BIAB vs AG recipes

[GPa Bob]

I have done 3 homebrews now. All were extract kits. Two came out excellent, the third hasn't been bottled yet. I have a 10 gallon brewing kettle thanks to excellent advice from some HBT members. Now I am thinking of going to all-grain brewing. However, I am 78 years old and don’t want to invest a couple of hundred bucks into a large AG kit. My question is if I go to BIAB, which is essentially AG, does the recipe change? … or is it just the brewing method that changes? I am hoping with a 10 gallon kettle I can do a 5 gallon BIAB. Thanks!

 

[Keith81]

BIAB is just a method for doing all grain so you should be good in terms of recipe. I don't BIAB so someone else will have to answer if the 10 gallon pot is large enough. My thought is that worst case scenario would be that you'd have to mash with less than full volume and then sparge.

 

[GPa Bob]

[ I don't BIAB so someone else will have to answer if the 10 gallon pot is large enough. My thought is that worst case scenario would be that you'd have to mash with less than full volume and then sparge.[/QUOTE]

Yes, I thought if I lost too much water, I would top it after I pull the bag and before I brought it to a full boil.

 

[daveMN]

All you really need for equipment is the BIAB bag. A ratcheting pulley is a nice addition, if you have some place overhead to attach it. I just taught a friend to brew all grain with BIAB. It's a good way to get started with all grain. Less equipment and a simpler process.

 

[JDXX1971]

I just looked at my Beer Smith program and for 1.050-1.060 beers 5 gallon batches on my system I would use pretty much all of that ten gallon space. Perfectly doable in your kettle I am sure though you may have to sparge a little on some brews. Get in touch with @wilserbrewer , get a bag and get to it!!

 

[auburntsts]

A 10 gal kettle can do a full vol, no sparge 5 gal BIAB batch. Of course you don't have to go full vol, no sparge if capacity is an issue, like in the case of a recipe with a very large grain bill. Regardless, the AG recipe (the grain bill) doesn't change but you'll get better results BIAB if you crush your grain (or have it crushed) much finer than you would for a traditional mash technique.

 

[Lefou]

I use a combination of one 5gal and one 7.5gal steel kettle to mash and brew AG on the stovetop.
BIAB is no problem and if you tend to like lighter SRM, lower gravity beers, doing five gallon brews should be no problem. I set my efficiencies up, then figure grain weights for a 3-4 gallon mash, then dilute.
Doing a 1.050-1.060 beer? No problem.
Adjust your water/grain ratio and sparge accordingly - or not.

 

[LostHopper]

Google: Alton Brown Turkey Derrick for managing heavy grain bag. Works great

 

[LostHopper]

Note: that photo was my first attempt. It worked but I've since adjusted pulleys so bag is more centered.

 

[GPa Bob]

Regardless, the AG recipe (the grain bill) doesn't change but you'll get better results BIAB if you crush your grain (or have it crushed) much finer than you would for a traditional mash technique.

Thanks, all for your advice. I will keep the above in mind.

 

[Yooper]

Thanks, all for your advice. I will keep the above in mind.

I love to look at members' names and see what they may say about them. GPa Bob means you're a grandpa named Bob? I'm married to a Grandpa Bob, and that's the first thing that caught my eye.

Welcome to the forum- we're glad to have you.

 

[GPa Bob]

GPa Bob means you're a grandpa named Bob? I'm married to a Grandpa Bob, and that's the first thing that caught my eye.

Thank you!!! Yup a grandpa 9 times. All wonderful grandkids!!

 

[Murphys_Law]

10G kettle is just fine for BIAB 5G batches! Get a good rope and pully system because you don’t want to be lifting the bag!

 

[EDF713]

Get a wilserbrewer bag (http://biabbags.webs.com) with the pulley, double crush your grain, use beersmith or biabcalculator.com to calculate volumes and temps, and follow the water chemistry primer in the brewing science forum, and your good to go. I’ve done full volume mashes of 1.050 and below in an 8 gallon pot. 10 will be plenty.

 

[jan_b19]

Usually you can use AG recipes for BIAB. There might be a lower efficiency So you might need to adjust the grain bill a bit. Then again you need to adjust any recipe to your system no matter what method you use. As said before just make sure your grain is crushed fine enough.

 

[North_of_60]

This I my BIAB set up. It’s a 10 gallon kettle. I do 5 gallon batches. The biggest I’ve done was a stout at 14.5 lbs of grain with a 1.063 OG. There would be room for a bigger beer but that’s as big as I go. Even at 1.063 I consistently get 76% brew house efficiency. I put the bag in the basket and mash for 90 minutes. That’s probably longer than necessary but it’s what I do. Then I lift the basket with the grains and set it on a grill placed on top of the kettle and sparge with 170 degree water to bring it up to my boil volumn. Then squeeze the bag really good and boil.

I paid $50 for the kettle and basket and $12 for the bag.

I use BeerSmith for building recipes.

 

[Kharnynb]

I've done the westvleteren 12 recipe biab in a 7.5 gallon kettle, just needs more sparging and a second kettle for overflow wort....

 

[Gavin C]

I have done 3 homebrews now. All were extract kits. Two came out excellent, the third hasn't been bottled yet. I have a 10 gallon brewing kettle thanks to excellent advice from some HBT members. Now I am thinking of going to all-grain brewing. However, I am 78 years old and don’t want to invest a couple of hundred bucks into a large AG kit. My question is if I go to BIAB, which is essentially AG, does the recipe change? … or is it just the brewing method that changes? I am hoping with a 10 gallon kettle I can do a 5 gallon BIAB. Thanks!

A 10 gallon pot is very good for 5 gallon batches. I have done it many times. There are some links in my signature covering the details. A few pictures there to illustrate the process. I have made 5.5 gallon batch beers beers at over 1.07 SG with full volume mashes. The system can work well and give pleasing results in my limited experience.

The only adjustments to a recipe are related to your efficiency. The same is true of any setup. Learn what your expected brewhouse efficiency is. This will change with respect to grain bill. Adjust your recipe accordingly.

Plan the beer, brew the plan.

 

[PADave]

Same recipe works just fine. A 10 gallon kettle is perfect. I've easily done 5 gallon, full volume, no sparge 1.075 brews in mine.

 

[brew703]

I just started brewing 5 gal batches now that I have my keezer set up.

I rarely brew a beer that is bigger than 1.060. Most are 1.050 and under (session beers).

I too have a 10 gal kettle. For a 1.050 beer you will use approx. 10 lb of grain which you will need about 8.6 gallons of strike water.

Once the grains are added it will almost max out the kettle. What happens for me is when I hoist the bag out some of the wort spills out over the top of the kettle. So what I have done is to measure out my strike water then withhold 1-2 gallons so I have more room to mash and no chance of losing any wort when I hoist out the bag. Once I begin the boil process I add back the water I withheld, give it a good stir then take my OG measurement.

Get a Wilserbrewer bag with ratchet. It will make your brewing much easier.

 

[RM-MN]

I just started brewing 5 gal batches now that I have my keezer set up.

I rarely brew a beer that is bigger than 1.060. Most are 1.050 and under (session beers).

I too have a 10 gal kettle. For a 1.050 beer you will use approx. 10 lb of grain which you will need about 8.6 gallons of strike water.

Once the grains are added it will almost max out the kettle. What happens for me is when I hoist the bag out some of the wort spills out over the top of the kettle. So what I have done is to measure out my strike water then withhold 1-2 gallons so I have more room to mash and no chance of losing any wort when I hoist out the bag. Once I begin the boil process I add back the water I withheld, give it a good stir then take my OG measurement.

Get a Wilserbrewer bag with ratchet. It will make your brewing much easier.

I would use about 8 pounds of grain (base malt) and 7 gallons of water for that same brew. Milling the grains finer will raise the mash efficiency to make up the difference in the amount of grains and controlling the amount of heat added during the boil will reduce the amount boiled off. All you need for a boil is a slow rolling of the wort. I typically boil off between 1/2 and 3/4 gallon.

 

[PADave]

I just started brewing 5 gal batches now that I have my keezer set up.

I rarely brew a beer that is bigger than 1.060. Most are 1.050 and under (session beers).

I too have a 10 gal kettle. For a 1.050 beer you will use approx. 10 lb of grain which you will need about 8.6 gallons of strike water.

Once the grains are added it will almost max out the kettle. What happens for me is when I hoist the bag out some of the wort spills out over the top of the kettle. So what I have done is to measure out my strike water then withhold 1-2 gallons so I have more room to mash and no chance of losing any wort when I hoist out the bag. Once I begin the boil process I add back the water I withheld, give it a good stir then take my OG measurement.

Get a Wilserbrewer bag with ratchet. It will make your brewing much easier.

I agree with RM-MN, that's a lot of strike water. For example I'm planning tomorrows brew and it's 1.055 OG. I'll use 11 lbs. of grain and 7.4 gal of water. Will end up with 5.5 gal in the fermenter. .5 gal grain absorption, 1 gal boil off, .4 gal kettle loss.

 

[brew703]

I agree with RM-MN, that's a lot of strike water. For example I'm planning tomorrows brew and it's 1.055 OG. I'll use 11 lbs. of grain and 7.4 gal of water. Will end up with 5.5 gal in the fermenter. .5 gal grain absorption, 1 gal boil off, .4 gal kettle loss.

I use Priceless Brewing's water calculator. I will be brewing next weekend. 1.050/ 10.75 grain / 8.71 oz hops (3oz are dh)/ .08 grain absorbtion / .040 hop absorbtion / 1 gal boil off / .4 kettle loss / .4 packaging loss / 8.09 gal strike water yields 5.5 gal to fermenter and 5 gal to keg .
So yeah you're right. A little off on the strike water. Something for me isn't matching up if you are using more grain and less water than I am.

 

[RM-MN]

I use Priceless Brewing's water calculator. I will be brewing next weekend. 1.050/ 10.75 grain / 8.71 oz hops (3oz are dh)/ .08 grain absorbtion / .040 hop absorbtion / 1 gal boil off / .4 kettle loss / .4 packaging loss / 8.09 gal strike water yields 5.5 gal to fermenter and 5 gal to keg .
So yeah you're right. A little off on the strike water. Something for me isn't matching up if you are using more grain and less water than I am.

I have a wee bit of Scottish blood in me. I squeeze ALL the wort out of the grain.

 

[brewgar]

Thanks, all for your advice. I will keep the above in mind.

All the above is great information. Also recommended: RO/DI water, Priceless Brewing calculator, and Bru'n Water calculator. Like you, I'm in my mid 70's, and highly recommend the above mentioned pulley arrangement for bag draining, as well as a temperature (InkBird) controlled refrigerator for fermentation.

Best wishes for happy brewing and delicious beers.

 

[GPa Bob]

All the above is great information. Also recommended: RO/DI water, Priceless Brewing calculator, and Bru'n Water calculator. Like you, I'm in my mid 70's, and highly recommend the above mentioned pulley arrangement for bag draining, as well as a temperature (InkBird) controlled refrigerator for fermentation.

Yup, my local grocery store sells RO for 39 cents per gallon ... or 5 gal for $1.89. That's hard to beat. The pulley is also a must! Living in Minnesota, my basement temperature is 62 degrees F. Too warm for a lager, but not bad for ale.

 

[r4dyce]

Yup, my local grocery store sells RO for 39 cents per gallon ... or 5 gal for $1.89. That's hard to beat. The pulley is also a must! Living in Minnesota, my basement temperature is 62 degrees F. Too warm for a lager, but not bad for ale.

You might be surprised, theres now lots of evidence out there that warm fermented lager yeasts perform quite well. Pitch rate and temperature consistency seem to be more important than exact numerical temperature.

 

[Kharnynb]

I would at least give it a shot with your own water first before going all nuts with ro and minerals.

I think there is a certain charm to your beer having something "local", unless your water tastes like it came out of a swimming pool...

 

[azmark]

RO water would also be local, just with the crud removed.

 

[Jayjay1976]

RO water would also be local, just with the crud removed.

Correction: Ro water would be local, just with the local removed.

IMHO, unless you're trying to simulate the exact water profile of a geographic location specific to a particular style, i.e. Bavarian hefeweizen, ordinary good-tasting tap water (treated with metabisulphite to remove chloramine) will produce perfectly good beers. Well, so long as your mash pH isn't out of whack. In other words, don't burn your house down just because the gutters need a cleaning.

Water chemistry, like nearly every aspect of this hobby, is something you can choose to either gloss over (as most do) or become needlessly obsessed with. But if you find yourself with an excess of time, patience, and money, by all means dive right in. I'm looking at you LODO-divas, home-maltsters, hop growers, and full-automation guys; lots of fun to be had but wholly unnecessary.

In my experience there are lots of cheaper, easier, and more fool-proof ways such as dialing in your process and perfecting your recipes that will produce real, tangible improvements in your beer.

 

[SoCal-Doug]

Yup, my local grocery store sells RO for 39 cents per gallon ... or 5 gal for $1.89. That's hard to beat. The pulley is also a must! Living in Minnesota, my basement temperature is 62 degrees F. Too warm for a lager, but not bad for ale.

Not sure about your part of the country, but in the southwest "water" stores are becoming more popular, most commonly in "lower socioeconomic" areas of town. You might do a search in your area. I found a couple places that sell RO water (and have full commercial RO setups in house) for 20 cents a gallon. Probably because our tap water around here really does taste terrible and barely passes state and federal standards.

 

[Owly055]

The idea that you must crush finer is really not valid in my opinion, or from what experience I've had using grain crushed at the home brew store. I would however have them crush twice. There is more than one way people measure efficiency, but who cares? Efficiency is less important than product quality. With a finer crush, you will end up with more trub, so even though your OG measures high, your net efficiency is reduced, as you brew fewer bottles of beer due to the trub. I've hit over 90% calculated efficiency with BIAB using an .030 feeler between my rollers..... which was standard for me. The level of trub however probably cost me a quarter of a bottle of beer from a 3 gallon brew over the courser crush. In the end it was a wash. Grain cost is the least of your expenses. Do you care if you have to buy an ounce or two more grain to hit the desired ABV? Do you really care if you have 5.9% or 6%? The game is about making good beer, not about achieving benchmarks.
RO water is NOT the way to start out if you have decent local water, but may be your only option...... Why take everything out and then add it back? If your local water is crap, then think about buying bottled non-ro water to start. You don't want chlorine, but it's fairly easy to remove. Building your own water from RO is a last resort, an extra unnecessary step. If your local water worked well for extract brewing, it should work well for all grain, provided the PH is within range and it has no chlorine. Inexpensive campden tablets available from your LHBS store will do job fine........ boiling will also. A little googling will turn up lots of info on this.

There is no better way to discourage someone from brewing than to introduce lots of complexity into what is a truly simple endeavor.

I would also STRONGLY suggest buying a couple of corny kegs early on. The cost will seem trivial compared to the labor of cleaning and sanitizing bottles. I resorted to the mini kegs that Williams Brewing sells, and some paint ball bottles for CO2....... the kegs fit in the fridge easily, and I charged my kegs periodically instead of leaving them on the bottle in the end. You will never regret doing it. But you have to reach "bottle burnout" first ;-)

............. disclaimer: I no longer brew. I had to quit brewing and mostly quit drinking for health reasons, but I've brewed in the neighborhood of 200 brews.

H.W.

 

[deadwolfbones]

I've been doing 3gal batches in a 6gal kettle. Works great. With pre-crushed grain, assuming a single crush, I put it in a freezer bag and pound it on a hard surface with a rubber mallet to double-crush. My efficiency is around 78%, so I've actually had to scale some generic AG recipes down, not up.

(Just found an online supply store that does double crush for free, though, so hopefully the mallet is a thing of the past.)

 

[PADave]

Correction: Ro water would be local, just with the local removed.

IMHO, unless you're trying to simulate the exact water profile of a geographic location specific to a particular style, i.e. Bavarian hefeweizen, ordinary good-tasting tap water (treated with metabisulphite to remove chloramine) will produce perfectly good beers. Well, so long as your mash pH isn't out of whack. In other words, don't burn your house down just because the gutters need a cleaning.

Water chemistry, like nearly every aspect of this hobby, is something you can choose to either gloss over (as most do) or become needlessly obsessed with. But if you find yourself with an excess of time, patience, and money, by all means dive right in. I'm looking at you LODO-divas, home-maltsters, hop growers, and full-automation guys; lots of fun to be had but wholly unnecessary.

In my experience there are lots of cheaper, easier, and more fool-proof ways such as dialing in your process and perfecting your recipes that will produce real, tangible improvements in your beer.

I use to be in this school of thought till I realized that i couldn't make a dark beer. The water I was using made a good IPA, but dark brews never came out right. Learned a little about water chemistry, started building my own water, and my beers have improved a lot. Not all water is the same, and not all water will make good beer.

 

[balrog]

@GPa Bob , 10G kettle with Wilser bag will be great for 5G batches, I've used that for nearly 100 brews. @RM-MN is right about the 8-11# grain, 7 gallons being typical. @Owly055 has a valid point about crush. I've bought double crush for a long time from Ritebrew and everything was very consistent brew to brew for efficiency. I recently went with a Corona mill and I'm still finding efficiency differences (wheat malt crushes differently due to size or general orneriness) but 4-6 gravity points is all I'm seeing.

But your kit will be great, with a bag, for 5G batches. And AG means you get to try all manner and kind of interesting combinations.