 lb of 6 row malted barley, and within about 10 minutes I noticed my 'mashed potatoes' turning soupy as the malt enzymes did their work. After another hour of holding at 145 and stirring consistently, when i was happy with the soupy consistency, i turned the heat up again again to 165 for another 1.5 hours, at this point when i could separate the wort from the grains, I noticed a syrupy consistency. I thought it was perfect, thick sugary liquid, so I let it cool just a bit, heated sparge water and began straining it into another pot and sparging to bring my total volume back up to 3 gallons. All in all, it took about 8 hours. I let it sit overnight to cool down, and first thing in the morning activated in slightly warmed wort liquid, and pitched a strain of whiskey yeast I picked up from my local brew shop.
Well, I set an alarm for work this morning, but it was the bubbling of the carboy that actually woke me up!
Cheers!
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Fart Vader
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Joined: Wed Feb 10, 2016 2:34 pm
Location: Canada eh!

Re: First all grain mash, no sugar, no enzymes

Post by Fart Vader »

Sounds like you're up and running right out of the gate.
Also seems that you have been doing the mandatory reading.
Congratulations.
My double walled boiler build: The Mashimizer. viewtopic.php?f=50&t=64980
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