How much Malto Dextrine or Cara Pils is needed to mimic higher mash temps?

So from what I've read, a lot of professional brewers mash all their beers at the same temps (usually around 150F), and use ingredients to adjust the "body" or "sweetness" of the final beers. At their scale, its preferable to keep the mashing process identical for all their batches. I guess they find it easier to fiddle with the grain bill slightly than to adjust mash temps for each recipe.

Anyway, I am considering moving to this approach for my homebrew. My question is this, if I mash all my beers at 150F, how can I mimic mashing at, say, 152F or 154F or 156F with ingredients? Does anyone have any experience in this area? I could just start with adding 8oz of Cara Pils and seeing where that gets me, but I'd rather hear from someone who's done this alteration before, with the intent of figuring out how to translate a lower mash directly into increased CaraPils or Malto Dextrine.

(And on those same lines, having used both CaraPils and Malto Dextrine before, but not in identical beers, can anyone chime in on the differences in the final flavor between the two?)

6/29: Still hoping someone of the same opinion chimes in here.

Topic body mashing ingredients beer homebrew

Category Mac

1
answered at

Not meaning to be a wise guy, but that's kind of like asking "how long is a piece of string?". For one thing, adding carapils or malto dextrine might increase the body, but it won't necessarily mimic what happens at higher mash temps. Also, it's going to be highly subjective, depending on your tastes and exactly what you hope to accomplish. Finally, we're homewbrewers. Why would the approach that commercial brewers take be right for us? It's much easier to adjust mash temp than it is to experiment with recipe adjustments. Why not take advantage of the freedom we have rather than try to do something that can easily be avoided?

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