Mashing Corn

I have only used flaked corn in beer recipes. I use cracked in UJSM but that isn't mashed. And I don't think running cracked corn through my mill is a good idea haha.

Whole, flaked, meal?

What is used for mashing corn other than flaked?

And also sparging will be a problem with high amounts.

Help me out guys

Comments

  • Very interesting was watching moonshine series yesterday where they took whole corn and left it to germinate in a moist hot tunnel environment. Hereafter they milled it for the kettle where it was cooked. They passed a comment that this method enabled the creation of natural yeast.

    Moonshine series bullshit or fact ??

  • edited May 2019

    What brand of mill do you have? Most home brew mills will handle corn, may take a few passes on lowering settings is all.

    Mashing Corn with Steam Injection @ AD

    This is pretty much all you need to know. pintoshine sells the enzymes as well as others.

    EnzyMash Enzymes for Mashing

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  • Well i have done it a few different ways. I used to run it thrpugh my malt mill bill it reallybdidnt handle it and even cracked would still stop the mill sometimes so I bought an heavy duty mill just for corn. Even still i have to give it two passes. I use and old school style of mashing called the lazy mash. Which is basically putting corn in my fermenters, and dumping water in at 99 degc then closing it up and insulating the tank to keep the temps over 80 deg. If you do that over 2 to 4 hours you do get gelatinisation. The wash is the basically sterile too. So then i let it cool to 70 c and add any enzymes and modify pH or add malt for enzymes and wrap it up again. 2 hours later crash cool to 30 and pitch yeast. For me i get the same yields as other methods. I have a freind who has a moonshine distillery and uses the same method. I think you dont get as good a yeild as steam mashing but its a lot easier. My mate says he gets the same ulyield but he has to let the wash ferment for a few extra days. Corn is really tough to work with but i like it. My moonshines i add 10% wheat and it snoothes it out. Next week I wiĺl be doing the same with triticale. I have had corn mashes ferment for 3 weeks. Which is ok as a hobbyist but not ok in a distillery. My bourons inmake the same way. But there are other people here with more experience at this than me.

  • @punkin said: What brand of mill do you have? Most home brew mills will handle corn, may take a few passes on lowering settings is all.

    Mashing Corn with Steam Injection @ AD

    This is pretty much all you need to know. pintoshine sells the enzymes as well as others.

    EnzyMash Enzymes for Mashing

    I have a monster mill and it works well but I think corn might not work well in there or screw it up for milling grain . Possibly corn meal or flour ? I have used flaked corn before . Then sparring can be a problem at higher levels . I know some commercial guys use hammer mills and jacketed kettles to prevent scorching . Just looking to get more corn fermented and not go the ujsm route with corn .

    Good info guys and thanks for the comments

  • edited May 2019

    MM should work fine, start with a wide setting and work down.

    Mashing is the first problem, there won't be a sparging process, you'll have to work out how to still it as well.

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  • I know this probably goes without saying, but buying the corn already cracked is a HUGE time saver. The difference in price in my area is pennies a pound and also check different brands; you'd be surprised the amount of difference in size of chunk from brand to brand. I found one that I just barely hit with my grinder and it comes out like a large cornmeal which is perfect. The less flour the better when it comes time to filter out. Of course if you can distill on the grain, all the better but I have ULWD elements in my boiler.

    FC

  • @FloridaCracker said: I know this probably goes without saying, but buying the corn already cracked is a HUGE time saver. The difference in price in my area is pennies a pound and also check different brands; you'd be surprised the amount of difference in size of chunk from brand to brand. I found one that I just barely hit with my grinder and it comes out like a large cornmeal which is perfect. The less flour the better when it comes time to filter out. Of course if you can distill on the grain, all the better but I have ULWD elements in my boiler.

    Sorta my dilemma with my boiler. I don't want to scorch. Just wondering if there was a way to mash corn and not get stuck sparge. Just might need a jacketed boiler and hammer mill.

    I want to see the difference between UJSM and doing a fermented corn

  • I don't think you can sparge corn.

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  • I ferment on the grain, strain the grain and then strip. DEFINITELY use Pint's method with enzymes or you will end up with an unstrainable goo. I'm small scale and work in 50 gallon mash runs so that won't work for most but here's how I do it:

    First things first; corn is a m@+#@rF@ck@r . Once you accept that then you can move forward. Grind to a COARSE cornmeal consistency. Any finer and it will clog up the works later. Mash using Pint's method and I can't stress that enough as it keeps the final product from sticking together, thus making it strainable. I don't keep the drill going the whole time but off and on. After the ferment I drain into 5 gal paint straining bags available at Lowes, Home Depot, wherever but only let a couple of gallons or so go in at a time. Allow most of the liquid to drain. This will happen pretty quick. Then take the bag and put it into a mop bucket compressor and get the rest of the liquid out.

    Like I said, this isn't for large scale as it takes me about an hour to strain the 50 gallons.

    Of course, YMMV

    FC

  • My first(only so far) attempt was with 2 bags of cornmeal from restaurant depot in a 60 gallon tank and a Milwaukee gear drive 1/2HP corded drill and a mortar mixer... I tried the method of adding boiling water and enzymes and was fully into polenta stage by the time the enzymes were added... it thinned out but was only able to get 1/3 or the liquid off... and it was not sterilized, so it smelled like vomit, the small amount of distillate smelled like vomit and bubblegum...

    Really looking forward to using steam to cook and being able to start from cold... would love to have a way to do the initial heating with some sort of heat recovery from a simultaneous still run or from a HLT with recovered heat from a previous run...

  • In the spirit of full disclosure, I also had a "vomit" mash while doing corn one time. Didn't let it anywhere near my still so Mike you are more of a man than I am. I attributed it to getting stuck because I ruined the enzymes with heat and it ended up too thick for the yeast to deal with. Pretty sure I heard small screams from the yeast as I tried to introduce them to the goo.

    FC

  • edited May 2019

    Keep in mind - there are non-yeast microbes that can consume starches and dextrins.

    Poor mash conversion, no pasteurization, you are setting the stage for a non-yeast microbe party.

    I’ve often suspected some of the beginner disasters we see around the intarwebs aren’t actually direct infection issues, but indirect infection as a result of poor conversion. High residual starch and dextrins.

    Pull a gravity and it looks somewhat ok, but the yeast don’t stand a chance. Once the sugars are gone, the other bugs will outcompete and make a mess. They have tons of food to chew through.

    Add in yeast handling issues and you are guaranteed disaster.

  • what’s the process with corn for commercial operations ? mash , ferment and distill on the grain . Use jacketed boilers ?

  • pulverize to near flour, enzymes, steam, column still that you and 4 friends could sit at a poker table inside of... 7' diameter, 5 foot spacing... 250,000 gallons per mash at a time if I remember right from the guy last week that had 800 million gallons of ethanol experience..

    He said he had the record for 'lifting trays', which happened when a tray plugged and you said 'more steam' to clear it instead of shutting it down...

  • I thought I would try posting in this thread rather than starting a new one.

    I have been starting to plan a few corn based mashes. I have managed to get hold of some malted corn so I don’t have to worry about adding enzymes or cooking the corn.

    Initially I had been planning on keeping the corn to 51% but I recently tried the Hudson Baby Bourbon which is 100% corn and I loved it so was planning on trying a 100% corn mash.

    My boiler has immersion elements so I can’t strip it on the grain. What I would appreciate some help with is;

    1. How finely should I mill the corn (same as above in this thread or more coarsely given its malted)?

    2. Should I add rice hulls to the mash tun and try to lauter the mash or ferment on the grain and run the wort through a wine press post fermentation?

    3. Any other pointers/advice?

  • @Sam said:

    1. How finely should I mill the corn (same as above in this thread or more coarsely given its malted)?

    2. Should I add rice hulls to the mash tun and try to lauter the mash or ferment on the grain and run the wort through a wine press post fermentation?

    3. Any other pointers/advice?

    1. Malted corn shouldn't need to be milled fine, just cracked open like barley malt. It's unmodified grains that need to be opened right up.

    2. Rice hulls will help but they are a PITA to work with. You might do OK with 50% barley malt. Not having a proper husk you will definitely need something tricky to lauter corn. I'd try 10% hulls.

    3. You're probably going to have trouble with that element.

  • Thanks, I might hold fire on 100% corn for the time being.

  • Might be worth trying the wine press post fermentation then allowing it to settle before racking to the fermenter / filtering as When i played with corn many years back, and squeezed it, i ended up with quite a bit of sediment that the elements didn't like

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