The talk was in the NCHF at Napa in October. Those folks on the left coast really know how to do a beer festival! The cold steeping procedure was designed to maximize the extraction of desirable melanoidins, and at the same time minimize the extraction of undesirable ones. The former are simple compounds which yield a fine malt taste. The undesirable ones come from more complicated structures. Polymers with sulfur compounds tend to have malt/vegetable tones. Others yield cloying tones, which to my palate have an under fermented character. The highest level melanoidins can even have burnt characteristics. The cold steeping procedure was developed by Mary Ann Gruber of Briess. My version goes as follows.
(i) One gallon of water per 3-4 lbs. of grains to be steeped is brought to a boil and held there for 5 mins.
(ii) The water is cooled down to ambient, and the cracked grains are added.
(iii) This mixture is left for 12-16 hrs. at ambient temperatures, and then added to the brew kettle for the last 15-20 mins. of the boil.
Mary Ann has had good results by adding the steeped grains directly to the fermenter without boiling, however I have not tried that variation of the procedure.
The upside of cold steeping is that it works. The downside is that it is very inefficient both with respect to extract and color. In my setup I am using 2-3 times the malt that would normally be used. As a consequence I have been using it for “adjunct malts” such as black and crystal. I also am very happy with the use of Munich malts with this process when they are used as secondary malts.
Say I wanted to brew a black IPA and use the cold steeping method for the dark grains. I would need to use more than if I was mashing them mainly because of poor color extraction? This would be good for me to know. I would hate to use my normal amount of dark grains and end up with a brown IPA…
When I used to cold steep I used ~ twice the roasted grains as when I mashed them with the rest of the grist. IIRC there are other ‘cold steepers’ here who do the same.
I just brewed a Black IPA a couple months ago that turned out fantastic. In this case, I did not cold steep. I had so much hop bitterness going on that the bitterness from the dark grains being mashed was nonexistent. I think I posted the whole recipe in a thread. But I mashed 14 oz of dehusked Carafa III and 4 oz of chocolate malt. It was a dandy.
alright, I verified that the amount I have in the recipe is more or less twice what I had in the first iteration and I liked the level of roastiness in that so this should be a good test of how I like the cold steep character.
next weekend (good lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise!).
gonna get the starter going tonight. I only ordered one tubeof yeast and it’s a low gravity ale but still. Gonna pitch the tube half and half into two 1 lite starters and then step them up into another liter on wednesday.
Well it’s in the fridge chilling to pitching temps. Plenty black. I forgot yup start my steeo last night so I just did it first thing this morning and the resultant liquor was black as night with a nice level of roastiness. the braid came loose during the mash so I had to run most of it off into buckets, reach re attach the braid and put it all back in. ended up getting better efficiency than I expected but nothing out of line. Well post again in a couple weeks.