I always thought squeezing the bag extracting tannins was a myth. It’s a product of higher temperature and pH that extracts the tannins.[/quote]
I think the temp and pH factors matter, but there is a teeny bit of truth in the squeezing the bag myth.
In my findings, tannin extraction is primarily a product of low gravity wort. Extending the runoff duration to the point that the wort gravity is less than about 3 brix (1.012) (my experience), invites a higher tannin extraction into those final runnings.
Assuming that the grain bag has been well-rinsed with water, squeezing that remaining water from the bag could contribute more tannins into the wort. So if the squeezings are relatively clear, don’t bother squeezing the bag any more.
I always thought squeezing the bag extracting tannins was a myth. It’s a product of higher temperature and pH that extracts the tannins.[/quote]
Yea, its not like mouth puckering tannins… its more likely some other protein that comes to play. It is off putting to me, but I have been told I have a very sensitive palate. Its usually not over the top, and some don’t pick it up. However I can pick it up pretty much right away. I ran quite a few BIAB tests, awhile back.[/quote]
Your MT is a kettle with a false bottom correct? How is ‘just lifting the bag out’ without squeezing and then sparging by pouring water over the bag any different from just draining the runnings from your MT with the false bottom and then batch sparging?
Well lifting the bag at all is creating a pressure that is not normally employed. However I can’t answer your question about batch sparging as I don’t sparge at all.
FWIW, I use Tinseth. Every time I’ve had a beer analyzed, it’s been right on almost to the IBU.[/quote]
Not that it matters much but I spoke with one of the brewers at GLBC and they said all their recipes use Rager. When I first started brewing I used those beers as my baseline for bitterness so knowing the calculation they used helped to get a point of reference for designing my own recipes.[/quote]
and that’s what’s really important to us as homebrewers…consistently getting the result we want.
I still struggle with this myself. I think things are getting better with switching out chico to WL007 for my IPA. One interesting thing I found was a lot of pro brewers are mashing much hotter (158-160F) than us. In addition, the 10% crystal malt limit is low and think you are fine to push it to 20%. I also think it’s possible that pros are using higher modified base malts like MO or GP instead of Briess/Rahr 2 row. I’ve tried most of all things mentioned and none really did much. Might try MO in next IPA and see if that does helps. Weird data point: tried a really short mash time once and beer ended up stuck at 1.020 but not the least bit sweet.
