First all grain in 4 years - BIAB

[RossSherwood]

Hey there. I'm Ross, from Scotland but currently living in Dublin. I used to do a lot of all grain brewing when i lived in Glasgow but have been out of the way of it since moving to Ireland. I recently got some gear and did a kit brew and realized why i moved to all grain in the first place. Clibits all grain thread got me inspired but i opted for a BIAB style. I did a lot of reading but eventually just went for it.

My first attempt is a Rye pale ale

2Kg Hook Head Irish Pale Malt (Crushed)
250g Carapils
250g Cararye

20g southern cross at 60 mins
20 southern cross grams at 30 mins
20g southern cross at flameout

S-04 yeast pitched straight in to wort when cool enough

16:30 - Brewday started with 6 litres of cold water being heated to 72 degrees Celsius. Getting my grains weighed in this time

16:45 - 72 degrees in pot. Put in muslin sheet and grains on top. 68 degrees after grains added

For the mash i opted to put the pot in the oven however due to it being my first attempt with this set up i had the oven too hot and it brought the temp up to 70 degrees at the bottom of the pot after 20 mins. Stirred the pot to bring it down and managed to maintain a decent temp of 68 to 66 over the hour. Lesson learnt and mark on oven dial to show a nice temp to keep the pot stable.

Scooped the bag out, drained and squeezed a little. Dumped the wort in to a sanitised FV then the grain bag as well to free up my pot. Heated 8 litres to 80 degrees Celsius. Dunk sparged for a few mins giving it a good stir in the pan again. Removed grains and added the original wort bringing my volume up to 12 litres, 65 degrees, a hydrometer reading of 1.030 with a temp correction of 1.047.

18.30 - Put the 12 litres on to boil

18.55 - Boiling and first addition

19:25 - second addition

1950 - final additiong

19:55 - Flame out

I then immersed the pan in a laundry bucket with cold water, once this water had heated up i replaced it and went off to the shop to get a few bits and a bag of ice. When returning at about 9 i threw in the ice and the mixture was at 22 degrees in about 15 mins, transferred to the FV and pitched yeast at 18 degrees.

All in all, all right. A few errors such as forgetting about the irish moss, the oven being too hot and getting some timings wrong but should be able to shave an hour off.

10 and a half litres at 1.045 after a top up of cold water

Couple of questions

my mash at 70 degrees for 20 mins, whats the science there? I know the optimum temps are 64 - 68. Should i expect any off flavours or poor fermentation?

Also after 12 hours theres only a very small amount of c02 being emmitted from the FV. I'm not too worried as i know it can take a while to get going but in the past it's being bouncing after a few hours.

 

[stan.distortion]

Hehe, love the big "TAKE OUT AIRLOCK" message on the side of the FV :) I must do the same as I forget without fail every time it comes to bottling. Is that the stockpot from Woodies DIY, the one they've got on offer at 25 yoyos at the mo? Wish I'd spotted that before I'd ordered one elsewhere, hard to find them at a decent price in Ireland.

Not certain on your questions, I'm new to this but if your OG came out well then I'd imagine the mash went ok. I may have had similar a few days ago, I'm pre-heating the oven and turning it off when the pot goes in and I think I got it too hot the last time, a lot more foam than usual while heating for the boil and a fair bit of flowery stuff on top during the boil, efficiency worked out a little lower than usual but it's fermenting away fine. Only took a few hours to get going but I'm re-pitching yeast cakes from the previous batches, only 2 batches of AG done with dry yeast so far but both took around 12-18 hours to get going.

 

[RossSherwood]

When you have a shocking memory like myself without messages like that i will keep making the same mistakes. The pot is actually a 'stellar' one from adverts.ie i got on Monday for 20 quid. Its 15 litres to the top so took the 12l boil all right. i was down at 8.5 after the boil but with a big OG so topped it up in the FV which was grand to help cool it as well. The stellar pots are expensive and its easy to see why, they are solid and its nice not having a glass lid i guess.

I live in a very small apartment so this system is grand, i have a good 5 gallon set up but its still in scotland and far too big for this flat. Im going to pop a couple of holes in it with a qmax cutter and fit a valve and themowell/thermometer i think. I have the gear lying around and its all weldless so can be re-purposed when i move to bigger set up.

Do you just launch the cooled wort straight on top of the cake? Been thinking the same myself as i hate paying for yeast when i can reuse it but i don't have much fridge space to keep all those mason jars lads use to wash yeast.

 

[stan.distortion]

Congrats on finding that :) I'd been scouring adverts.ie for about a week before biting the bullet and ordering a new one. Kind of glad I didn't see the Woodies ones earlier too, I got one afterwards and they're kind of tinny compared to the one I got first, really thick base with no burning or obviously hot areas after the boil.

I'm still meaning to read up on handling yeast but have been bottling the last batch while brewing the next and tipping out all the remaining beer/glop from the FV to leave just the cake, then rinsing out vigorously with lukewarm water (around skin temp, hadn't measured accurately) to get a sludge and then pouring some of that into the brew, somewhere around 1 or 2 egg cups full per gallon and it's worked very well so far.

Saved a few batches of it too, small pop bottles, a couple of teaspoons of sugar, lukewarm water up to about quarter full then up to about half full with the yeast cake sludge. They got going in no time, obvious activity after 10-15 minutes and overflowing after 20-30 and then into the fridge with the caps barely sealing. They where dormant after an hour or so and got going again after a few hours in a warm room so I'm guessing they're fine but haven't tried pitching with them yet and would like something better for sealing than a half-loose cap, a bit worried nasties might get in.

 

[RossSherwood]

I'd been meaning to check salvage yards like Mac's warehouse in Dublin as i know they have ex-catering stuff up the stairs there. I was tempted to order one on amazon but they seem pretty poor, the only one i fanced was one advertised as a cous cous pot. took about 16 litres but then there was a handy colander thing to sparge with.

I'll maybe do the same for my next batch. I found myself with a good bit of time on my hands with the smaller batch size so i think i could handle bottling and brewing at the same time. Any idea how long a yeast mix like that could last in the fridge? I guess you would know when you take it out to warm it up whether it comes alive again or not. What strain are you using?

 

[stan.distortion]

I'd been meaning to check salvage yards like Mac's warehouse in Dublin as i know they have ex-catering stuff up the stairs there. I was tempted to order one on amazon but they seem pretty poor, the only one i fanced was one advertised as a cous cous pot. took about 16 litres but then there was a handy colander thing to sparge with.

I'll maybe do the same for my next batch. I found myself with a good bit of time on my hands with the smaller batch size so i think i could handle bottling and brewing at the same time. Any idea how long a yeast mix like that could last in the fridge? I guess you would know when you take it out to warm it up whether it comes alive again or not. What strain are you using?

From what I've heard it should be fine after a month and 3 or 4 months seems fairly common but whether my procedures, hygiene etc. is up to standard for those kind of times... I'd certainly have no hesitation in re-pitching with it after the week or so it's been in the fridge so far and will probably take one out every week or so just to see how they're getting on.

The three I have in at the mo are safale US-05, safale S-04 and gervin GV12 (supposedly Nottingham but doesn't seem to have Nottinghams high attenuation). They all appear to be totally dormant in the fridge but apparently some yeasts will keep going even at those low temps, especially larger yeasts so not planning on screwing the caps down tight any time soon, last thing I need is the fridge contents liberally coated with yeast sludge

 

[MmmBeer]

Couple of questions

my mash at 70 degrees for 20 mins, whats the science there? I know the optimum temps are 64 - 68. Should i expect any off flavours or poor fermentation?

Also after 12 hours theres only a very small amount of c02 being emmitted from the FV. I'm not too worried as i know it can take a while to get going but in the past it's being bouncing after a few hours.

The mash temperature dictates the ratio of fermentable to unfermentable sugars in your wort. Lower temperatures (60-65°C) produce lots of fermentable sugars and therefore a higher alcohol level, but less sweetness in the final beer. Higher temperatures will produce more unfermentable sugars, therefore lower alcohol and more sweetness.

The diagram below, from John Palmer's 'How to Brew' shows the relationship between the two amylase enzymes (alpha and beta). Beta amylase is the one that create the more fermentable sugars.

Re the lack of bubbles, the yeast will currently be multiplying like bunnies, to ensure there is enough to ferment your beer. Check again in another 12 hours.

 

[RossSherwood]

You say about screwing the lids down? Would there be enough pressure built up to cause trouble?

thats a nice, clear chart there all right. Apart from the 'sweeter' flavour due to less sugars being created is there any off flavours associated with alpha amylase?

thanks

 

[stan.distortion]

You say about screwing the lids down? Would there be enough pressure built up to cause trouble?
...
thanks

Potentially the same as highly overcarbonated bottles if the yeast keeps working away, explosive pressures! I think a rag or bit of kitchen towel stuffed into the tops might do the job, maybe moistened with a sterilising solution.

 

[stan.distortion]

Read up a bit on fermentation pressures after, pressure breaks down the yeast cell walls and the most they'll survive to is about 35psi. Tried pitching with the saved yeast yesterday too, worked but I'll be doing things a bit different the next time:
Had them out of the fridge for about 3 hours, overnight would have been better as very little sign of life before pitching.
Still looking lifeless this morning but the brews where just getting properly started and I'm guessing that's down to using sugar without any nutrients, will be using wort next time and maybe a second batch with wort plus a little nutrient to see if it helps.
Should've made a proper starter rather than just tipping in some of the bottle, will try making one from the contents of the test jar pre-boil next time.