Fathers day Brewday.. Fail?

[DarthCitra]

This was my first recipe i made myself after being inspired by Saison Rue from the Bruery. Im an IPA fanatic and wanted to see how a 100% Brett IPA would turn out. I just recently got some new equipment and was excited to try it out. Set up my new outside burner in the backyard along with my new IC, gathered my ingredients for the brew 10lbs of 2-row, some acid malt, 1lb wheat malt, .5lb carapils, some 40L, corn sugar, and my whirlfloc tablet. Also had my blend of zythos, Galaxy and Amarillo.
Once strike water was up to temp, I started to mash in, After about 9lbs of grain in i started to see that i had too much water in my kettle (fyi BIAB). Started to stir much slower being extra careful not to spill. Thought i was good to go after getting it all in there, put the lid and and SPLASH, all over my food and leg, thought oh well **** happens and let it sit for the 60 mins i planned to mash. once 60 mins was over i grabbed a strainer to set my bag in so i could drain and sparge...set my bag on the strainer and BAM fell into the wort and splashed all over me and my wife who was watching me struggle trying not to laugh.
After that sticky mess on my arms and legs and crusty hair had my boil going strong with my 55,000 BTU burner. Used a few drops of Fermcap-S just in case...i threw some steaks on the grill, look over and have my first boilover, Ran over and started blowing on the pot to try and control the mess being made (Thank god this was outside). Added my bittering hops and went with my schedule (60-15-10-5-whirlpool). Once my time was up on the 60min boil i realized i didnt throw my IC in the sanitize...oh ****... grabbed my bucket of starsan and dunked the IC in there for a few minutes and went with it.

I must say the IC sped things up and is a gift from the Gods!! I walk inside while its cooling and see my whirlfloc tablet, the 40L and my sugar still on the table! After a few minutes of cursing at myself, realized my steaks havent been turned (thank god only burnt my steak!)

I undershot my gravity by quite a bit since i forgot the 40L and sugar, once i removed those from my software, it predicted 1.066 and i hit 1.064. Not bad i guess for my second all grain go.
Still had an awesome father day.

Sorry for the long post and probably terrible grammar... Typing this at work going back and forth. but, let me know how your fathers day brewday went!

 

[peterj]

Haha wow, sounds like you had a lot going on! Also sounds like you need a bigger kettle!

Also, you don't have to sanitize the IC. I just put mine in for the last 5 minutes or so of the boil, but you could just put it in after flameout. The near boiling wort is enough to sanitize it.

You could also have added the sugar while the wort was still hot. Or you can add it right now by dissolving it in a little bit of water, bring that to a boil, cool, and add it to the fermenter. This is actually a good method for adding larger amounts of simple sugars.

The 40L you may just have to go without. Unless you wanted to steep that in the water you're going to dissolve the sugar in. Sounds like it should turn out just fine either way though.

I just got done moving so it's been a while (and will probably be a while more) since I've brewed anything. It's killing me!!

 

[kh54s10]

Well, you didn't brew what you initially intended. But, YOU MADE BEER!

If you put your IC into 200 plus degree wort you really have nothing to worry about.

Until you have your processes down so that you don't really have to think about things I would limit the grilling to, before or after brewing or possibly during the mash time.

What you experienced is most of why I dislike doing BIAB.

Why wasn't the crystal 40L in with the rest of your grain?

 

[kh54s10]

peterj, Good call on the sugar.

 

[DarthCitra]

Haha wow, sounds like you had a lot going on! Also sounds like you need a bigger kettle!

Also, you don't have to sanitize the IC. I just put mine in for the last 5 minutes or so of the boil, but you could just put it in after flameout. The near boiling wort is enough to sanitize it.

You could also have added the sugar while the wort was still hot. Or you can add it right now by dissolving it in a little bit of water, bring that to a boil, cool, and add it to the fermenter. This is actually a good method for adding larger amounts of simple sugars.

The 40L you may just have to go without. Unless you wanted to steep that in the water you're going to dissolve the sugar in. Sounds like it should turn out just fine either way though.

I just got done moving so it's been a while (and will probably be a while more) since I've brewed anything. It's killing me!!

I can add the sugar after fermentation already started? i was surprised when i woke up today that the brett has started!

and thank you for the suggestion on the IC. Hopefully you can start brewing soon man!

 

[DarthCitra]

Well, you didn't brew what you initially intended. But, YOU MADE BEER!

If you put your IC into 200 plus degree wort you really have nothing to worry about.

Until you have your processes down so that you don't really have to think about things I would limit the grilling to, before or after brewing or possibly during the mash time.

What you experienced is most of why I dislike doing BIAB.

Why wasn't the crystal 40L in with the rest of your grain?

I just dont have the money to throw into a mash cooler or anything fancy like that. I just grabbed my box of the grains i just received in the mail leaving behind some of my extra 40L in my pantry.

 

[peterj]

I can add the sugar after fermentation already started? i was surprised when i woke up today that the brett has started!

and thank you for the suggestion on the IC. Hopefully you can start brewing soon man!

Yeah definitely. That's actually the preferred method for beers with high proportions of simple sugars (like tripels, dubbels, and things like that) because if you add the simple sugar up front the yeast will go for that first. Then the yeast can adapt to just eating the simple sugar and may not be able to process maltose as well as they should, which can lead to under attenuation. So people will let them reproduce and get to work with just the maltose, then when fermentation starts to slow down just after high krausen you can add the simple sugar dissolved in water.

 

[kh54s10]

I just dont have the money to throw into a mash cooler or anything fancy like that. I just grabbed my box of the grains i just received in the mail leaving behind some of my extra 40L in my pantry.

BIAB is a good way to brew and a lot of all grain brewers do nothing else.

I do BIAB occasionally, but I prefer my 3 tier system.

I mill my own grains so everything gets weighed out into a bucket then milled into a second bucket. So all the grains go into the mash at the same time.

 

[DarthCitra]

Awesome! i will definitely use your advice and wait for that krausen to fall. Any tips on when i should check that it fell since i have it in a bucket and not my glass carboy? Also my first time using a bucket for fermentation.

 

[charliehorse]

I've added sugars (maple syrup, molasses, inverted sugar) into a secondary fermentation too (I just had to use a "tertiary" fermentation afterwards. Just remember, at the end of the day, you'll have beer and at an OG or 1.064, it'll give you a buzz.