Cedar Rapids Brewing Society

Good morning gentlemen. This is my first post, as well the first recipe I plan to do with all grain. I just purchased everything to try an all grain brew (my 15 gallon pot just came in the mail yesterday with the burner!), and I was hoping that someone with a lot more knowledge than I have can give me some advice. I would like to brew Midas Touch, from the extreme brewing book that I have. Unfortunately, every recipe is an extract. I found that 1.23xlb of extract will give you the amount of grains you need, and for light malt extract you use 2 row barley. But at what temperature, and for how long do you mash in/out? When an extract recipe calls for the specialty grains to be steeped and THEN add the extract, what do you do in the case of an all grain? Here's the recipe that I made before, and want to be my first batch of all grain:
Ingredients:
Preboil:
6 gal water
Boil:
8lbs light malt extract (75 minutes)
2lbs clover honey (75 minutes)
1/4 ounce Simcoe hops
10 saffron threads (eob)
Fermentation:
White Labs WLP001 or Wyeast 1056 ale yeast
1 qt White Muscat Grape Juice concretrate
starting gravity 1.086
final 1.026
ibu 12

Heat 6 gallons of water. Remove from heat & add light malt extract and honey. Return to boil. After 15 minutes add Simcoe hops. Boil for 60.

Hey Matt - my 15 gallon pot came yesterday too, congratulations on making the transition to all-grain.

I would recommend you to John Palmer and his book, How to Brew....but you can get all of the essentials from his online version which you will find here: http://howtobrew.com/book/introduction.

I suggest you give these sections a good read, particularly the all-grain sections; "Your First All-Grain Batch" will likely be most helpful to you to get started.

What are you using as a mash tun? The section on Methods of Mashing will explain how you can do the mash using a mash tun.

Good luck,
D

You both might want to read up on and try BIAB, it's my preferred method after various thing of the last few years.
Heat water, drop in the bag for half an hour, pull it to drain while starting the boil.

Typically you mash ~150F. At 1.5 qts/lb, a reasonable rule of thumb is strike water is mash temp plus 10F. That works for a cooler, anyway. If your mash tun is metal and sucks out a lot of heat, either up the strike water temp, or preheat the mash tun. Don't forget to account for the water retained by the grain, typically ~ 1/5 gallon per pound.

Usually all "specialty" grains go in the mash. The exception is that sometimes dark grains are added at the end of the mash, so they don't over-acidify the mash.

No way would I boil the honey for the entire time. For a beer this strong, I would add it to the cooled wort at pitching time. Same w/ juice. If that scares you, add at end of boil.

You might want to try a brewing calculator. I think Brewer's Friend has a free on-line version. Also, the earlier recommendation for Palmer's How to Brew book is solid.

How much grain depends on your efficiency, which depends on your process. Also, stronger brews tend to have lower efficiencies.

Just remember, barley wants to become beer. And aerate the wort well and pitch a lot of yeast. Prost!

TappedOut wrote:No way would I boil the honey for the entire time. For a beer this strong, I would add it to the cooled wort at pitching time. Same w/ juice. If that scares you, add at end of boil.

Yes, another relevant point is that for fully refined adjuncts like sugar/honey/syrups, you can add them after fermentation is active and yeast have already propagated, to (theoretically) reduce the osmotic stress on the yeast and encourage more complete attenuation, for a beer that (again theoretically) may taste better sooner and not take as long to condition.

Also Pat can speak better to this part: If using raw fresh honey, you will lose volatile aromatics and change the flavor slightly if you boil it. Add cold-side.

Hi Matt! Think I replied to you on a Facebook post too. Once figure out what you need for grain I recommend keep it simple. Figure 65% for efficiency. You can change from there as you brew.

Take all your grain, mix with160-165 F strike water, 1.5 qts./lbs. to mash around 150-152F. Hold for 60 minutes.

Skip mashout. I did this for about 5 years until built my HERMS setup. It basically gets you a gain in efficiency. This was recommended by Ashton Lewis, aka Mr. Wizard in BYO magazine. If you want to mash out, get temp to 168F and hold for 10 minutes.

Sparge with 170F water. Go slow if fly sparging. 30-45 minutes for 5 gallons.

Once sparge is done it is just like extract brewing. I recommend honey and any other adjuncts after the boil.

Read How to Brew and/or Complete Joy of Homebrewing. That his how I learned to brew all grain. And post in the forum for tips and share your results at our meetings!

Cheers!

You guys are amazing! I just followed the book's recipe the first time around, but I will try adding the honey the same time I add the Muscat grape concentrate, which is about 4 days in.

I wanted to thank all of you guys for your input, and I have my first all-grain brew under my belt as of last Sunday. I have no idea how to calculate the numbers for the Beersmith 2 program, and when I tried to write the recipe, things like honey, muscat grape juice and saffron were not options. I am not sure how to calculate things like the head space in the MLT, mash tun mass, etc. I have the 70qt (I think, it doesn't say) Coleman Extreme cooler. I used the 36" stainless braid as a filter and it worked well without getting clogged. The 60qt aluminum stock pot took a while to get boiling, even with the gas on high. Once it got boiling, I looked away to say something to the wife, and had a massive boil over. In all, I would say the equipment worked well. I didn't feel like anything was lacking. I made a wort chiller, and it seemed to work better with the water at a trickle, rather than rushing out. Is that what most of you guys do, or do you open the faucet and let it rush out?
I started with 21.3lbs of 2-row UK barley. I heated up the MLT with 2 gallons of water at 160, and then heated up 8 more gallons at 160. I need to upgrade my thermometer, because it is a really cheap one. I think I need to get it hotter next time. I came out with 7.5 gallons, which puts me at 75%. I then added 4 more gallons because I wanted 11 gallons (1 gallon of loss figured). I think giving the mash more time to rest allowed more wort to come out, because I ended up with 12 gallons during boil. One thing I will definitely not do again is what I did in the next step. I got my 7.5 gallons, then put in the 4 gallons of additional water (per a YouTube video I saw), and let it sit for 20 minutes. Cool. But then, like an idiot, I stirred up one last time, while only letting it sit for 5 minutes. I became impatient. After boiling and chilling, there was so much sediment in the bottom... It was like a lunar landscape. I wasted a gallon there, which really annoyed me. I took the SG and it was at 1.072. The recipe called for 1.086, however I couldn't think of what I could add that wouldn't drastically alter the flavor. I believe the last time I made it, it had similar readings as well. I pitched the yeast at about 80 degrees, because it was 2230, and I was going to head to bed. Checked on it this morning, and the airlock is going like a bat out of hell, so hopefully the higher temperature didn't cause any off flavors.
Takeaway:
1. Wow, this was an 8.5 hour process! I was not expecting that. Next time, I shouldn't start at 1400.
2. Let the mash bed rest for longer
3. have the sparge/strike (don't remember which is which) water heated and ready to go well before hand.
4. You really have to smack the yeast packet hard to break the nutrition packet. Both packs had unbroken yeast nutrient.
5. Really get a good vortex going so I don't waste a gallon due to sediment
6. Cleaning out the spent grains really sucks. Maybe one of the jumbo bags next time would be an improvement

8.5 you did great for yourfirst ag, i think mine was 11 hours

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bf514921 wrote:8.5 you did great for yourfirst ag, i think mine was 11 hours

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I second that, practice makes perfect, you'll find tricks and other things you get your process time down. Most AG brewers average between 5 and 7 hours by the time they get things figured out with their system. There is hope, welcome to addiction!

Yeah, hitting temps is the most time consuming. Clean-up can be done in parallel or during the 60-90 minute boil.

Once you have your process down, then you can time manage many of the tasks and work more efficiently.

I am all over the place with timing, because I have made many changes and additions to my system over the past 2 years....so mine is still a work in progress.

Matt F. I think has a very efficient brew day...but I think he has an electric HERMS....heating up to the strike temp might still take time, but it is set electronically so that you do not have to watch over it.

BUT....you've done the hard part...and that is overcoming the intimidation of doing all-grain....it really is not that hard to craft really good beer from all grain as long as you have a clean and sterile system, reasonably good ingredients, and healthy yeast (I'm a big fan of yeast starters).

Focus on your process and getting it down without having to follow a script....and then you can begin to focus on other things, one at a time to improve your results.

Friendly reminder...we are meeting at Clock House tonight....7 PM social hour and meeting begins around 8 PM.

My system is a HERMS and I preheat all my water with an electric HLT. Very slick. I crush grain and prep water night before. Still takes me 6-7 hours. If I step mash it adds time. I do a lot of post-boil whirlpool hops in my IPAs too which can add an hour. Sounds like your first AG went pretty well.