A Guide To All-grain Brewing In A Bag

[Thirsty Boy]

Is there any benefit to maintaining the mashout temperature for (say) 15 minutes, or do you just remove the bag as soon as you reach mashout temperature?

I don't think it will make a lot of difference (assuming you stirred up to it rather than lifted the bag) - but it might. Give it a crack and see. Gotta balance off the extra time and effort for what it will give you.

 

[dpadden]

From Basic Brewing website....

BIAB Podcast

Australian home brewers Dan Walker and Geoff Hammond explain the all grain technique of Brew in a Bag, which they advocate as a good way to get into brewing with grain.

 

[Bribie G]

Great link Paddo.
Pollux, may have mentioned this before but what I've been doing is to run 8 litres of first runnings out of urn into stockpot number one, add equivalent amount of boiling water out of stockpot number two into the urn to bring to a mashout temp (still fine tuning that one..) Then stir like buggery. Hoist, drain and squeeze bag then pour the first runnings back into the urn. I've been doing a two hour boil to get the level back down to where it should have been. Two hours is good enough for Pilsener Urquell, good enough for me

 

[dpadden]

From Basic Brewing website....

BIAB Podcast

Australian home brewers Dan Walker and Geoff Hammond explain the all grain technique of Brew in a Bag, which they advocate as a good way to get into brewing with grain.

Just finished listening....congrats on a great interview guys.

 

[Bribie G]

I take it Dan is thirsty boy? Sounds more mature and sensible than I imagined :lol: :lol: Great show.

 

[eamonnfoley]

Why dont you just pop the BIAB bag into a bucket after you take it out of the mash - then periodicially pour additional wort it into the boil. ?

 

[Mantis]

Why dont you just pop the BIAB bag into a bucket after you take it out of the mash - then periodicially pour additional wort it into the boil. ?

I think most of us do. I hang the bag on a hook so its off the bottom, but in the bucket, then pour the drippings into the boil. After about 5 mins the bag has cooled enough to give it a real good squeeze and thats about it.

 

[Damian44]

I hang my bag above my pot as it heats up to the boil. After 10 min the steam out of the pot completly fills the bag with water. I give the bag a squeze every time it fills, until i reach the boil.

 

[canon1ball]

Just finished listening....congrats on a great interview guys.

Thanks Paddo, for the podcast tip.
Reading through this forum for a week or so (just finished post#620) and about to do my first BIAB. Brewing kit beers with aditions (Crystal malt, extra hops etc.) with good results for a year now.
I'm not interested in perfect brewing, I'm simply after a better beer than the ones they sell at the bottle shops without the $60 to $80 price tag to enjoy with friends and by myself. BIAB seems to be the answer!
So, in short I'm happy for every tip I can get for my first BIAB brew and I'm listening to 'Brew in a Bag' by Dan and Geoff right now and hope to gain more confidence!

 

[Mantis]

Thanks Paddo, for the podcast tip.
Reading through this forum for a week or so (just finished post#620) and about to do my first BIAB. Brewing kit beers with aditions (Crystal malt, extra hops etc.) with good results for a year now.
I'm not interested in perfect brewing, I'm simply after a better beer than the ones they sell at the bottle shops without the $60 to $80 price tag to enjoy with friends and by myself. BIAB seems to be the answer!
So, in short I'm happy for every tip I can get for my first BIAB brew and I'm listening to 'Brew in a Bag' by Dan and Geoff right now and hope to gain more confidence!

Check out the blog in my sig. It has pics of my first biab and went off without a hitch. Its a simple process and really not much that can go wrong.
So jump in man and get brewin

 

[Bribie G]

possibly a bit off topic but I have done a couple of brews in the last few weeks with a big whack of adjunct:

A Solly Cerveza with 4kg of Galaxy and 1kg of rice (cooked to mushy)

A Kiwi Blonde with 4kg of Galaxy and 1kg of polenta cooked mushy.

What has really struck me is that in both cases the end result of the mash has been a bag that has drained quickly and after a bit of squeezing has yielded an almost dry bag of spent grain. I hang it over the baby bath next to the urn, and don't even get a cup of extra wort running out of it. Normally, doing a grain bill of 5kg of Maris Otter with a few specialty grains I end up with a bag that takes ages to drain it and needs heaps of squeezing, yields a couple of extra litres in the baby bath, and is still quite heavy when I take it out to the compost.

I think the adjunct grain, maybe, after the starches have been converted by the malt enzymes, is leaving hulls in the mash sort of like rice hulls, that fluff up the mash and let it drain out much drier than all malt?

Obviously a style that lends itself to BIAB.

 

[canon1ball]

Check out the blog in my sig. It has pics of my first biab and went off without a hitch. Its a simple process and really not much that can go wrong.
So jump in man and get brewin

Already printed out your blog/pic's a week ago. Thanks!
The pic's helped to explain the process to a mate of mine with Parkinsons desease, he loves a good beer too!

 

[warrenlw63]

:lol: Spills and Thirsty sound like The Wiggles.

Warren -

 

[Thirsty Boy]

:lol: Spills and Thirsty sound like The Wiggles.

Warren -

No one in their right mind would let either of us sing - or anywhere near their children for that matter

Although Spills does have a red car and a propensity towards skivvies........

 

[reviled]

Thought I would add here that I believe I have overcome the problem of a cloudy/hazy beer...

Ive had massive probs with chill haze cos of BIAB, ive watched a few others brew traditionally and ive put it down to all the protein not being filtered by the grain bed, which is why we get such a cloudy wort, and up untill recently all of my beers (apart from my dark beers) and this has been causing me to get alot of shit from other brewers on their mission to convert me to traditional...

Now I can fight back! I did a pale beer, 3kg Pils and 250g Munich, and went and brought a PH meter, I checked the PH of the mash before I added anything, 6.9, then (because I didnt have proper stuff on hand) squeezed the juice out of two lemons, stirred really well and checked the PH again, 5.5, awesome! Mashed as usual, used carageenan as usual, fermented out etc...

When I kegged it, I didnt use gelatine like I usually do, and after about a week and a half in the keg, im pouring clear, almost bright beer with absolutely no chill haze at all :beerbang:

Now im not saying this will work for everyone, and im not blaming BIAB for chill haze, allthough for me I know its the contributing factor over others who arent fiddling with mash PH etc, but hey, if a bit of lemon juice works for me (ive got some citric acid now), then so be it! Had to share cos im absolutely stoked!!

 

[katzke]

Now I can fight back! I did a pale beer, 3kg Pils and 250g Munich, and went and brought a PH meter, I checked the PH of the mash before I added anything, 6.9, then (because I didnt have proper stuff on hand) squeezed the juice out of two lemons, stirred really well and checked the PH again, 5.5, awesome! Mashed as usual, used carageenan as usual, fermented out etc...

Now im not saying this will work for everyone, and im not blaming BIAB for chill haze, allthough for me I know its the contributing factor over others who arent fiddling with mash PH etc, but hey, if a bit of lemon juice works for me (ive got some citric acid now), then so be it! Had to share cos im absolutely stoked!!

That can be one of the potential problems with BIAB. It is not like we are running afoul of brewing science, more like we are validating it. Because we use more water in the mash, pH can be a problem. The explanation is easy. Remember that the grain reacts with the water chemistry. Light colored grains have less ability to acidify the mash. We are using more water and so effectively have less grain then other mash techniques.

I think that most home brewers have pH problems but because they use less water when mashing the result is not as noticeable. It is not hard to test pH and make easy adjustments. I do it the hard way and am still learning the effects of adding brewing salts to adjust the water. 5.2 stabilizer is also a quick and easy way to fight pH problems.

 

[Bribie G]

I have been using 5.1 stabiliser in all my brews for the last six brews and they are coming out just fine, as well as using Polyclar.

see my Cerveza post 1749

 

[reviled]

I have been using 5.1 stabiliser in all my brews for the last six brews and they are coming out just fine, as well as using Polyclar.

see my Cerveza post 1749

I was allways hesitent to use polyclar cos of the need for filtering, and now I dont have to, lemon juice is more natural

 

[Mantis]

I use the 5.2 stabiliser and my brews are coming out clear. Citric acid may well be a cheaper option tho

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I was allways hesitent to use polyclar cos of the need for filtering, and now I dont have to, lemon juice is more natural

not sure if this is just an excuse for the tounge poke - so if it is, silly me.

You don't need to filter polyclar - you buy the VT variety sold by some of the site sponsors. It has a larger particle size and settles out perfectly well. You just rack off it along with the yeast.

doesn't hurt you anyway - although I have heard it might make you fart....