BrewnWKopperKat
ʘ‿ʘ
Looking forward to seeing how you brew (as your time / interest permits).I need to document my brewing better to maybe add to this convo.
One of the things I appreciate about "I Brewed A Favorite Recipe Today (link)" is that people (including @D.B.Moody ) include process notes. And in those recipes, I see a number of nice refinements to "conventional" kit or book processes.
By "conventional", I'm guessing that it was 30 min at 150F-ish. I have steeped this way a couple of times. One of the additional benefits is that the 30 minutes can be used for a number of other things - measure hops, catch up on HomeBrewTalk topics, ...I have been doing the "conventional" steeping methods for the most part as it only adds a little time to my brew "day".
When I started brewing with kits, the process was "steep from flame-on to 160F" - so that's my "go to" steeping process.
Both processes seem to produce the same result - although I'm open to ideas for measurements that show different results.
The experimental "15-20 min cold steep in a side dish", if it produces the same results, could be useful in situations like my "two batches at the same time" brew day. Or on brew days where one makes a big wort to split / blend into smaller batches.
Same here - my DME+steep batches are 30 min (or less) boils.I seldom boil longer than 45 min. and mostly around 30 min.
That being said, I don't see a problem with a kit (or custom recipe) that uses a 60 min boil. There are many good ways to make enjoyable beer with fresh extract.