Stampie said:
So first what are your thoughts on this Angel yeast? I assume it has Alpha and Beta enzyme in it but the temps it's converting don't come close to the temps the logical side of my brain says are needed.
My second thought is would this work on Oats? Let's just say that I'm asking for a friend of mine that ruined a good pot trying to make unaged Oak whiskey. This method seems like it could work.
Before even watching the video my first thought is, "They're skipping the standard mash process and going to rely on enzymes in the mix instead of the grain. Not sure if you'd need an amylase or not. Probably going to want some sort of Glucosidase."
Okay... umm... you're just going to have to put up with some scientific terms. I could explain these in laymans terms, but it would make this a LOT longer.
Shot at 1:18 shows the ingredients. Sure enough, it's alpha-amylase and glucoamylase. So, I was right about the glucosidase, but that makes tons of sense with alpha-amylase. Sooooo... science time. Go look up an amylopectin molecule. That's the primary starch in malt, and I think in many other grains. Similar enough to get the idea. What those enzymes are going to do is, the a-amyl will make a bunch of random cuts to chop up those large starch chains. That glucoamyl is going to then go to town on what's left. Unlike beta-amyl, it's going to take apart even the limit dextrins and break everything down into strait glucose.
So yeah. This makes perfect sense. 0.2% - 0.6% is a LOT. Like, if that were just grist weight, it would be nearly double our pitching rates on a lager yeast. But I suspect that includes water weight, too. So... around 5-8 times our normal pitching rates? That is relying on the enzymes in there to do all the work.
So you wouldn't even need to really bother with a mash. You'll want to grind and cook the grains like he does, but that's just to hydrate and gelatinize your starches so the enzymes can get to them. You're not worried about normal optimum mash temps since you're just dumping in a bunch of strait enzyme instead of trying to activate what's in your grain.
This would almost certainly work with effectively any starch grain. Same process no matter what. If you use flaked oats, you wouldn't need to mill.
Yeah. It's weird because distilling is dirty. This is what you can do when you use a bunch of added enzymes.