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Homebrewer11777 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 17, 2025 5:16 am Sounds like you may have added the malts at too high of a temperature. Either your corn/oats were not well mixed or your thermometer was out of calibration. If say the corn was actually at 160 when you added the malt you might have denatured enough of the enzymes from the malts to leave some unfermentable sugars in your wash. Adding some glucoamylase at right temperature next time would provide insurance that enough enzymes are available to get a full conversion. I use a product called Diazyme and add a couple teaspoons when the mash is below 130F.

Also have to confirm how you are measuring gravity. If refractometer do you understand how to correct for a measurement once fermentation has started? This is probably not your issue since you mentioned you have been doing sugarheads without problems but it is surprisingly common issue for new brewers on the beer side that show up at forums asking why their final gravity is so high and should they get some champagne yeast or something to move this along?

Last thought is rice hulls don't provide any enzymes or yeast...they act as supplemental husk for beer brewers use to loosen up the "stuck" mash when there is a lot of huskless grain in the mash (corn, wheat, rye...). This makes it easier for the beer brewers to lauter (separate the liquid part of the mash (the wort) from the solids before boiling with hops. Purely mechanical and nothing to do with fermentability or fermentation.

Kbharring wrote: ↑Mon Feb 17, 2025 5:57 am

Homebrewer11777 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 17, 2025 5:16 am Sounds like you may have added the malts at too high of a temperature. Either your corn/oats were not well mixed or your thermometer was out of calibration. If say the corn was actually at 160 when you added the malt you might have denatured enough of the enzymes from the malts to leave some unfermentable sugars in your wash. Adding some glucoamylase at right temperature next time would provide insurance that enough enzymes are available to get a full conversion. I use a product called Diazyme and add a couple teaspoons when the mash is below 130F.

Also have to confirm how you are measuring gravity. If refractometer do you understand how to correct for a measurement once fermentation has started? This is probably not your issue since you mentioned you have been doing sugarheads without problems but it is surprisingly common issue for new brewers on the beer side that show up at forums asking why their final gravity is so high and should they get some champagne yeast or something to move this along?

Last thought is rice hulls don't provide any enzymes or yeast...they act as supplemental husk for beer brewers use to loosen up the "stuck" mash when there is a lot of huskless grain in the mash (corn, wheat, rye...). This makes it easier for the beer brewers to lauter (separate the liquid part of the mash (the wort) from the solids before boiling with hops. Purely mechanical and nothing to do with fermentability or fermentation.

And I use a hydrometer to measure the gravity.

I know the rice hulls don’t add anything, but my mash was definitely stuck so I was hoping that the hulls would help aerate and restart the yeast.
I had some enzymes but was hoping for good luck without them.
I will consider adding some next mash and I will definitely
recalibrate my thermometer and make sure it’s correct with the next mash.
Thanks for the advice.