Brewing from Grains

[Dogger Dan]

Hi Folks,


I am in a bit of a Mayday here. I have made my Lauter Tun and my heat exchanger which by the way was cheap cheap cheap so I am now declaring myself ready to brew from grain.

The fact is I am doing something really simple, an uncomplex ale, but it requires chocolate malt and crystal malt along with the pale malt. Nowhere have I read if I pitch all the grains at the same time or do I treat the specialties the same way as I brew a kit up (steep it like tea). Just a question, will take any answers by tomorrow.

By the way, how do you post pics here. I also have a bottle washer, along with a few other items I think may be of intrest. Additionally posting a pic here would have probobly saved my frustration at Home Depot today as I was trying to explain to the kid that I needed to run copper pipe through the wall of a cooler and keep it water tight. I don't hold a lot faith out there for Canada becoming a Super Power anytime soon if this lad is the best we can put foreward.

Sorry maybe some of this should have gone elsewhere

Dogger

[Gough]

Dogger,

Congrats on making the jump to all grain. Hope it goes well for you. Like everything in this hobby there are conflicting theories on whether to add the grains all at once or keep the specialty grains until the end. You can chuck all your grains in together without too many dramas, but some brewers reckon that with the darker specialties (esp balck patent malt and roast barley) it is worth waiting until towards the end of the mash to add them or even steeping them separately to avoid acidic/tanniny flavours coming across. Personally I think for your first go you are better off throwing them all in together and worrying more about keeping your temp stable throughout the mash and getting your sparge right. Are you fly sparging or batch sparging? If you are worried about ph issues resulting from the darker grains, batch sparging can really help here - and it is easier in my opinion. I'm a big believer in the K.I.S.S. principle and as I'm still not an 'expert' all grainer yet myself I tend to err on the side of caution/simplicity. Have to say though that my all grain beers have been by far my best brews ever and I'm well hooked now

So, I think you'll be fine putting all your grains in together from the start of your mash, and it'll be one less thing for you to worry about!

Good luck, and let me know how you get on.

Shawn.

[Dogger Dan]

I'll be batch sparging by the looks of it. Thanks for the help though, my feel was to chuck them all in. It is only 500 g Crystal and 200 g Chocolate


Dogger

[wombat]

Mmm... Dark ale.... Chocolate malt and crystal malt together..... mmmm.... anyway, what I meant to say is - it would be great if we could get a thread going and just fill it full of all-grain recipes with tasting notes. That would be cool. Anyone else?
-wombat

[Dogger Dan]

I'm game, especially as I have only just got my feet wet

Dogger

[Gough]

Yep, I'll chuck in my 2 cents worth.

Shawn.

p.s. Wombat, I brewed a porter a while ago with Choc malt, Crystal and Black Patent (although in 'restrained' quantities ) and it turned out really nice. No dramas with mixing your grains in my opinion just got to get your quantities right... Different stroke I guess...

[wombat]

Great to hear, Gough - I love a good porter
It would be great if you could post your recipe because good porter recipes seem to be hard to find. As soon as I finish this brew that's in the fermenter right now, in goes a porter
I was thinking of just partial-mashing it though about 50/50 because I don't have the right equipment yet, but it should still be a nice beer.
-wombat

[Dogger Dan]

All,
Thanks for your help, my first all grain is sitting having a good chug as we speak. It went smoothly, the two pieces of kit that I made (lauter tun and heat exchanger worked a treat which is really unusual for me) Even the missus is excited over it.

As an aside I think there is something wrong with her. She marched me down to the homebrew and made me get some more grains. Then she bought us a beer fridge to put the kegs in, solely for use as a beer fridge. Take advantage while you can I guess

Dogger

[rain]

Now if I am to remain the typical Oz bloke of my generation I'd have to say:
Watch-out when the wife suddenly gets an attitude of " ....... let me help you, dear." when it comes to beer-type men's secret business.

[Dogger Dan]

Yeah,

the hairs are up saying "Danger Will Robinson, Danger" I didn't listen to them the first time either. I wouldn't be where I am now if I had LOL. God you can lead round by the nose eh?

Dogger

[Gough]

Wombat,

If you haven't got the capacity to all grain brew yet, I've got a good extract 'n grain porter recipe for you. You'll need a big boil pot - about 20 litres will do it, but other than that you won't need any really specialised equipment. Here 'tis...

Wickham Porter

Style: Robust Porter Brewer: Shawn
Batch Size: 22.00 L Assistant Brewer:
Boil Volume: 16.00 L Boil Time: 60 min


Ingredients Amount Item Type % or IBU
3.00 kg Pilsner Liquid Extract (7 EBC) Extract 82.0 %
0.25 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (118 EBC) Grain 6.9 %
0.25 kg Chocolate Malt (887 EBC) Grain 6.9 %
0.15 kg Black (Patent) Malt (985 EBC) Grain 4.2 %
30.29 gm Target [10.2%] (60 min) Hops 30.1 IBU
25.00 gm Williamette [4.9%] (30 min) Hops 9.2 IBU
15.30 gm Williamette [4.9%] (15 min) Hops 3.6 IBU
1 Pkgs Wyeast American Ale Yeast 1056 Yeast-Ale

Measured Original Gravity: 1.050 SG
Final Gravity: 1.010 SG
Estimated Color: 61 EBC (59-118 EBC) Color [Color]
Bitterness: 42.9 IBU (25.0-45.0 IBU) Alpha Acid Units: 3.1 AAU
Alcohol by Volume: 5.2 %
Actual Calories per 12 oz: 165 cal



Carbonation and Storage Carbonation Type: Corn Sugar Carbonation Volumes: 2.4 (1.8-2.5 vols)
Estimated Priming Weight: 124.6 gm Temperature at Bottling: 15.6 C
Primer Used: 120 Age for: 4.0 Weeks
Storage Temperature: 11.1 C

[wombat]

awesome - thanks very much, Gough
i'll get it brewing in a week or so and i'll keep this thread posted
-wombat

[Evo]

Just a quick question so I thought I'd whack it on the end of an appropriate thread. As a partial mash virgin, I'm just getting some yeast starters ready and am about to dive in. Without going through the whole process, one of the stages requires me to put water with my grains and hold it there at 65 degrees (thereabouts) for an hour.

The instructions I read recommend using an insulated esky which I think would have trouble holding a temp like that for that long. Ok, here's my question (and I'm sure I'm not the first to think of it) but could you use a big hot water urn to do this and adjust the temp to stay at 65 ?

[Dogger Dan]

Ok, sorry, what is a hot water urn? I mean I know what hot water is and what an urn is but I am wondering if there is something special about it. Rememberyou need tyo accurately hold the temp in order to get a starch conversion. I found applying heat a pain and difficult to regulate

I do use the esky, if that is a Coleman cooler and it works well, I see a 1 degree drop over an hour, that is one deg F.

I am brewing up a couple of grains myself this weekend

Dogger

[Evo]

Aaaah, yes, I forgot, we don't all speak Strayan (Australian) on this forum re the Esky thang .

The hot water urn is one of those big old fashioned stainless pots with a thermostat controlled element in the bottom of it that keeps the water at whatever temp, usually boiling - for coffee and tea (those "other" drinks).

But, after reading what you wrote about your Esky, or your Coleman cooler or your Chilly Bin (bit of Kiwi speak for you, bro), I don't think I'll bother.

Have you made any mods to your Coleman cooler Dogger or is she stock standard ? Oh, and another quick question for you Dogger, my HBS guy told me not to "sparge my wort". Any idea why ? I could of asked him but he'll talk the leg off a chair. The main reason I'm doing a partial mash is so I can say "I'm just sparging my wort".

[wombat]

in the words of the the great beavis and butthead:
butthead: "huh huh he's sparging...."
beavis: "yeah! boiyoiyoiyoiyoing!"
-wombat

[Dogger Dan]

Evo,

But of course there are mods my friend, Life wouldn't be good if you don't have custom materials.

I would suggest if you are only doing a partial that you use a 19 L cooler, mine is a beverage one, so tall and skinny. This gives me a good grain bed and eliminates stuck sparges. Additionally, my copper pipes have slits on the bottom rather than the top which also helps with stuck sparges.

As far as not sparging, why wouldn't you sparge. I don't know why he would say that but if you find out let me know would you, (I just need the readers digest version ). I mean all you are doing is washung the sugar off the grain

This web site helped a lot and even shows you how to build a system and go about doing your first batch

http://howtobrew.com/


Good Luck

Dogger

[Gough]

Evo,

The esky will be fine. I built a copper manifold for the bottom of mine and it connects to the tap hole in the esky. Easy.

As for not sparging, sounds a bit odd. Maybe for a partial the bloke was trying to keep it nice and simple. You can get away without sparging the smaller quantities of grain in a partial because most of the fermentables are coming from the extract, but if you can sparge without aerating the hot wort too much then it will be to your advantage. Give it a go.

Good luck,

Shawn.

[Evo]

Yeah nice Dogger and Gough. I'll be a mashin it up with the big boys before too long.

See, that's what you've gotta love about homebrew. You've got - drinking beer, making beer to drink, and making stuff to make beer to drink. It doesn't get any better.

Alright, so can the Ernie Urn idea. No need. Overkill. I can deal with that. Coupla other questions you have raised though (gee you're gunna get sick of me ). If I was to move into all grain Dogger, what size Chilly Bin would I need then ? What size do you use ? My mate and I just brainstormed a few designs over a couple of James Squire's. Can you post photos (or links to photos) of your setup ?

And Gough, I thought the idea was to get as much oxygen into your hot wort as you could. I thought that was half the battle of brewing from grain. As Pauline says, "Please explain".

Cheers guys.

PS, next time I go to the HBS I'll ask him why no sparge. I'll just make sure I have some time to kill

[Dogger Dan]

Evo,

I can answer both questions,

I use a 19 L (5 gallon) cooler which works for about 10 lbs of grain. which makes 5 gallons comfortably. I am thinking I may need to increase the size.

The oxygen story, the grains will oxidize readily at temps over 80 deg F so you need to be careful sloshing things around. It is a bit different after you boil mind you, and I think this is because you have left a lot of the oxidizable material behind

Dogger

Dogger