After a couple of weeks of research, and of course time to let my first and only kit brew ferment so I can use the fermenter I finally done my first biab.
Overall, I loved it, I did however underestimate how much time it would take - as I brewed it on monday night after work, I finally completed (by the time it had cooled down enough to pitch) at about 1am... Lesson 1: dont brew when in work the next day!
I followed the Mini Biab guide and brewed the amarillo. I think it went smoothly enough, however after putting in my estimations in the spreadsheet, I do think ive ended up with less wort in the fermenter that the spreadhseet said. I'll have to calibrate the kettle better to account for the evaporation etc, although perhaps a maxi biab would be more suited to my smaller kettle.
pre boil gravity was 1.040 and post boil was 1.058 (however i did notice when it cooled down fully, it moved up to 1.060, dont know if thats a bad thing or not).
The one thing I was worried about was the mash temperature, but incame my trusty old sprayway jacket wrapped around - I checked it once half way through and it had dropped by 1 - happy days, a bit of heat and back on for the remainder. I'm all for the simple approach so next time Im just going to let it maash without checking.
Anyway it is in the fermenter and looks to be going nicely. Have purchased a second fermenter so I am already looking forward to my next brew day. Not sure where to start with the next one... Id like to use some of the remaining grain I have left over and hops if possible as I dont have the storage space for the grains for any length of time... would be a waste to not use them, but not the end of the world.
Maybe looking towards something like a belgian ale for my 2nd, a dubbel or something along those lines. Not sure where to start.
I was playing around with brewers friend but no idea what would be good to add in. I did look at a few other recipies and tried to plagorise - is it just a case of doing that to create your own - or sre there some tried and tested forumlas to stick to?
Alternatively if anyone could point me in the direction of a nice belgian ale that is suitable for a beginner id be most grateful.
One brew down - many to go!
Post #2 made 10 years ago
Congrats on the first brew!!! The All Amarillo is an awesome beer, sounds like you did just fine! It definitely takes a little longer for BIAB then an extract brew, but the results IMO are totally worth it.
Lately I've been considering splitting my brew day, mash one evening after work, do a good mashout to kill any nasties, then boil the next night after work, and probably slow chill the kettle and pitch the third night. Hard to give up a weekend day for me with so much other stuff going on right now. On the other hand doing it all at once is definitely the best way to get the process down and get a good baseline of how a brewday should go, especially when starting out...
If you ended up with less wort, and a bit higher gravity than estimated, you may have a bit more evaporation than BIABacus estimated, if this continues after a few brews you can adjust for this in the 'Default Adjustments' (Section X). I would stick to the defaults for now as it is difficult to judge from just one brew. Also, you only need a good rolling boil, not a jumping outta the kettle boil, so keep that in mind.
As far as designing recipes / cloning recipes, either way is a good way. I started with tweaking existing recipes a bit and now usually just start from scratch. When I do this I will usually look around for a while to get an idea of the average grain/hop bill for the style I want, then figure it out from there. Probly good to do a few tried and true recipes when first starting out (but not necessarily mandatory)
Good Luck on the next brew, keep that pipeline going!
Lately I've been considering splitting my brew day, mash one evening after work, do a good mashout to kill any nasties, then boil the next night after work, and probably slow chill the kettle and pitch the third night. Hard to give up a weekend day for me with so much other stuff going on right now. On the other hand doing it all at once is definitely the best way to get the process down and get a good baseline of how a brewday should go, especially when starting out...
If you ended up with less wort, and a bit higher gravity than estimated, you may have a bit more evaporation than BIABacus estimated, if this continues after a few brews you can adjust for this in the 'Default Adjustments' (Section X). I would stick to the defaults for now as it is difficult to judge from just one brew. Also, you only need a good rolling boil, not a jumping outta the kettle boil, so keep that in mind.
As far as designing recipes / cloning recipes, either way is a good way. I started with tweaking existing recipes a bit and now usually just start from scratch. When I do this I will usually look around for a while to get an idea of the average grain/hop bill for the style I want, then figure it out from there. Probly good to do a few tried and true recipes when first starting out (but not necessarily mandatory)
Good Luck on the next brew, keep that pipeline going!
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Post #3 made 10 years ago
Steharg, it sounds like you're on the right road and looking forward to the journey as well as the beer. I have mostly used existing recipes or modified them somewhat and my next batch will be closer to a repeat than any other batch in a year. So many beers to make, so little time. While you peruse recipes that look tempting pay attention to the relative amounts of "base malts," and those called crystal, cara... and other names, and those that are Dark. Then you also get to try to figure how the mash temperature(s) impact the results that come from a particular grain mix. Then throw yeast into the picture - not all of them - remembering that yeast drives the bus to beer. It is great fun. Keep notes and label your bottles so you can tell them apart when you have multiple batches. I find that different colored tapes cut in a different way for each batch (parallelogram, trapezoid, notches) on bottles with one on the batch notes helps. Oh, and keep brewing.
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Post #4 made 10 years ago
cheers, will do a few more mini biab's before I adjust the process too much, it seemed to go well so no point changing it. will keep an eye on the levels though.
Thanks for the advice on the recipes, will have a look around and see what I can come up with - I suppose the recipe section is a good place to start!
Thanks for the advice on the recipes, will have a look around and see what I can come up with - I suppose the recipe section is a good place to start!
Post #5 made 10 years ago
Congrats stehang and welcome to the forum 
,
Short on time so I'll fly into some questions/answers...
You mention the spreadsheet but I'm unsure which one you are referring to. Never hesitate to post your spreadsheet of whatever nature as it makes things fast/easy to answer.
Lots of educational issues here to discuss and there's plenty of members here that could expand on any one of the following...
1. Evaporation varies on every brew.
2. Volume and gravity is like a see-saw. At the end of a brew, if you fall short on volume, you will hopefully find that your gravity is too high. Adding nice water at the end of a brew to balance things is the easiest/most sensible way.
3. A few gravity points difference between actuals and estimates is not significant.
4. Monitor your mash regularly when you are starting out on all-grain. Agitate the mash and record the temperature and correct it for quite a few brews until you get a feel for your system.
If you are keen on learning as much as you can as fast as you can, then I would recommend your first step to be studying the Clear Brewing Terminology thread over a few beers as it is the first step in learning how to 'drive' really well. I say drive instead of brew because it is very much like learning how to drive a car. Learning well is a lot faster than unlearning bad habits and re-learning good ones.
Focus on that first and then we can focus far better on our next recipe.
PP
P.S. If anyone can give links to or expand 1-4 above, that would be fantastic
. (In the meantime though stehang, jump into the CBT thread ).
,Short on time so I'll fly into some questions/answers...
You mention the spreadsheet but I'm unsure which one you are referring to. Never hesitate to post your spreadsheet of whatever nature as it makes things fast/easy to answer.
Lots of educational issues here to discuss and there's plenty of members here that could expand on any one of the following...
1. Evaporation varies on every brew.
2. Volume and gravity is like a see-saw. At the end of a brew, if you fall short on volume, you will hopefully find that your gravity is too high. Adding nice water at the end of a brew to balance things is the easiest/most sensible way.
3. A few gravity points difference between actuals and estimates is not significant.
4. Monitor your mash regularly when you are starting out on all-grain. Agitate the mash and record the temperature and correct it for quite a few brews until you get a feel for your system.
If you are keen on learning as much as you can as fast as you can, then I would recommend your first step to be studying the Clear Brewing Terminology thread over a few beers as it is the first step in learning how to 'drive' really well. I say drive instead of brew because it is very much like learning how to drive a car. Learning well is a lot faster than unlearning bad habits and re-learning good ones.
Focus on that first and then we can focus far better on our next recipe.
PP
P.S. If anyone can give links to or expand 1-4 above, that would be fantastic
. (In the meantime though stehang, jump into the CBT thread ).
Last edited by PistolPatch on 29 Jan 2015, 18:52, edited 1 time in total.
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Post #6 made 10 years ago
I'll take a shot at a few here...PistolPatch wrote: P.S. If anyone can give links to or expand 1-4 above, that would be fantastic
These are inter-related. Your evaporation on every brew varies because your brewing conditions are never quite the same on every brew. If you brew outside, the weather will affect your evaporation rate (wind, humidity, temp etc.) Besides that, even if you are indoors, unless you have precise control of your boil, you will boil either more or less vigorously as the last time. This will affect things as well. Pistol Patch has reported some pretty significant differences to boil-off on similar brews in the past.PistolPatch wrote: 1. Evaporation varies on every brew.
2. Volume and gravity is like a see-saw. At the end of a brew, if you fall short on volume, you will hopefully find that your gravity is too high. Adding nice water at the end of a brew to balance things is the easiest/most sensible way.
Boil-off affects volume, of course, but because we boil off water mostly... it also affects the concentration of sugars in the wort. The sugars do not get boiled off. That means if we start with a pre-boil gravity of 1.035 and 30L and we boiled down to 22L volume of ambient wort, we would expect our gravity to be 1.048. I use quite a few brewing tools from time to time, usually from Brewers Friend (http://www.brewersfriend.com/stats/). Their boil off calculator is how I figured the above. The calculator shows very well the relation between volume and gravity when dealing with evaporation. It will also help you plan for diluting the wort if you boil off too much.
As an aside, assuming you are using a hydrometer to take gravity readings, the reason your gravity reading increased as your wort cooled down is because the hydrometer will read lower gravity the warmer the liquid is, there is a tool to adjust for that as well. However, please note, don't trust any one reading from a single instrument. There are several threads on this as well around here.
So... if your evaporation varies from brew to brew and that affects both volume and gravity... what next?
Well...
Homebrewing is nice because there are no quality assurance departments or even customers to please, if you happen to boil off an extra liter or under boil by a liter, it only affects the brew by .002 gravity points. So on our 1.048 brew, if we ferment to a final gravity of 1.013, our ABV is 4.59%. If we over shoot our boil by 1 liter, our ABV becomes 4.86%, hardly something to write home about.PistolPatch wrote:3. A few gravity points difference between actuals and estimates is not significant.
I would also like to amend the above to
3. For me, A liter or two difference between actuals and estimates is not significant, when dealing with Volume of Ambient Wort.
If I end up with a liter or two difference from what I expected, I'm not having a fit about it. I record my brewday in my notes, drink and share the beer that is made, and move on to the next brewday. Of course, I am aiming to hit my numbers, but I'm not married to them. Some people do care about getting the right amount into the fermenter on every brew. If you are that person, PistolPatch always suggests to shoot for over evaporating (or boiling a bit more vigorously) as it is easy to dilute with pre boiled water.
At any rate... I strongly recommend learning the clear brewing terminology before jumping into any other subject. It is the base on which we all communicate here. It will also teach you more than anything else here about the brewing process. The brewing process is very forgiving on the hot side (everything from the creation of the wort through the end of the boil). You can really screw up and, as long as your sanitation, cleaning and fermenting practices are sound, make really good beer! So don't worry, welcome, and brew on!
Jeff
Last edited by safebrew222 on 29 Jan 2015, 23:30, edited 1 time in total.
Post #7 made 10 years ago
Alot of food for thought, thanks alot for the replies. I am learning as much as possible, hopefully it will sink in for the next brew. I'm in no rush for my 2nd brew day just yet... I've alot of reading to do before then.
cheers
ste
cheers
ste
Post #8 made 10 years ago
Congrats Ste.
I'm staring at the precipice that is the difference between kits and mini biab. I've all but convinced myself to be honest.
Any chance you could specify some details about the size of your kit and the version of the recipe you used please?
I'm staring at the precipice that is the difference between kits and mini biab. I've all but convinced myself to be honest.
Any chance you could specify some details about the size of your kit and the version of the recipe you used please?
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Post #9 made 10 years ago
Sure
I followed the mini-BIAB guide http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=153 basially to the letter.
I used the BIABacus file http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=158&p=641 and adjusted for my kettle size.
Kettle is 25.7L (32x32cm) - I didnt mean to set out to buy this size, it was the only one they had in the shop!
All brewed on my stove top - nothing to write home about - i've just got the bog standard basic kit of a fermenting bucket, siphon, bottles, hydrometer etc
Kettle is a bit bigger than in the guide so I am hoping to squeeze a few more litres out of it next time - trial and error at the min until I've done a few more and have more specific calculations about my kettle.
I followed the mini-BIAB guide http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=153 basially to the letter.
I used the BIABacus file http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=158&p=641 and adjusted for my kettle size.
Kettle is 25.7L (32x32cm) - I didnt mean to set out to buy this size, it was the only one they had in the shop!
All brewed on my stove top - nothing to write home about - i've just got the bog standard basic kit of a fermenting bucket, siphon, bottles, hydrometer etc
Kettle is a bit bigger than in the guide so I am hoping to squeeze a few more litres out of it next time - trial and error at the min until I've done a few more and have more specific calculations about my kettle.
Post #10 made 10 years ago
Cheers. I'm probably going to get a 20l pot as my intention bus doing smaller batches than the current 20l kits.
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Post #11 made 10 years ago
Well, after a pretty crappy very long day, decided it was about time I tasted the fruits of my labour for the first time, even though it's a bit early.
Early report - it's bloody lovely.. I'm absolutely delighted with that even going by the early taster.
Now I just need some patience to not drink the rest by the weekend. Now I realise why you all brew larger batches!
Will post a photo of a pint when I open the next.
Early report - it's bloody lovely.. I'm absolutely delighted with that even going by the early taster.
Now I just need some patience to not drink the rest by the weekend. Now I realise why you all brew larger batches!
Will post a photo of a pint when I open the next.
Post #12 made 10 years ago
Isn't that the best feeling? Great news.steharg wrote:Early report - it's bloody lovely.. I'm absolutely delighted with that even going by the early taster.
Last edited by safebrew222 on 11 Feb 2015, 08:22, edited 1 time in total.
Post #13 made 10 years ago
Great to hear steharg and well done!steharg wrote:Early report - it's bloody lovely.. I'm absolutely delighted with that even going by the early taster.
Now I realise why you all brew larger batches!
Also excellent posts above by safebrew and his amendments to my post are perfectly correct (thanks SB
)...
I think the thing that all of us brewers need to focus on more is quotes like, "it's bloody lovely," instead of, "I am hoping to squeeze a few more litres out of it next time."
Way too often we forget that tantalising the senses is the highest of goals in beer making. Whether you get 4.5 gallons or 4.7 gallons is not important when it comes to excellence.
Remember that
PP
Last edited by PistolPatch on 14 Feb 2015, 17:21, edited 1 time in total.
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