Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

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kyolic
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Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by kyolic »

I am making my first AG corn mash on Monday and I have a couple of questions:

I will be using 10 kg (22 lbs) flaked maize, 5 kg (11 lbs) malted barley and 50 liters (13 gallons) of water.

1- As the flaked maize is already gelatinized, I don't need to boil it right?

2- Should I crush the maize for a better conversion or just leave it as it is?

3- What is the optimal mashing temperature, particularly for this process? 65C (149F) for three hours will be fine?

4- I am aiming for an OG of 1.070. Do you think this bill will make me reach there? I will be using Alpha Amylase as well.

Thanks in advance.
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rubberduck71
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by rubberduck71 »

Others with more experience than I to correct me if I'm wrong:

1- correct, flaked grains have already been gelatinized & don't need boiling

2- no need to crush, you already have good surface area for water to get to the starches. Check out the difference between flaked vs cracked vs whole.

3- holding at 90-120 min of mashing temp (~155F) will do the job with your recipe

4- not sure on this one. There are links to calculators on this site to measure your potential ABV (or Google it). Amylase can't hurt! It may push your typical 80-90% conversion on malted grains alone closer to 100%

Hope this helped,
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River Rat
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by River Rat »

If you're using plain alpha amylase (not high temp enzyme) then 155-160 would be a good time to add that. I would let it drop to 149 before adding your malted barley. Adding the barley will drop the temp on down a little more. Hopefully the alpha has already done its work at this point, and the barley will be more efficient at finishing the job in the 140's. Just my 2 cents.
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8Ball
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by 8Ball »

I’d use two pots at the same time:
1. Pot 1: boil some water, cut the heat, stir in the flaked corn. Use enzymes if you have them at proper temperatures. Its ok if you don’t, the malts will have enough. Combine with the malts at 149F.
2. Pot 2: step mash malts 30 minutes @ 100-110F; 60 minutes @ 120-125F, 90 minutes @ 140-149F.

Keep the corn/barley nash at 140-149F until you get a good iodine test. Let it drift down to pitch temp and ferment on the grain. You should hit around 1.075 with this grain bill, maybe a little more. Shoot for a 5.3 ph.
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kyolic
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by kyolic »

I talked to the producer of the alpha and he said that the product is most active at 60C (149F).

How about I add both the barley and alpha at the same time at 60C (149F), quickly raise the temperature back to 60C (149F) and mash it that way for 3 hours? 60C (149F) is enough for the barley to do its job?
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River Rat
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by River Rat »

That should work just fine. Like 8Ball said, you really don't need the alpha at all if you're using 11 lbs of malt to 22 lbs of corn. It won't hurt anything to use it since you have it. Yes, everything should be converted after 3 hours at 140-149. An iodine test will confirm that for you though.
If you add heat during the mash be careful to not get higher than 149. That is the high end of the "safe range" for the barley's beta amylase.
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kyolic
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Re: Making my first AG corn mash and I have a few questions

Post by kyolic »

River Rat wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 9:19 am That should work just fine. Like 8Ball said, you really don't need the alpha at all if you're using 11 lbs of malt to 22 lbs of corn. It won't hurt anything to use it since you have it. Yes, everything should be converted after 3 hours at 140-149. An iodine test will confirm that for you though.
If you add heat during the mash be careful to not get higher than 149. That is the high end of the "safe range" for the barley's beta amylase.
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