Mash Temperature and Beer Body in All Grain Brewing

by Brad Smith on December 20, 2012 · 29 comments

Great beer balances bitterness, color, flavor and body. As an all-grain brewer, you need understand how to control the body of your home brewed beer using mash temperature. By altering your mash schedule to match the style of beer you are brewing you can achieve precise control over the body and mouth-feel of your beer.

Managing Beer Body in the Mash

The key step in mashing is called the conversion step. Frequently done at a temperature between 146F/63C and 156F/69C, the conversion step breaks down complex sugars in the grains into shorter chains of sugar that can be consumed by yeast. If you are doing a single step infusion mash, the conversion step is your single step.

The temperature of your conversion step determines, in large part, what percentage of the complex sugars are broken down into simpler sugars. This is due to the enzymes active in the mash that break down complex sugars into simpler ones.

The two main enzymes active during the mash are alpha and beta amylase. Alpha amylase, which is most active in the 154-167F/68-75C range, creates longer sugar chains that are less fermentable, resulting in a beer with more body. Beta amylase, which is most active between 130-150F/54-65 C trims off single maltose sugar units that are more fermentable. This results in a more complete fermentation (higher attenuation) and a cleaner beer with a thinner body.

A more complete explanation is as follows: both enzymes work to break longer sugar chains into smaller maltose units that yeast can ferment. Alpha amylase is very flexible as it can break sugars chains up at almost any point, and is useful for creating shorter chains for beta amylase to work on. Beta amylase, in contrast, breaks off single highly fermentable maltose units of sugar, but can only work from the ends of the sugar chain. As a result beta amylase is better at creating single molecule maltose sugars that yeast loves, but it takes longer as it works only from the ends of the molecule. The two enzymes work best when applied in combination which is why we usually mash in the middle temperature range around 153F/67C.

A low step temperature (146-150F/63-66 C) emphasizing beta amylase will therefore result in a more complete conversion to simple sugars, but will take longer to complete. These simple sugars will ferment more readily, producing a highly attenuated beer that has higher alcohol content but less body and mouth-feel.

Conversely, a high temperature conversion step (154F-156F/68-69 C) emphasizing alpha amylase gives you more unfermentable sugars, resulting in lower alcohol content and a full bodied beer with a lot of mouth-feel. Moderate conversion temperatures (150-153F/65-67C) result in a medium body beer. In BeerSmith the mash profiles are labeled light, medium and full bodied to make this selection easy.

Conversion time also varies with temperature. Complete conversion of your malt for a low temperature, light bodied profile takes longer than a high temperature, full bodied mash profile. For my BeerSmith software, I actually built this into the latest version – using an adjustment factor when estimating the final gravity of the beer based on the mash conversion step temperature.

A Hybrid Mash Conversion Profile

One trick I see some advanced brewers use is to include a step both at a low conversion temperature (say 145F/63 C) and a second mash step at high conversion temperature (say 155F/68 C). This results in very high sugar conversion, and a very clean, light bodied beer. It does this by activating both the alpha and beta amylase in sequence. It is useful primarily for beers that require a clean, dry finish – and is most often associated with lagers.

Designing your Beer

How does this apply to all-grain beer design? It depends upon the style. Some styles, such as lagers have a clean, low bodied finish. Low temperature, light body mash profiles are appropriate to use with these styles. Sweet Stouts, Pale Ales and other full bodied beers will benefit from a full bodied, high temperature mash profile. Refer to the BJCP style guide for your target beer style to determine whether a light, medium or full bodied mash profile is appropriate to your style.

Thanks again for joining me on the BeerSmith Home Brewing Blog. Please subscribe to the BeerSmith newsletter or my podcast for more articles and episodes on home brewing.

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{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }

Emanuele Corazzini December 21, 2012 at 4:44 am

Moderate fermentation temperatures (150-153F/65-67C) result in a medium body beer???
I guess you meant :
Moderate conversion temperatures (150-153F/65-67C) result in a medium body beer

Brad Smith December 21, 2012 at 5:47 pm

Thanks – I corrected the obvious typo!

Pavel Feynberg February 11, 2013 at 12:19 pm

I’m just getting started in homebrewing and reading up all the information I can get my hands on. This post is fairly technical, for a beginner, but begins to explain why some people get a more malty tasting beer or a low alcohol content offering. I was just talking to a homebrewer who’s last batch yielded unfavorable results and he was guessing it had to do with the malt temps as you discussed. You seem to have this down to a very specific science – how long have you been home brewing?

David June 18, 2013 at 12:04 am

Whenever I do a search with brewing ideas, or to estimate the results of an error, I seem to find your articles.
Maybe that’s why I have a copy of your software on my P.C. and my phone.

Brad Smith July 5, 2013 at 11:48 am

Thanks David for the kind words.

Andre Lim November 14, 2013 at 12:35 am

For your hybrid profile, you are activing your beta first before your alpha right? Does this give the most balance between alcohol and body?

Steve February 8, 2015 at 6:56 pm

I’ve been brewing since the days of Compuserve, like 1994 or so, and your website and information is the best I’ve found! Keep up the great information sharing: please!

Jonathan June 30, 2015 at 4:23 pm

What do you have to say about the simple process of mashing at 69 degrees Celsius initially (favoring alpha) and just letting it cool to whatever it cools to over the hour (which in my plastic cooler gets it down to a beta favoring temp range) such that you get the range of temperatures without any need to manipulate anything over the hour. I do this routinely for my stone ruination IPA clone.

steve August 7, 2015 at 5:01 am

Jonathan
Sounds logical but the higher temp destroys the beta activity. To get a bit of both you need to start lower then increase.

james fruge September 28, 2015 at 3:56 pm

I used to work for a private brewry and they made there mash at no higher then 90-100°F. The beer often came off really sweet with a slight taste of alcohol. But then they also used it to make liquor. However at 90-100°F it took 4 days for the mash to roll then again we made 500 gallons every 4 days.

Do i have to get it to 150°F or can i do it at 95°F without a problem?

liquor delivery nyc January 25, 2016 at 4:10 am

Hi, I want to subscribe for this web site to get most up-to-date updates, therefore
where can i do it please help.

Brad Smith January 25, 2016 at 11:33 pm

Go to http://beersmith.com/blog/subscribe for our newsletter.

Ian Frederickson August 17, 2016 at 9:41 pm

Hi, I have been brewing full grain beer for some years and use Beersmith exclusively as it gives me more than enough information to make some great brews but I still have not worked out what mash temperature Beersmith uses to estimate the final gravity for estimated alcohol (ABV).
I am guessing it is 68 deg C.
Is that a correct guess?

Ben October 21, 2016 at 8:07 am

So would one go to create a sweet boozy beer. Think gouden caromus, hertog jan grand prestige, naparbier avant garde etc. they are very sweet, bold, big mouthfeel and between 9 and 13% abv. Can this be done with a single conversion step of 68 degrees?

Brent July 8, 2017 at 12:46 pm

Great advice, great program I have the mobile and desktop versions
Worth every cent
Thanks Brad

Seattle2k July 23, 2017 at 9:19 pm

@James, that just doesn’t make sense. The enzymes working in that temperature range are for protein rest. You’re not converting much starch to sugar at 90-95. Go with 153 F, and you’ll get great results.

BREWMASTER XXX May 15, 2018 at 5:58 am

The Beta works on what the Alpha has made,so therefore the mash wont start till it is at the initial Alfa working temperature.
Does everyone agree with that ?

Apart from that, I would like to know the resultant percentage fermentability of each of the three groups of mashing ranges.
Any help there anyone?
Cheers.

Jørgen Moisejeff Berg May 27, 2018 at 5:35 pm

Ben – probably a late answer, but Belgian beer, like the ones you mention, probably use a high temperature mash and then use caramelized sugar to get the high alcohol content. Which would if I am not mistaken give you a full bodied beer that’s high in alcohol. The caramelized suger ferments 100% but leaves behind flavor and color. The malt with low content of fermentable sugars will give a full body and add sweetness to the beer. Please keep in mind I think that’s what they do, not 100% sure about the process

Pedro Victor September 8, 2021 at 10:28 am

Hi Brad, your blog posts are very rich in important information that helps a lot to improve my beer.
On this blog subject (Mash Temperature and Beer Body), I have an old question about the “adjust FG for mash temp” advanced option: In which situation should I disable it? I ask this because I noticed a different value in FG and ABV when I turned it off, and I was in doubt about which values ​​would be correct. And should I override the default core temperature value to match my mash profile (medium body BIAB and OG 1,046)?
Thank you very much for your attention. Cheers!

Brad Smith September 8, 2021 at 10:42 am

In general I recommend leaving this option on as fermentability does change with mash temperature, and the model used in BeerSmith is a reasonable approximate of that.

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