60 minute or 90 minute mash/boil?

[The Baron]

Hi
just ordered the Graham Wheeler british clone book but a lot of the recipes ask for 90 minute mash and boil which would put a hour on a brewday. Question is this really necessary how would it impact if I did 60 mash 60 boil?
Thanks Pete

 

[Gunge]

I routinely do 45min mashes and boils. Damned if I can tell the difference.

 

[Ali]

In theory a longer mash time should yield a bit more sugar, and for the boil, it should be slightly more bitter. In practice I can't really tell the difference, and certainly not enough to add an hour on a brewday. One thing to remember is that you won't need as much wort as you will be boiling less off in thye shorter time period. In practice I find I need around 1 1/2 litres less when doing a 60 m inute boil as opposed to a ninety minute boil.

Others will I am sure be along soon to offer more technical answers to your questions, but for me the difference is negligible at best :

 

[Martybhoy]

I do a 90min - 2hr boil if using pilsner or wheat malt. Recently decided to try a 60min boil for a hefeweizen and it lost the bready, malty character I usually get when doing longer boils.

That said, I wouldn't bother with a boil over 60m for all other types of brews.

 

[Honk]

If you play about with the recipe in an online brew calculator you should find that you need to adjust the initial amount of hops to get the same level of bittering with a shorter boil but other than that and what Ali says above you should be fine.

 

[The Baron]

If you play about with the recipe in an online brew calculator you should find that you need to adjust the initial amount of hops to get the same level of bittering with a shorter boil but other than that and what Ali says above you should be fine.

just what I thought was waiting for confirmation Thanks

 

[The Baron]

In theory a longer mash time should yield a bit more sugar, and for the boil, it should be slightly more bitter. In practice I can't really tell the difference, and certainly not enough to add an hour on a brewday. One thing to remember is that you won't need as much wort as you will be boiling less off in thye shorter time period. In practice I find I need around 1 1/2 litres less when doing a 60 m inute boil as opposed to a ninety minute boil.

Others will I am sure be along soon to offer more technical answers to your questions, but for me the difference is negligible at best :

Thanks Ali didn't think it would make much difference as most sugars are converted by 60 mins so I have read many times elsewhere

 

[Slid]

I may be talking nonsense here, but as an observation, if you add in the time taken up by "doughing in" to the mash time of 60 mins and then the time taken to get the sparged liquid up to boiling, then the 60 mins boil, plus messing about time with sterilising chillers and so on, it comes out much nearer 90 plus 90.

My AG system is the MK 1 Grainfather, which I suspect is fairly time efficient, in so far as AG can ever be described as such, but perhaps the GW/GH and Dave Line books just give an indication around the total times to be allocated to each major stage in the process?

 

[Duxuk]

I have recently reduced my boil time from 90 to 60 minutes. The big difference is..................erm.....................there's no difference. At least for my pale ales.
If you want more sugars and hence more efficiency then try overnight mashing. It saves time because you're sleeping whilst it's mashing.

 

[jceg316]

I had a system which at best got 70% efficiency, I went from 60 to 90 min mashes and my efficiency went up to 80%. As I had a HERMS the wort came out much clearer as well. I now have a Grainfather where I get 80% efficiency and clear wort from a 60 min mash so I don't bother making it longer, unless there is a specific reason to.

I have done 90 min boils before to see whether it makes a difference for lager, and no, I couldn't tell any difference.

 

[MrRook]

I routinely do 45min mashes and boils. Damned if I can tell the difference.

Me too. I switched to 45 minutes years ago and see no difference.

 

[Fil]

my understanding is that the 90 minute mash/boil durations are 'catch all' values which Will convert all available starch in the mash and achieve hot break in the boil regardless of the grainbill. Thing is we will be brewing with for the most part well modified modern grains which do not need these durations to achieve the desired results.

So if your shorter mash is providing you with a reasonable bhe, and brews achieving targets for OG and FG, and your confident the hot break is achieved within the boil, Hop utilisation is perhaps the only consideration you may need to make, which can be addressed with a slightly heavier hop bill.

even so i still mash and boil for 90 minutes, but perhaps i dont have the same immediate demands on my time of those with young families, and dont mind the extra hour or so of PnQ up the brewshed..

 

[BeerisGOD]

I have recently reduced my boil time from 90 to 60 minutes. The big difference is..................erm.....................there's no difference. At least for my pale ales.
If you want more sugars and hence more efficiency then try overnight mashing. It saves time because you're sleeping whilst it's mashing.

Wish I would remember to do this. Along with cold steeping the specialty grains. I think it's that thing of I'm only aloud one day to brew at the weekend.
I'll try explaining this process to the misses (glazed over eyes) and try to impress on her it'll 'be best for the both of us'

 

[The Baron]

Well Chaps and Chapesses you have done me proud and convinced me that 90 mins is no longer required and as I am using a Ace System which is reasonably efficient i do not now see the reason for 90 mins mash/boil.It generally hits its SG and volume without me doing a proper efficiency evaluation so 60 mins it is and I will compare the results to Mr Wheelers figures in his book
Thanks Pete

 

[Grizzly299]

Just to throw a spanner in the works as I didn't see it mentioned, *depending on the intensity of your boil*, 90 min boil may give you more kettle caramelisation. This can add a little more complexity and depth of flavour to your brew.

For example if you were brewing a particularly low abv beer and didn't want it to lack depth of flavour, extending the boil could be one way to address that.

Many styles can gain a little something from extending the boil time.

*If you have a weak boil then you're not likely to get much caramelisation. This can be offset by vigorously boiling and reducing a quantity of your first runnings on a stovetop until it becomes a dark caramel like syrup and adding it back to the boil.


Also, in terms of hopping, there is no reason why you can't keep the same hop bill with that longer boil. Just add the hops after the first 30 mins.

As long as your boil gravity at 60 mins is where it should be, then alpha acid utilisation should be the same.

 

[foxbat]

In theory a longer mash time should yield a bit more sugar

Only if you badly mess something up. Full conversion is easily achieved within 60 minutes and confirmed by the iodine test. The amount of sugar you get out of it is down to the effectiveness of your sparging technique.

 

[MyQul]

I routinely do 30min mash/30min boil with my 5L stove toppers and havent noticed any difference

 

[dps51]

must of the time I did a 90min mash/boil
then changed to 60min mash/boil and did not notice any difference.

 

[Norfolk79]

I've always done a 60 minute mash, followed by a 10 minute mash-out.

The only time I've boiled for more than 60 minutes was when I massively undershot my pre-boil gravity and boiled for longer the reduce the volume and up the gravity.

 

[pms67]

I have recently reduced my boil time from 90 to 60 minutes. The big difference is..................erm.....................there's no difference. At least for my pale ales.
If you want more sugars and hence more efficiency then try overnight mashing. It saves time because you're sleeping whilst it's mashing.

I done an over night mash with my last brew and it was decent efficiency,what temp did you start at?