Bam! first all grain (BIAB)

[Sippa]

Hey all, another first BIAB thread.

Brisbane show holiday on Wednesday presented a perfect opportunity for the neighbour and I to get some equipment together and have a brew day.

My plan was to do my first BIAB, had done plenty of partials and read a lot about the process so I was pretty confident I could get it done.

So my Equipment is the usual 19l Big W pot, a re-purposed wok burner and paint strainer bag from bunnings.

The grist:

2kg Maris Otter

0.3kg chocolate

0.3kg carared

0.2kg rye

Was a self designed recipe I will be single hopping with citra at 30, 20, 10 and 5 minutes with a considerable dry hop to come.

So for a 12l batch brewsmith gave me a required 15.6l total water, I took 2.5l of that for a sparge. mashed at 67 for 60 min, required 1 temp adjust and towels wrapped around the pot. Removed grain bag to drain into another container while I heated the wort, Sparged with the 2.5l of water heated to about 80 i think.

Returned the runnings to the main wort, boiled for 60 min adding hops, poured through sieve into fermenter and it came in at 10l. I thought I had all the water I needed but I think I lost alot more through the boil then predicted.

Target OG was 1056 at 12l, I got 1062 for the 10l that went into fermenter, topped up to 12l and that brought OG to 1053 so from that brewsmith calculated 73% efficiency so not far off the planned 75%

Pitched 100ml thin slurry of S-04 at 20 degrees I had made over the last 24 hours from a dry yeast pack. The excess yeast from the 2l starter goes into storage for use later on.

So pretty happy with result, the extra water required I figured I just lost more in the boil than allowed for yeah?

Super keen to do my next one, just have to wait until I have room in the ferm fridge, thinking maybe a SMaSH with Maris Otter, haven't decided the hops yet.

Cheers

 

[Matplat]

Maris otter, fuggles. It's a classic, get it done nice work

 

[Sippa]

Fuggles hey? hadn't considered it, what sort of flavours that give me?

 

[wereprawn]

Fuggles hey? hadn't considered it, what sort of flavours that give me?

Imagine having a mouth full of damp, musty dirt.

 

[Sippa]

Intriguing, as a kid I would probably have loved that, having eaten a lot of dirt as a child. Might have to mash and split for 2 different boils, one with Fuggles and one with an IPA based single hop schedule,

 

[Matplat]

Indeed it has 'earthy' aromas, but in a good way.... seems like it is one of those hops that can be a bit like vegemite i.e. you love it or hate.

 

[eldertaco]

Congrats on your first BIAB, let us know how it went once it's ready!

My vote is for Maris Otter + Centennial SMaSH, mine turned out very nicely.

 

[Sippa]

I think an IPA quantity of Centennial would be pretty nice, I like Amarillo and Centennial as a combo for a pale ale I make. Will let you know how it turns out, Just dry hopped with 40 grams of Citra a couple days ago, about to decant and crash chill.

One tasting note about the samples I have tasted so far, it seem quite savoury if that makes sense, thinking cracker type flavours and tones of rye spice.

 

[Sippa]

So after some time away, (changed jobs and got married and had honeymoon), finally get back to giving some feedback on taste of the brew, I have finished it off, didn't take long, was definitely savory, different, I enjoyed it as did the SWMBO. Pretty big fruity hop aroma and nice initial musky bitterness as you would expect from the citra hop but was like biting into a nice rye or sour dough bread. Basiclly smelt fruity like all the fruit notes you get from the citra but savory......

Sorry i've not the eloquence or vocabulary to better describe it than that.