Begin Brewing!

In the last post , I talked about how I select and modify recipes to match my equipment, process, and efficiency. I also talked about how, before I start to brew, I clean, measure, and arrange everything so that the actual brew goes as smoothly as possible. In this post, we're going to look at the mash process and how I typically do it. My brew day sheet tells me how much mash and sparge water I've calculated that I will need based on the grain bill and equipment. I begin by filling The Grainfather with the mash water and dropping in a Campden tablet to remove chlorine and chloramine. I fill my sparge water kettle with the sparge water amount, plus one gallon to account for dead space in the Mega Pot kettle. When The Grainfather has reached the mash temperature (or the temperature of the first step in a multi-step mash), I begin scooping in the crushed grain. Adding crushed grain to the mash water Every few scoops, I stir the grain with the stainless steel spoon you s...

A couple of homebrewing friends have asked me about my process. They want to know how I go from a recipe to a finished beer, the steps I follow, why I follow them, and the tools I use. This post is an attempt to capture and share all the information. It's important to note that my process changes a bit as I learn new things, gain new equipment, or discover better or easier ways to do things. Consider this post a "snapshot" of my process and equipment as it stands right now. Six months from now it could be different. The Equipment My current brewing equipment consists of the following: iMake's The Grainfather RIMS brewing system: This handles mashing, boiling, and chilling of the wort. I also added the Graincoat accessory to reduce heat loss and speed up kettle heating time. An induction cooktop and Mega Pot 1.2 kettle: This provides heated sparge water. I have it on top of a tall table, at a height that I can open the valve on the kettle and have sparge...

A few months ago, I made an attempt to clone the excellent Trappistes Rochefort 10 beer in my Grainfather. The resulting beer turned out well, but had two significant flaws. It had no head when poured into a glass and it was missing a caramel/toffee note that was in the original beer. Since then, I believe I've sorted out the foam/head issues. The original recipe used a high percentage of adjuncts (D-180 candi syrup), relatively low-alpha-acid hops (4% and 6.4%), and probably had yeast that got a bit "tired" after fermenting an 8.5% or higher beer. In this version of the recipe, I've replaced some of the Pilsner malt with Cara-Pils and Melanoidin malts, which I've found produce an excellent creamy head without appearing to affect the flavor of the beer. I also replaced some of the Styrian Goldings hops pellets with German Northern Brewer pellets at 10.1% alpha acid. I'll also bottle the beer with a freshly-rehydrated yeast and priming sugar, which should ens...

Weyerbacher discontinued their Double Simcoe Double IPA recently, and also released the recipe below. If you like that beer and want to try brewing your own, this recipe should get you on the right track quickly. Note: I know this is a DIPA, but the stated hops amounts at flameout and dry-hop seem awfully high to me. The Recipe The recipe is based on the following specifications: Batch size: 5.5 gallons Total grain bill: 16.25 pounds OG: 1.085 (23 Brix) SRM: 7.6 IBU: 92.8 Brewhouse efficiency: 75% Boil time: 60 minutes The ingredients: 12.5 pounds of Muntons 2-row Pale Malt (76.9%) 2.25 pounds of Muntons Crystal 150 (13.8%) 1.5 pounds of Weyermann Munich (9.2%) 2.1 oz. Simcoe pellets @ 60 min. 8.0 oz. Simcoe pellets @ 0 minutes 8.0 oz. Simcoe pellets for dry hopping 1 Whirlfloc tablet @ 15 minutes 1/2 teaspoon Yeastex @ 15 minutes Wyeast 1272 American Ale II yeast Mash Schedule Mash at 154F for 60 minutes Mash out at 167F for 10 minutes Fly spar...

In the last post, I shared an overview of The Grainfather, recommended equipment to use with it, and an overview of the brewing process.  In this installment, I'm going to talk specifically about mashing and sparging. Having brewed over a dozen batches with it, I'm finally becoming very comfortable with the device, the mash process, and how to get what I want out of it. I don't consider myself a "master" of it yet, though. For those who have never done all-grain brewing, I want to provide a quick overview of the mash process itself. Mashing - With or Without The Grainfather The goal of mashing is to turn the starches in the grain into sugars. More specifically, you want to turn the starches into a mix of fermentable and unfermentable sugars that provide the flavor profile associated with the beer you are brewing. A sweeter beer might warrant more unfermentable sugars. A more dry beer will demand few unfermentable sugars. To a great extent, controlling the...

Late in 2015, I made the switch from extract brewing to all-grain. I had made some really good extract beers prior to that switch. Switching to The Grainfather and all-grain brewing at once was like learning to brew all over again. All-grain brewing is different from extract brewing up to the point at which you start boiling the wort. Brewing in The Grainfather is different from brewing with other equipment. I'm not saying that either is necessarily better or worse, just that it's all different. Any time you introduce a change into your process, you introduce a need to learn and experiment. I'm hoping in this post to share things I've learned about brewing all-grain beers with The Grainfather so that the rest of you won't make some of the mistakes I did. Note: This post refers to the US model of The Grainfather and may not apply to non-US versions. Let's start with things about The Grainfather itself: What else do you need?  Although The Grainfather is ...

Recently, I've been trying to "dial in" settings in BeerSmith and Beer Tools Pro so that I can do a better job getting my actual brewing results to match up to the figures in the software. Below are some of the figures I've worked out with my US Grainfather. Given manufacturing variances and possible measuring errors on my part, these might not match exactly to yours, but hopefully they're close enough that it will help you. BeerSmith Equipment Profile: Brewhouse Efficiency: 83% (based on my experience, yours may vary) Mash Tun Volume: 8 gallons Mash Tun Weight: 8.82 pounds Mash Tun Specific Heat: 0.12 Cal/gram-deg C Mash Tun Addition: 0 gallons Lauter Tun Losses: 0 gallons Top Up Water for Kettle: 0 gallons Boil Volume: 6.25 gallons Boil Time: 60 minutes Boil Off: 0.40 gallons per hour Cooling Shrinkage: 6% Loss to Trub and Chiller: 0.53 gallons Batch Volume: 5 gallons Fermenter Loss: 0.40 gallons (yours may vary) Whirlpool time: 0 minutes B...