Adjusting grain bill due to good efficiency?

[BansheeRider]

I have been brewing AG for a couple months. I get about 80-85% efficiency with my setup and I am just realizing that I need to adjust the recipe to keep the beer within style correct? I was inputing a recipe into beer smith from Northern Brewer and the expected OG is off the chart due to my efficiency. How do you guys adjust for this? Less base malts and specialty grains or what? I also realized that if adjusting the grain bill the hop additions must be adjusted as well.

 

[chickypad]

I don't know how others do it but I just keep the recipe percentages the same. If your gravity is the same as the original recipe it shouldn't affect the hop additions.

 

[BansheeRider]

I don't know how others do it but I just keep the recipe percentages the same. If your gravity is the same as the original recipe it shouldn't affect the hop additions.

My OG is always very high compared to the original recipe due to my efficiency. The buttering hops need to be adjusted due to the higher gravity.

 

[chickypad]

My OG is always very high compared to the original recipe due to my efficiency. The buttering hops need to be adjusted due to the higher gravity.

Yes but you said you're going to adjust the grainbill to fit the recipe. If you do that don't adjust the hops.

 

[MindenMan]

If your O.G. is constantly higher than expected, you could percentage wise reduce your grain bill to hit right on, or you could could add more water to adjust your O.G./F.G., or you could try out free Brew Mate software. If you punch in all your numbers for a particular style, and you want to change volume, IBU's, etc., anytime you change one number the software automatically scales all the other ingredients up or down as needed. I use it often as well as QBrew, or Brewtarget, depending on what end result I want.

 

[BansheeRider]

Yes but you said you're going to adjust the grainbill to fit the recipe. If you do that don't adjust the hops.

Maybe I'm not wording this correctly....the grain bill must be adjusted to stay within the recipes OG. So if the recipe calls for an OG of 1063 I will get an OG of 1090 because of my 85% efficiency, which also results in a higher ABV. The hops must be adjusted because the higher OG is a higher concentrated wort which needs more bittering. My question is.....how is this accomplished, adjusting base malts and specialty grains, or just base malt, or what? I don't want to make an american amber with an OG of 1080 and 9% ABV when the recipe calls for an 6% ABV beer with a 1055 OG.

 

[BansheeRider]

If your O.G. is constantly higher than expected, you could percentage wise reduce your grain bill to hit right on, or you could could add more water to adjust your O.G./F.G., or you could try out free Brew Mate software. If you punch in all your numbers for a particular style, and you want to change volume, IBU's, etc., anytime you change one number the software automatically scales all the other ingredients up or down as needed. I use it often as well as QBrew, or Brewtarget, depending on what end result I want.

I have beer smith, still learning the software.

 

[thadius856]

BeerSmith is easy. Top of the recipe page, click "Adjust Gravity". Type the desired OG. Done.

You should be entering the AA of your specific hops (assuming you buy in bulk) into your Inventory page. When you make a recipe, it'll automatically use that AA level. Similarly, you should hit "Adjust Bitterness" on most recipes. It isn't unusual to vary from what I have by 20%+.

 

[BansheeRider]

BeerSmith is easy. Top of the recipe page, click "Adjust Gravity". Type the desired OG. Done.

You should be entering the AA of your specific hops (assuming you buy in bulk) into your Inventory page. When you make a recipe, it'll automatically use that AA level. Similarly, you should hit "Adjust Bitterness" on most recipes. It isn't unusual to vary from what I have by 20%+.

Ok so I can enter the original recipe and click on the "adjust OG" and "adjust bitterness" and beersmith will change to quantities of both the grains and hops?

 

[thadius856]

Ok so I can enter the original recipe and click on the "adjust OG" and "adjust bitterness" and beersmith will change to quantities of both the grains and hops?

Correct. My workflow looks like this:

Enter original recipe (regardless of size).
Select my equipment profile (batch size and tot eff should update).
Click 'Adj Gravity'. Enter OG from recipe.
Click 'Adj Bitterness'. Enter IBU from recipe.

Note you need to manually adjust 0 minute and dry hop amounts, as they don't affect bitterness (at least according to BS2).

 

[chickypad]

No - hit the scale recipe button in the top left corner and then you can enter your efficiency and it will scale the inputted grainbill to achieve this. Note that it DOES NOT change the hops, because you are making your OG match the OG of the original recipe. There is no need to adjust the hops, that's what I was trying to say.

Edit: looks like there is 2 ways to do it - single button scale recipe or adjust gravity and bitterness separately as above. Either way though for a given gravity you should not need to adjust the hops from the original. If you do it in the 2 steps it will initially change the hops when you change gravity, then when you hit the adjust bitterness it brings the hops back up to the original recipe numbers.

 

[thadius856]

No - hit the scale recipe button in the top left corner and then you can enter your efficiency and it will scale the inputted grainbill to achieve this. Note that it DOES NOT change the hops, because you are making your OG match the OG of the original recipe. There is no need to adjust the hops, that's what I was trying to say.

Edit: looks like there is 2 ways to do it - single button scale recipe or adjust gravity and bitterness separately as above. Either way though for a given gravity you should not need to adjust the bitterness.

For a given gravity, no. Hopping does not matter. However, that's not the point I was trying to make.

Your efficiency and the efficiency of the person who wrote the recipe will almost always be different. Likewise, the AA of your hops and the AA of their hops will be different.

You most definitely should adjust for differences in alpha acids...

Edit: ...at least, if your intent is to clone what they have made.

 

[EarlyAmateurZymurgist]

You should read the article that I recently posted.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/entries/A-Practial-Method-for-Grist-Formulation-and-Scaling.html