AustinBrewDawg
Well-Known Member
So last year about this time I had a brew so frustrating that I had to put it down for a while. I was attempting my 1st all-grain batch (BIAB) and ran across issue after issue. First, the smell of the mash process overwhelmed the house so bad that SWMBO left a very unhappy camper and was not happy with yours truly. Second, I hit my efficiency so low (only hit ~1.035 on a target of >1.070) that I debated even pitching/fermenting. Lastly, after deciding to ferment it, I put it on my brand new kegging system which lost ALL of the CO2 in a 24 hour period, thus leaving me to determine if I'm leaking at the bottle, manifold, valve, ball lock or keg lid. All in all, I was frustrated and had to take a break.
Fast forward a year, SWMBO and I are in a new, bigger house with large back patio, I get my old turkey fryer out of mothballs and decide to give it another shot. This time, I decide to do a lower gravity Hefeweizen (based on Jamil's Harold-is-Weizen), brew outside (so as not to inundate the house with offending odors), and specify an extra fine crush from LHBS so that I can start isolating efficiency issues. In my mind, I'm thinking that potential issues before were: fineness of the crush, pH of my mash water (City of Austin Municipal Supply), goofiness with mash temps, and sparging effort. I also decide to do a 4 gallon batch instead of 5 gallons.
So, I start yesterday morning at 9 am with 18 qts of strike water in my 40 quart pot heated to 165 degrees (calculated on iBrewmaster for iPad) and doughed-in 4.5 lbs of Pilsener malt and 4.5 lbs of Red Wheat (LHBS was out of all other wheat malt). I used 2.0 qt/lb for mashing because my sparge water pot is smaller and can only hold about 4 gallons of water. After dough-in, the mash dropped to 154 (target was 152). I covered the pot and after about 20 minutes the temperature dropped to 149. Since I wanted to mash at 152 I fired up the fryer again in an attempt to "goose it" back up to ~153 or so. However, I found that the temperature varies greatly in different parts of the mash as my thermometer kept reading 149 after goosing it for several minutes. Lifting the lid I found parts of the mash got really hot (over 170) so I cut the flame, left the lid off and stirred constantly. After about another 20 minutes, the mash dropped back down to about 155. At this point, I decided to extend the mash an extra 20 minutes (for a total of 80 minutes from dough-in) to account for the lost time at higher temp. I realize that my theory may be wrong. My pre-boil OG was 1.036 (target was 1.040). After the 80 minute mash, I heated the mash to 170. Then, I lifted the grain bag&basket, dunked it in my sparge pot where I had 12 qts of 170 water. Then, I placed the basket over the mash pot and set it on a BBQ grate. I poured the dunk sparge over the grains and then used the lid from the sparge pot to squeeze the grains. I proceeded with a 90 minute boil adding 0.67 ozs of Hallertau at the 30 minute mark.
After chilling, my OG came out at 1.048 (target was 1.054) this corresponds to an efficiency of 64% (target was 70%). So I'm still having a few issues, but definitely getting closer. Assuming I attenuate down to the expected 1.014, my predicted ABV will still be well within the style. I pitched a vial of White Labs 300 (Hefeweizen Ale) and set it in my keezer set to 62 degrees. Checked the keezer this morning and I already have a nice foamy krausen and airlock activity.
All in all, this brew day went MUCH smoother and SWMBO was still talking to me after. I think my potential efficiency issues are: mash pH (didn't monitor this time), goofy temperature fluctuations, the crush is still not fine enough (there were still a lot of barely cracked kernels). Next time, I plan to buy some pH strips to monitor and be more careful with goosing the temperature. My instincts are telling to stick with small beers for a couple more rounds, so I'll probably do a blonde ale or maybe a saison. Although my mouth is watering for a big Belgian IPA.
Anyway, typing this was more therapeutic than anything, so if anyone took the trouble to read through all that, feel free to tell me what you think if you'd like. I'm open to any and all feedback. Regrettably, I didn't take any pictures, but I will post a pic of the finished product.
Fast forward a year, SWMBO and I are in a new, bigger house with large back patio, I get my old turkey fryer out of mothballs and decide to give it another shot. This time, I decide to do a lower gravity Hefeweizen (based on Jamil's Harold-is-Weizen), brew outside (so as not to inundate the house with offending odors), and specify an extra fine crush from LHBS so that I can start isolating efficiency issues. In my mind, I'm thinking that potential issues before were: fineness of the crush, pH of my mash water (City of Austin Municipal Supply), goofiness with mash temps, and sparging effort. I also decide to do a 4 gallon batch instead of 5 gallons.
So, I start yesterday morning at 9 am with 18 qts of strike water in my 40 quart pot heated to 165 degrees (calculated on iBrewmaster for iPad) and doughed-in 4.5 lbs of Pilsener malt and 4.5 lbs of Red Wheat (LHBS was out of all other wheat malt). I used 2.0 qt/lb for mashing because my sparge water pot is smaller and can only hold about 4 gallons of water. After dough-in, the mash dropped to 154 (target was 152). I covered the pot and after about 20 minutes the temperature dropped to 149. Since I wanted to mash at 152 I fired up the fryer again in an attempt to "goose it" back up to ~153 or so. However, I found that the temperature varies greatly in different parts of the mash as my thermometer kept reading 149 after goosing it for several minutes. Lifting the lid I found parts of the mash got really hot (over 170) so I cut the flame, left the lid off and stirred constantly. After about another 20 minutes, the mash dropped back down to about 155. At this point, I decided to extend the mash an extra 20 minutes (for a total of 80 minutes from dough-in) to account for the lost time at higher temp. I realize that my theory may be wrong. My pre-boil OG was 1.036 (target was 1.040). After the 80 minute mash, I heated the mash to 170. Then, I lifted the grain bag&basket, dunked it in my sparge pot where I had 12 qts of 170 water. Then, I placed the basket over the mash pot and set it on a BBQ grate. I poured the dunk sparge over the grains and then used the lid from the sparge pot to squeeze the grains. I proceeded with a 90 minute boil adding 0.67 ozs of Hallertau at the 30 minute mark.
After chilling, my OG came out at 1.048 (target was 1.054) this corresponds to an efficiency of 64% (target was 70%). So I'm still having a few issues, but definitely getting closer. Assuming I attenuate down to the expected 1.014, my predicted ABV will still be well within the style. I pitched a vial of White Labs 300 (Hefeweizen Ale) and set it in my keezer set to 62 degrees. Checked the keezer this morning and I already have a nice foamy krausen and airlock activity.
All in all, this brew day went MUCH smoother and SWMBO was still talking to me after. I think my potential efficiency issues are: mash pH (didn't monitor this time), goofy temperature fluctuations, the crush is still not fine enough (there were still a lot of barely cracked kernels). Next time, I plan to buy some pH strips to monitor and be more careful with goosing the temperature. My instincts are telling to stick with small beers for a couple more rounds, so I'll probably do a blonde ale or maybe a saison. Although my mouth is watering for a big Belgian IPA.
Anyway, typing this was more therapeutic than anything, so if anyone took the trouble to read through all that, feel free to tell me what you think if you'd like. I'm open to any and all feedback. Regrettably, I didn't take any pictures, but I will post a pic of the finished product.
