A Guide To All-grain Brewing In A Bag

[Thirsty Boy]

I entered two BIAB brews in Vic Brew and one in ANAWBS

The oatmeal stout in Vic brew was the only one of the three that I thought had any chance at all of a decent score... and it was the only one that got one..

Vic Brew - American IPA. 22nd out of 36 with 71.3 points and comments about being under bitter for style, too sweet, overly estery. Suggestions to choose a more attenuative yeast (I used S04) and to increase bitterness, reduce dry hopping and increase late kettle hops.

They were spot on too... I tapped that beer out of the fermentor three quarters of the way through just so I could enter another BIAB beer. If it hadn't been underattenuated then I wasted my time letting the rest of the batch sit in the fermentor for another 2 weeks

Vic Brew - Oatmeal Stout. 7th out of 27 with 99 points. Comments about thin body and lack of mouthfeel. One judge said the roast was too harsh and overdone.... another it wasn't roasty enough.. oh well. Main suggestion was attention to recipe with all judges suggesting an increase in the amount of oatmeal.

I agree, the main thing I would improve on that beer is a lack of body. Need to up the oatmeal a bit and mash a little higher. Then it will be as slick and chewy as I was aiming for.

ANAWBS - English Barley wine. Dead last out of 6 with a pathetic 23.5 (out of 50) points. Haven't got judges feedback yet.. But I imagine it will say something about it being overly hot and needing another year of age. Its only a few months old.

I'm gonna have to say that this one hasn't got anything to do with BIAB no matter what the judges say. Its my first barley wine, I have never tasted an actual barley wine and it was made using some left over pale malt and a cake of Palm sugar... I only called it a barleywine because its strong. I have absolutely no idea if other than being in spec for OG, FG and ABV ... it bears any resemblance whatsoever to an actual barleywine. Not a lot apparently with only 23.5 points :lol:

So the BIABs didn't do spectacularly well... but the stout did OK I suppose. And there were no themes in the faults found by the judges.. nothing particular that stuck out as different to my other beers.

But, (except the Barleywine) they didn't come last either... so at least we know that its possible to make a worse beer than I can make with BIAB.

I know that James squire got a 3rd place in ANAWBS with a brew made on a Bucket in Bucket All in One system... thats a fair bit like BIAB

Anyone else with a happier tale to tell...

Thirsty

 

[hairofthedog]

Missed the G&G BIAB Brew day. Anyone else holding one or willing to open their brew day/brewery for us visual learners.

rgds mike

how you going mike im more than happy have a few guys over for a biab brewbbq if your intrested would have to be the 1st sat in december as im going on holidays for most of november ive got about 20 biabs under my belt & a heap of positive feedback about some of my pilsners so let us know if your intrested

 

[wambesi]

how you going mike im more than happy have a few guys over for a biab brewbbq if your intrested would have to be the 1st sat in december as im going on holidays for most of november ive got about 20 biabs under my belt & a heap of positive feedback about some of my pilsners so let us know if your intrested

Is that an open invitation........
Thats just down the road from work.

 

[hairofthedog]

Is that an open invitation........
Thats just down the road from work.

yeah wambesi your more than welcome

 

[danek]

Greetings from the UK! I'm in the process of making my first all-grain, and first BIAB, beer. I've got fifteen minutes of the boil left, and so far it all seems to be going OK. Lifting the bag out of the kettle was a bit of an effort, but certainly manageable. The wort smells like wort, so I'm really looking forward to seeing how this comes out.

I'll post back in a few weeks when the beer's ready to drink. Thanks to everyone for the great guides and "how to" files. I really appreciate all the work you guys have put in.

 

[tcraig20]

Dave's home brew seem to be selling something that resembles a scaled down BIAB setup now:

http://daveshomebrew.com.au/index.php?page...rt&Itemid=1

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Dave's home brew seem to be selling something that resembles a scaled down BIAB setup now:

http://daveshomebrew.com.au/index.php?page...rt&Itemid=1

A nice little partial mash set-up. He's selling kits that include grain and extract. To make it BIAB and pure all grain ... you'd just make less beer and leave out the extract (sort of)

another reason why I never understood the BIAB knockers who talk about the material that makes it through the bag... partial mashers have been using grain bags for donkeys, the same stuff makes it through their grain bags, and partial mashes have won plenty of awards.

 

[sathid]

I did my first AG (BIAB) 2 days ago. It was fun

One thing I was a bit concerned about, was that my stove struggled with the boil, and I only lost about 4L of volume (including what I lost from the grain). So I missed my gravity, as I was hoping to lose 7L of volume during the boil.

Should I just start with 27L of water next time, rather than 30L?

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I did my first AG (BIAB) 2 days ago. It was fun

One thing I was a bit concerned about, was that my stove struggled with the boil, and I only lost about 4L of volume (including what I lost from the grain). So I missed my gravity, as I was hoping to lose 7L of volume during the boil.

Should I just start with 27L of water next time, rather than 30L?

Depends a little. You need a good boil. It has to be a nice rolling boil. Not jumping about the place, but there needs to be a good solid turnover of liquid from top to bottom.

Have a think about your volumes after you pull out the bag and let it drain/squeeze it (whatever you decide to do) In my BIAB brews I squeeze the bag and I lose abot 0.5-litres of liquid absorbed by each kg of grain. If you dont squeeze the bag but let it drain out well, then you will probably lose 0.75L/kg. Measure what volume you get after the draining of the bag, then you will know the starting volume of your boil.

If at the end of an hours worth of boiling, you have reduced your volume by 10-15% ... then your boil is probably vigorous enough. If not, then you might need to do something about your boil off.

So, having a guess at the details of your brew, I'll say you had about 4.5kg of grain and you took the safe route and didn't squeeze. So you would have lost about 3.4L to grain absorbtion, which means that you only boiled off 0.6L or about 2.5% - if you did squeeze and you only lost 2.3L to the grain.. then you boiled off 1.7L or about 6%

In either case, too low, and it indicates that your boil is probably not vigorous enough.

So, your options are

- try to get a more angry boil, maybe try to put the pot over two burners. Or go wild and buy a stand alone burner. If you get it up to the 10-15% of your starting volume range boiling off per hour.. you are in the safe zone

- Hope that your boil is OK (it'll do for now, work on it as you get more experience) and adjust your starting volume as you suggested. Try this next brew and see how you go.

It'll take you a few brews to work out just what the hell goes on with your system. Once you work it out.. all you have to do is compensate for the results in your technique and recipe. Your first few brews might not turn out exactly the way you planned them, but they will still be fine beer. And you had fun.

So its all good

Welcome to AG sathid :beerbang:

Thirsty

 

[sathid]

Thanks for the thorough reply mate. I had 4.5kg of grain, and I did the whole "twist the bag" thing, and then also poured the runnings from the bucket I dumped the grain bag in, into the pot. I definately think the boil was not vigorous enough. It was only just boiling. But I did get a decent hot break (at least, I think I did ) and I had a LOT of cold break, which was not stopped by my sieve (I actually lost about 2-3L of wort due to avoiding pouring in the cold break).

The recipe was to produce 23L, which I did, but only because I left some of the wort behind to avoid the cold break going into the fermenter. In addition, there was 1L of water and 1L of starter that went into the brew. Was supposed to be 1.045 OG, ended up with 1.038 (after pitching yeast).
So it's either going to be very dry, or a midstrength SNPA. lol

Bubbling like mad now tho And my compost heap will love the grains and hops.

 

[randyrob]

Hey Guys,

Pat has kindly asked me to knock up some bumber stickers to get the awareness out there,
what do you think?





Rob.

 

[BrissyBrew]

I have been avoiding posting let alone reading this thread for awhile. But after a quick skim read there are a couple of questions that make me scratch my head a little.
L:G ratio has been raised as a concern. But I was thinking about how the mash settles, that is if you are not constantly stirring what you end up with as a grain bed with hot liquor sitting above it. I admit that it seems the grain bed would be more watery than a really thick mash, but the grist does settle and I assume what you end up with is a grain bed at the bottom with one L:G ratio and liquor sitting above this. Meaning that the total L:G ratio does not really reflect the effective L:G ratio in the grain bed where enzyme reactions are taking place.

Lets looks at some thin mashes out there already, continental European decoction mashing up to 5:1 L:G (liquor to grist ratio). It is true at normal mashing temperatures weaker mashes give more fermentable worts, probably some anecdotal evidence of this by BIAG brewers from this forum. Beers coming out a little dry. Maybe adjusting the mash temps is a work around. Mashes made with 39% solids give worts with maximum extract yield, whilst mashes made with 16-32% solids provide the highest fermentables. BIAB seems to be pushing towards a 1:7 ratio so maybe mash temperature adjustments might be a way to overcome this, I also think due to people not stirring BIAB may actually have an effective ratio more like 1:4. How much water is floating on top?

 

[SpillsMostOfIt]

Depending on how obsessive I am feeling, I will stir the mash somewhere between every five and 10 minutes throughout the mash. Certainly in the first 20 minutes, I stir a lot. I do this in an attempt to ensure that starches and enzymes continue to meet and interact and also to keep temperature as/where it should be - usually, every second stirring will be with an immersion heater. So, following BrissyBrew's theory, I have a variable L:G ratio. Because I DunkSparge(tm), I (currently) reserve around one third of my total liquid for sparging, leaving me with (taking my most recent brew as an example) about 4.6kg grain in about 23litres of liquid. (I can't give you good volume measurements due to the way I use my kit, but I reckon it's close enough for government work.)

I'm slowly jacking up my mash temperatures on my *cough* standard ales to make them a bit stickier - I'm currently at around 67-68degC.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I have both stirred and not stirred. It probably made a difference, but not a startling one.

The problem I see with what you are saying Brissybrew, is that the enzymes dissolve throughout the whole liquid portion of the mash, so while the grist does indeed settle to the bottom, it only has contact with a much thinner density of enzymes. Of course, most of the starch should be dissolved too.

The low density of enzymes, plus the fact that Beta Am enzymes are bit protected from temperature degreadation when they are in a thick mash, and BIAB is the opposite, leads most people who "know" about brewing to conclude that you will get overly dextrinous wort due to the Betas petering out before they can do their job. They are of course wrong, they make sense, their interpretation of the science (fortunately for us BIABers) just doesn't match the results of actually brewing this way.

You're one of the first people to look at the method from the outside and conclude that the result will be an overly fermentable wort... a theory for which you can (and you have) build an equally convincing argument to the overly dextrinous crowd.

For mine... you are much closer to the mark than most. I think that you do end up with slightly more fermentable worts from BIAB. But its hard to tell, most of the people who I know who do BIAB, mash at lower temperatures than I do, so regardless of their methods, I would expect their beers to end up with a lighter body than mine.

You summation that temp is a workaround is dead on.. temperature is just by FAR the most important factor in determining fermentability, L:Ghas an effect alright, but its second fiddle by a long way; and it is in BIAB as well. You just (as you would on ANY system) tweak the temps till you get it right.

On my non-BIAB system, it turns out that I don't really need to make any adjustment for temperature when I transfer my BIAB experimental recipes across. I was originally mashing a degree higher working on the assumption that the BIAB worts would be a bit more dextrinous, but it just ended up not being an issue.

Its kind of like anybody's brewery really.. If you are translating a recipe.. you just have to know your system. If your beers always turn out too thick.. mash a bit lower than the recipe... to thin visa versa. For a first go, BIAB is just not so different that you need to worry about "always" making an adjustment when you get a new reccipe, just make it. You have as much chance of hitting it on the nose as you do with any other brewing method.

For me, there are a couple of questions still to be answered about BIAB and its longer term results, but the fermentability thing is just a closed issue. It is no bigger or more difficult an issue to manage than it is when you are brewing using any of the dozen or more methods you might choose.

Thanks for the thoughtful input to the thread, its great to hear from people who have a really good grounding in the theory.

Cheers

Thirsty

 

[PistolPatch]

Firstly just a quick thanks to ThirstyBoy. I reckon one of the best days for BIAB was certainly the day that Dan got his sewing machine out. While many of you have contributed so well here, I think the award for the most numerous posts of consistent high quality in this thread (and elsewhere) goes to Dan. He gets nowhere near enough thanks for the massive amount of time and thought he has thrown in here so good on ya Dan and thanks a heap mate. I think I can say that from everyone here.

A Simple Way to Improve Efficiency In A Big Way

I said I'd start a thread on this but I probably had too many drinks when I wrote that. I think a simple post is a much better idea and a morning one at that - lol!

While not all of you will be able to do the following, it is worth having a think on with the equipment you have. Here's what I did on my last brew which gave me an extra 2lts of wort (about an 8% improvement in efficiency.)

It simply involves tilting the kettle using your skyhook as follows...

Here's the process that applies to my set-up for a single-batch...

The Chill

1. End boil and turn on chiller.
2. Agitate frequently using sterilised paddle kept in the wort.
3. When below scalding temperature, tilt the kettle as high as possible.
4. Continue frequent agitation (this speeds up the cooling process.)
5. At chill end, let sit for 10 or 15 minutes before syphoning.

The Syphon

1. Insert syphon to just below the top of wort and start the syphon.
2. Gradually lower syphon until wort starts to become unclear and then lift it up a tad. Keep syphon in place and let kettle drain

Other Considerations

1. Double Batches: If double-batching, before you tilt the kettle, syphon off half of the batch to reduce the kettle weight. Tilt the kettle and then let it sit for 10 or 15 minutes before syphoning the remainder.
2. Auto-Syphons: Unfortunately the syphons being sold now don't work as the internal diameter of the hose is just too large. I have a new one and if I find a way of getting it to work I'll let you know.
3. Tap in Kettle: Not sure how the above would work for those who have taps in their kettle especially on a double-batch. I'm thinking that you could tilt your kettle so the tap outlet is high and then gradually lower it until the wort becomes unclear, then lift up a tad. Dunno about this especially as everyone's set-up differs.
4. Kettle Shape: This certainly works well with pots of large diameter but I'm unsure how much of a difference it would make for those who have kettles.
5. Safety: Of course, you don't want to be putting weight on handles that are weak. The Robinox pots are very solid though and will easily handle tilting the kettle with a single batch.

You can, of course, if you do want to eak every bit of wort out of a brew, also tilt your fermenter. Do the tilt away from your tap so that the tap sits on the high side. On draining, gradually lower the tap in the manner mentioned in 3 immediately above.

I think that simple mechanical ways like the above which give you high percentage improvements whilst also making your brewing easier are the first areas that should be considered by those keen on obtaining very high efficiencies. Other ways seem to involve more equipment and labour with only a slight reward.

As for the skyhook, if you don't have one, get one. I was unable to install one for most of my BIAB brewing due to the premises I was in. The double-pulley set-up ($6 each from any hardware) is truly wonderful and remember you can use it to hang your hopsock as well.

Wow! I think I actually wrote something informative. First time in ages - lol!

Spot ya later,
Pat

 

[Hashie]

Good post Pat, when I get re-settled and back into brewing, I'll give it a go and let you know how it goes.

Cheers

Thirsty and Spills deserve all the accolades they get, between the 2 of them, in Pat's absence, have been polite, informative and concise in their replies to questions from other brewers. 2 thumbs up.

Edit; accolades.

 

[joshuahardie]

Dave's home brew seem to be selling something that resembles a scaled down BIAB setup now:

http://daveshomebrew.com.au/index.php?page...rt&Itemid=1

I tried my first BIAB yesterday using a setup similar to the above link. due to size contraints i halved the batch size and then supplemented with a extract kit. so it is partial BIAB

Although i have read about hald of this thread i have a few questions.

1. once i have the grain in the bag do i shake the flour out of the bag that has been produced from the cracking of grains
2. after mashing when do i start timing my boil from. from the moment a rolling boil starts, or when a rapid boil starts, and then i can reduce the heat
3. i tried the wort once it was cooled in the fermenter, and it looked cloudy and tasted gritty. i assume this will fall out of suspension over time, but have i done something wrong, or can i do better next time somehow?

any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ikern]

I tried my first BIAB yesterday using a setup similar to the above link. due to size contraints i halved the batch size and then supplemented with a extract kit. so it is partial BIAB

Although i have read about hald of this thread i have a few questions.

1. once i have the grain in the bag do i shake the flour out of the bag that has been produced from the cracking of grains
2. after mashing when do i start timing my boil from. from the moment a rolling boil starts, or when a rapid boil starts, and then i can reduce the heat
3. i tried the wort once it was cooled in the fermenter, and it looked cloudy and tasted gritty. i assume this will fall out of suspension over time, but have i done something wrong, or can i do better next time somehow?

any help would be greatly appreciated.

Josh,

I've only got 6 BIAB's under my belt so I am by no means an expert but I'll share what I know from my efforts. Perhaps some of the other more experienced guys will chime in.

1. I don't remove any "flour" from my grains as thats the stuff I want the enzymes to convert. Leave it in.
2. With my urn I get a layer of foamy scum start to build up as the temp rises. This layer starts to move around a little and then eventually the bubbles come up through this layer. I consider the rolling boil as started once most of this foamy layer has dispersed and I have the rolling bubbles coming up through the wort. Hope that makes sense.
3. The wort should taste quite sweet/bitter once cooled in the fermenter. What material did you use for your bag? This is quite important. It needs to be fairly fine like the swiss voile mentioned in numerous posts in this thread (plus some pics). From your description it sounds like your material may be too coarse and let too much of the grist into the wort.

Hope this helps.

Soz.

 

[joshuahardie]

Josh,

I've only got 6 BIAB's under my belt so I am by no means an expert but I'll share what I know from my efforts. Perhaps some of the other more experienced guys will chime in.

1. I don't remove any "flour" from my grains as thats the stuff I want the enzymes to convert. Leave it in.
2. With my urn I get a layer of foamy scum start to build up as the temp rises. This layer starts to move around a little and then eventually the bubbles come up through this layer. I consider the rolling boil as started once most of this foamy layer has dispersed and I have the rolling bubbles coming up through the wort. Hope that makes sense.
3. The wort should taste quite sweet/bitter once cooled in the fermenter. What material did you use for your bag? This is quite important. It needs to be fairly fine like the swiss voile mentioned in numerous posts in this thread (plus some pics). From your description it sounds like your material may be too coarse and let too much of the grist into the wort.

Hope this helps.

Soz.

The bag material is swiss voile that i got from spotlight, i am not sure of the threadcount or anything like that, but the weave would hold back anything bigger than a grain of sand.
The wort is cloudy and looks like muddy water, totoally differnt to the clear liquid in a fresh wort kit and the sample i tried tasted gritty?

hmmmm

 

[ikern]

The bag material is swiss voile that i got from spotlight, i am not sure of the threadcount or anything like that, but the weave would hold back anything bigger than a grain of sand.
The wort is cloudy and looks like muddy water, totoally differnt to the clear liquid in a fresh wort kit and the sample i tried tasted gritty?

hmmmm

Probably grasping at straws here, but what temp did you mash at and for how long?

Soz