TheRtHonorable
Active Member
Hey guys,
I've brewed a few kits, and now decided to jump into BIAB all grain brewing. I've gradually built up the kit, with a 50L stainless boiler, voile bag, and a home made wort chiller, and yesterday was the day to start my first proper brew.
So... Friday afternoon included a trip to the local homebrew shop. Bought the ingredients as follows for my Bathams Bitter clone...
4.5kg Pale malt
31g Fuggles @ 60mins
18g Northdown @ 60mins
10g Goldings @ flameout
For yeast, I asked the guy who runs the shop for his advice and came away with Gervin GV12... I know very little about yeast but hopefully it'll be ok!
The boiler is heated from the big ring on my range cooker. I started off with 20L of water in it on the gas, and added another 10L by repeatedly boiling our kettle, just to speed things up. All water was taken from a batch I'd treated with a campden tablet. Finally the boiler started to heat up.. I hit 71C (according to my new but cheap and nasty thermometer), and in went the grain, which dropped the temp to 67C.
It was then mashed for 75 mins at 67C. Wrapped in closed cell foam and with a pillow on top of the lid, it only dropped one degree over that time, which I was pleased with. I then upped the temperature to 75C for the last ten minutes, however it took ages to get it up those eight degrees! The grain probably ended up mashing for more like two hours in total.
So, then the bag came out, and I raised it to a boil. I did sparge the grain a little with about 2L of water at 70C, and then let the bag sit over a spare pan. I eventually got another few litres out of the bag with a bit of a squeeze. I then tipped that into the boiler and got it up to a boil. For a good boil, I had to place the boiler over three rings of the hob.. the big wok burner just wouldn't heat up up fast enough on it's own, but it did hold a reasonable rolling boil once it got there.
Now, I don't have a hop strainer on the outlet tap of the boiler, so I washed out the grain bag, and put the hops in it to boil. This is one of the things I need to get for next time I think!
I'd made my own 3 coil wort chiller, but I completely forgot to put this into the boil 15 mins before the end. I added the last of the hops at flameout, but then ended up relighting the gas and dropping the chiller in for 5 mins. Hopefully this is enough, and I had washed it as well as possible before it went in anyway.
The chiller itself was fantastic. It took the wort from boiling to about 60C in about a minute, and then down to 30C within 7 minutes. I used the water coming out of it to wash the steriliser out of my FV, but had to turn it off early as my wort was getting too cold! I think it might be overkill really, but it's futureproof this way if I move to larger batches.
The wort was then transferred to the FV, but because I dont have a hop trainer and the hops were lifted out in the bag, all of the hot and cold break material also went into the FV. I'm hoping this will settle out ok!
I ended up with 20L at 1.052 OG... I then diluted this down to 23L, and measured it at 1.050. The yeast went in and is now bubbling away like mad! Can't wait to try it now!
I've brewed a few kits, and now decided to jump into BIAB all grain brewing. I've gradually built up the kit, with a 50L stainless boiler, voile bag, and a home made wort chiller, and yesterday was the day to start my first proper brew.
So... Friday afternoon included a trip to the local homebrew shop. Bought the ingredients as follows for my Bathams Bitter clone...
4.5kg Pale malt
31g Fuggles @ 60mins
18g Northdown @ 60mins
10g Goldings @ flameout
For yeast, I asked the guy who runs the shop for his advice and came away with Gervin GV12... I know very little about yeast but hopefully it'll be ok!
The boiler is heated from the big ring on my range cooker. I started off with 20L of water in it on the gas, and added another 10L by repeatedly boiling our kettle, just to speed things up. All water was taken from a batch I'd treated with a campden tablet. Finally the boiler started to heat up.. I hit 71C (according to my new but cheap and nasty thermometer), and in went the grain, which dropped the temp to 67C.
It was then mashed for 75 mins at 67C. Wrapped in closed cell foam and with a pillow on top of the lid, it only dropped one degree over that time, which I was pleased with. I then upped the temperature to 75C for the last ten minutes, however it took ages to get it up those eight degrees! The grain probably ended up mashing for more like two hours in total.
So, then the bag came out, and I raised it to a boil. I did sparge the grain a little with about 2L of water at 70C, and then let the bag sit over a spare pan. I eventually got another few litres out of the bag with a bit of a squeeze. I then tipped that into the boiler and got it up to a boil. For a good boil, I had to place the boiler over three rings of the hob.. the big wok burner just wouldn't heat up up fast enough on it's own, but it did hold a reasonable rolling boil once it got there.
Now, I don't have a hop strainer on the outlet tap of the boiler, so I washed out the grain bag, and put the hops in it to boil. This is one of the things I need to get for next time I think!
I'd made my own 3 coil wort chiller, but I completely forgot to put this into the boil 15 mins before the end. I added the last of the hops at flameout, but then ended up relighting the gas and dropping the chiller in for 5 mins. Hopefully this is enough, and I had washed it as well as possible before it went in anyway.
The chiller itself was fantastic. It took the wort from boiling to about 60C in about a minute, and then down to 30C within 7 minutes. I used the water coming out of it to wash the steriliser out of my FV, but had to turn it off early as my wort was getting too cold! I think it might be overkill really, but it's futureproof this way if I move to larger batches.
The wort was then transferred to the FV, but because I dont have a hop trainer and the hops were lifted out in the bag, all of the hot and cold break material also went into the FV. I'm hoping this will settle out ok!
I ended up with 20L at 1.052 OG... I then diluted this down to 23L, and measured it at 1.050. The yeast went in and is now bubbling away like mad! Can't wait to try it now!
