I am planning an making an American wheat beer this weekend, many of the recipes i have read give directions for a decoction mash. I have the basic cooler mash tun set up can I still do a decoction mash and if so how? and if not any suggestions for a mash schedule?
You can do a decoction. This episode of brewing tv explains the process best in my opinion.
You can and should safely skip the decoction mash. While it might be fun to try, it doesn’t improve flavor and is pretty much a waste of time.
If you do want to try it, you’ll need a colander where you can pull out the grains every few minutes to boil the decoctions. Essentially it goes something like this:
Dough in at 95-105 F with the usual 1.25 to 2.0 qt water per lb grain. After about 10 minutes, use the colander to pull most of the grains into a kettle. The liquid that is left behind contains all the enzymes and is called “the main mash”. Bring the grains (not the main mash!) up to about 150 F for about 10-20 minutes, then boil for another 10-20 minutes, then return it to your main mash. Stir well, let it rest for a minute or two, then pull the grains out and bring to a boil again. Now your main mash should be somewhere in the neighborhood of 120-130 F. Boil the grains for just 2-10 minutes, then put back into the main mash again. This should bring your main mash up to 150-ish. If not, repeat until it does. Once you hit 150-ish in the main mash, rest for about 30-40 minutes. Then you can either repeat for a mashout at 170 F, or you can skip the mashout and just runoff and sparge and brew as normal. That’s the streamlined decoction process in a nutshell. You can do all the rests for 20-40 minutes if you like, some people do, but I find this unnecessary and perhaps even detrimental, as you don’t want to do a protein rest at 120-ish for more than a couple of minutes with modern well-modified malts or it will kill your beer’s body and head retention.
Optionally, you can skip all this hassle and just mash at 150 F for 40-45 minutes, runoff and sparge, and you’re done. Results will be approximately the same, with the exception that decoction produces a slightly darker beer that is perhaps 2-3 SRM points darker.
Either way, you’re going to make a great beer. Enjoy.
I’m a believer in the effect of decoction mash but it is subtle and not always worth the effort. I don’t usually see it done with American wheat recipes but you can do a decoction mash with anything, so try it out if you want and see what you think.
It’s very easy to do a decoction mash with a cooler mash tun. You just need a medium to large pot and your stove or other heating element to boil the decoctions.
The one thing a decoction mash will certainly do is increase your yield. It will also affect the color some. For an American wheat beer, I’d probably skip it entirely.