how far in advance do you crush your grain?

I've been told 3 weeks if it is sealed, but I believe your beer will be better with fresh or near freshly ground grains.

I grind minutes befor mashing.

 

We get 50lbs bags of milled malt at the brewery I help at. It's still good and lasts for weeks after we get it. If stored in a dry cool place it can store for probably a month. I'm guessing it could be stored longer but I have no experience with that.

I have personally pre-milled a lot of grain in prep for a brew day. I was taking some crystal malt over to a friend's house and I got it milled Friday. We brewed on Sunday. No problem.

No don't put it in the fridge. That will draw moisture and probably some other flavors and smells you don't want. Main thing is keep it dry, and keep it cool-ish. About 65 - 70F is fine.

 

I always do the night before. No issues and no difference from immediately before

 

I always do so on brew day, but before I got my mill I had crushed them at the LHBS up to a week before...with no perceivable negative effects.

 

Another time saver to consider is to heat your strike water the night before to ~190* and then wrap the kettle with a few towels.

As for the grains, the night before will be fine.

 

Depends on the humidity in your area. I usually mill grain a day or 2 before brewing, but given ideal storage variebles...6 months would probably be OK.

 

You'll lose probably 2 or 3 degrees an hour if it's wrapped up. 190* might be too high to start with actually.

This way, you'll only need to heat your water a little bit before mashing in, rather than taking it up from room temp.

 

I crush my grains about a half hour, give or take, before the mash. I firmly believe fresh is better. And that the little things add up. YMMV.

 

I recently got a grain crusher and now crush while my strike water heats up. I used to buy pre-crushed grain and usually would use it within a week or two, but occasionally held on to it for months, as many as 6 months. If the beer was worse for wear, I couldn't tell. Although these results make me skeptical that advance crushing is problematic, if you can do it in close proximity to your brewing effort, why wouldn't you? It certainly wont seem less fresh than crushing a week or two in advance.

 

Completely agree, although crushing and sealing the grains the night before is probably one of the more minor offenses if you need to save time on a brew day

 

Yes, fresh should be better, but your grist usually doesn't suffer too much from milling a little early...I want to believe too and sleep good, but I've made too many beers with leftovers that turned out exceptionally good : )

 

I bought bags of crushed malt for many years. They will keep just fine for at least 3-6 months if storage is reasonably cool and dry (i.e. not in a garage in Texas, though obviously uncrushed malt will not survive long there either).

 

F$#^@ing socialist homebrewer! ...or explain new avatar : ) ...OK, let's get a room : )

Seriously BAs: I have a 3 gal mashtun (for 5 gal partial mashes or the whole enchilada 1gal+ batches) I'm willing to give away to a new brewer that can convince me they're worthy...I will also pay shipping (The Donald need not apply)...cheers All! : )

 

I brewed up a big batch of my house beer in June that I ran through my grinder in December. Tried to get to it before that but couldn't. ( Came out good ) I wouldn't sweat a few days, or a few months.

 

I crush my grains then heat my mash water.

 

if you have a grain mill I believe you will see the difference grinding the day of the boil vs getting grains pre crushed then using months after you receive them, just my thoughts.

 

I've brewed with freshly crushed grain. I've brewed with months old crushed grain. Never noticed a difference.

 

I usually go with 1-2 days, and I condition the malt beforehand.