Converting Extract to All-grain: Pilsen Munich and Rice Solids Extract

[woozy]

So I'm drinking my second batch, a Blonde, and it's really good. So I'd like to make it again. But I'm thinking I'd like to try it as an all-grain.

Any ideas how?

4 lbs. Pilsen- Liquid malt extract
2 lbs. Munich- Liquid malt extract
1 lb. Rice Extracts

1/2 lb. Carapils
1/2 lb. Honey Malt

1 oz Liberty(bittering)
1/2 oz U.S. Saaz(flavor)
1 oz Cascade (aroma)

Windsor Dry or WLP002 English Ale or WLP011 European Ale

really yummy by the way. I recommend it. Maybe I'll do another extract...

 

[Yooper]

So I'm drinking my second batch, a Blonde, and it's really good. So I'd like to make it again. But I'm thinking I'd like to try it as an all-grain.

Any ideas how?

4 lbs. Pilsen- Liquid malt extract
2 lbs. Munich- Liquid malt extract
1 lb. Rice Extracts

1/2 lb. Carapils
1/2 lb. Honey Malt

1 oz Liberty(bittering)
1/2 oz U.S. Saaz(flavor)
1 oz Cascade (aroma)

Windsor Dry or WLP002 English Ale or WLP011 European Ale

really yummy by the way. I recommend it. Maybe I'll do another extract...

You can just use pilsner malt for the pilsen LME, Munich malt for the Munich LME, and Flaked rice for the rice.

The amounts will be a little tricky, due to conversion and Munich LME isn't 100% Munich malt.

I'd go with

6.5 pounds pilsner malt
1 pound Munich malt
1 pound flaked rice
all else the same

That should work out, depending on your efficiency.

 

[woozy]

Thank you.

=====
Well, I mucked about with brewing calculators and got with 78% efficiency got similar results. Well, I got ridiculous units of 7/40 ... but if I round, ... well, similar enough... In percentages I got 70% pilsner, 15% Munich, 15% rice and 8.25 lbs total.)

So, my research says Munich is 50 Munich and 50 percent "base malts". In your estimating were you replacing the 50 percent "base malts" with pilsner? To come up with the 6.5 - 1 (rather than 4-2) ratio? If not pilsner, is there another "base malt" I should be substituting?

i.e. 55% pilsner, 15% Munich, 15% Rice, and 15% something else? Mmm, might as well keep it simple to pilsner, Munich, and rice...

 

[woozy]

Boy, *do* I get obsessive when it comes to math!

My final calculations for 5 gallon batch is:

5 lbs Pilsner
1 lb munich
1 lb 6-row
1 1/2 lb flaked rice
1/2 lb carapils
1/2 lb honey malt which at 78% efficiency is an o.g. of 1.054

Took me only 3 1/2 hours to figure out what took Yooper only 10 minutes.

 

[woozy]

Okay, from what I've read this seems to be a rough rule of thumb.

LME seems to have the same PPG as the maximum yield of the grain so simply divide by your efficiency to get the grain. (I'm kind of a little globblewhocky on this concept. Then again the numbers are definitely close enough for a rough estimate.)

1 lb of DME is equivalent to 1.25 lbs of LME so multiply DME by 5/4 and divide by your effeciency.

So: 4 lbs Pilsen LME = 4lb/.78 = 5 1/8 lbs Pilsner grain.
2 lbs Munich = 2/.78 = 2.5 lbs grain half of which is munich and half 6-row ???
1 lb rice solids = 5/4*1/.78 = 1.6 lbs of flaked rice.

Any thoughts? Does this seem reasonable?

It seems to come down to me assumption "LME seems to have the same PPG as the maximum yield of the grain" which is probably *NOT* true but I get it from here. But if as a rule of thumb "most grains yield 80% sugar" (It actually varies from 72 to 80 percent) and it's also true that "most extracts are 20% sugar and 80% water" (I assume that also varies). Then it would follow as a *general* rule of thumb "grains and LME" are basically the same percentage of sugar". And thus this ought to work as a general rule of thumb. At least enough to get you a ball park grain bill which you can tweak later. Right?

 

[rklinck]

Seems to me you are making things way too complicated. Take the OG from the extract recipe and use that to figure out your total grain bill (e.g., I need 9 pounds to get 1.050 for a five gallon batch). Then use the percentages of each type of grain from extract recipe and multiply by total weight.

 

[woozy]

Yeah, that's what I did in the end. For some reason I had a difficult time realizing that if the extracts were in proportion (4 to 2 to 1.25) then the grains would be too. Or in theory close enough. Then when I did I was ridiculously precise. When I did round off I must have have made a math error because when a recalculated the new O.G. it was 12 points higher. Then I did the exact same thing again and got within 1/2 a point with rounding errors.

When you say "I need 9 pounds to get 1.050 for a five gallon batch" are you assuming all grain has more or less the same yield? About 37 PPG? I'm obsessive compulsive so I had to use the individual yields for each grain (pilsner 37, rice 38, munich 35, 6-row 35, carapils 36, Honey Malt 34), subtract the effect of the carapils and honey malt and calculate the other grain bill (8.15 lbs and 36.2 PPG) and then round the units down. And then combine all.

I end up with the same answer you did. 9.15 lbs for 1.052. But I got a lot of satisfaction wrestling and beating it into submission.

Anyway, I'm new enough to All-grain and to brewing that the "9 pounds to get 1.050" isn't as obvious and self-evident as it probably is to you and Yooper. Otherwise I probably wouldn't have asked the question in the first place.

Still not sure what Munich Extract is made of. It's part Munich and part "base malt" which I'm thinking is 6-row but I could be wrong.

 

[rklinck]

I don't worry too much about differences in yield from different grains because my recipes generally are 80% or more base malt plus Munich. Because my recipes are similar in that regard, I can use rules of thumb. It also happens that 90% of the beer I brew ends up in the 1.045-1.055 range, so I know what I need to get there.

You will figure out your own rules of thumb as you brew more and get dialed in.

I would assume the base malt for the Munich extract is either 2 Row or Pilsner. I would just use Pilsner to simplify (that's clearly what Yooper did).

Finally, you should invest in BeerSmith if you don't have it. It is really handy. When I come up with a recipe in my head using my rules of thumb, I put it into BeerSmith to fine tune.

 

[woozy]

Finally, you should invest in BeerSmith if you don't have it. It is really handy. When I come up with a recipe in my head using my rules of thumb, I put it into BeerSmith to fine tune.

yeah.... but until I figure out the rules of thumb beersmith will yield GIGO (garbage in garbage out). Or more accurately, I can't do things right with beersmith if I don't have any concept of what right is.

Wrestling with silly math might not be everyone's idea of fun but they help me nail down concepts.

Side anecdote: I had a crusty old sailing instructor once who had his version of him vs. the high-tech gps story. He was giving a coastal passage class and he was showing how to plot a course. His student and a brand new GPS and wanted to see if it'd plot a course so he entered the marina and got a course straight home. The instructor pointed out that yes it would plot a course straight home-- by way of sailing through the San Francisco Zoo and the Financial District. The thing is, I always figured the instructor took away the wrong moral from the story. He saw the moral as "having proper skills is better than technology". I figured the *real* moral was "Ask and answer the *right* question". The student had asked the GPS for the course to the Berkeley Marina and the GPS gave a perfectly correct answer. It was just an utterly useless question. The instructor in plotting *his* course was asking and answering an *entirely* different question.

I kind of figure Beersmith without understanding the concepts would be similar. I can *so* easily imagine punching in an o.g of 1.052 but forgetting to adjust the volume for 2 gallons or something equally stupid.

 

[rklinck]

Agreed. You need to have a basic understanding or BeerSmith won't help. It lets you check your calcs and fine tune the recipe.