Page:A Practical Treatise on Brewing (4th ed.).djvu/75

Rh an extract, it occasions a coagulation, forming a sort of thin paste, like thin batter, or starch when preparing for stiffening linen. This we call setting the goods, and little or no worts will be discharged.

This evil, although it never can be thoroughly cured, may sometimes be partially rectified, by sprinkling over the mash a quantity of colder, or even of cold liquor, so as to reduce the temperature. Since thermometers have been so generally introduced, setting the goods has not occurred so frequently. It is, however, of the utmost importance to take the first liquors at the proper temperatures, and for that purpose the following process will be found infallible.

Since our first writing on this subject, a different, and, we are inclined to think, a more certain mode has been adopted to secure the proper temperature for making the best extract in the first mash; after which, as before stated, particular temperatures may be considered of very little importance.

We now find that at the temperature of about 168° to 170° Fahrenheit, the diastase of the malt acts most powerfully in saccharising the starch