Can any all grain recipe be brewed in a bag

[Lowlyf]

Hey guys,

Is it reasonable to assume that any all grain recipe can just be brewed in a bag and forgoing certain steps stated in the recipe and just using the BIAB method?

Thanks,

 

[Moog]

as far as I know..........yes, but I'm a relative newby ( 1 yr)

 

[Pogierob]

You will have problems with high gravity beers, the efficiency drops

 

[Crusty]

Hey guys,

Is it reasonable to assume that any all grain recipe can just be brewed in a bag and forgoing certain steps stated in the recipe and just using the BIAB method?

Thanks,

No different to any other equipment.
Brew away.

You will have problems with high gravity beers, the efficiency drops

The same can be said with any equipment.
Biab is on par with traditional brewing methods regarding efficiency & efficiency will drop with high gravity beers no matter what brewing equipment you use.

 

[TimT]

If your bag doesn't work, get a bigger bag.

"Give me a place to stand, and I will move the world". - Archimedes on his discovery of the lever.

 

[Lowlyf]

Awesome guys, thanks heaps! Christmas brew on the cards!

 

[GalBrew]

It's not a problem, though you will have to know how to adjust a recipe to your own equipment for it work out the way you want it. You can't just plug in a recipe designed for 'traditional' brewing and expect it to come out exactly the same on your BIAB setup without some tweaking, such as basing it on your efficiency, changing mash volumes to account for no sparge (or whatever your process) and altering your hop additions if you no-chill.

 

[Blind Dog]

BIAB is just another method of brewing. As with any system, you're only really limited by the physical constraints of your set up, your ability to move wort and grains from once place to another, and your imagination, ingenuity and bank balance to over-come any shortcomings. Even with higher gravity beers, its possible to exceed the perceived limitation of a system with a reiterated mash without any real loss in efficiency until you push it (I've done a few now on my BM, which is really just a fancy BIAB with RIMS, maintaining normal efficiency until I get above a pre-boil gravity of about 1.085 where it starts to drop off exponentially). Its an idea that's probably as old as brewing itself

Pre-BM I found a mix of Maxi-BIAB (RdeVjn posts were inspiration) and a 2 pot boil (Lord Raja Goomba I) a good way to get a full keg of beer from a 19L Big W pot + 15L Kmart pot. really cheap set-up that made great beer, just a little fiddly

Point is, there's pretty much always a solution to an apparent constraint and usually some clever devil either here or elsewhere has been there and found an answer that you can adapt to your own circumstances. Not sure anyone has found a way of getting 100L of beer from a 19L stock pot yet, but I'm sure someone, somewhere is trying

 

[S.E]

Not sure anyone has found a way of getting 100L of beer from a 19L stock pot yet, but I'm sure someone, somewhere is trying

That’s easy. Just brew 6 x 17L batches cube them then either ferment them together in one large fermenter, or ferment them individually and blend them before bottling.

 

[oglennyboy]

The biggest problem I ever had was a barleywine with 11.5kg of grain in a 44 litre urn.... couldn't lift the bag at all! Had to ladle grain into a colander and juggle sparging vols while getting the bag weight down far enough. A massive pain in the arse, but got 35 litres at 1.080 into the boil, and another parti-gyle from the grain dregs at 1.035. Never again though

Finally got a rack to fit over the urn element and have had a couple of successful step mash brews, using held back hot water to give an added kick-along to the ramping time. So far it does seem that it's all do-able as BIAB, just ticked over my 30th brew in 18 months.
cheers!

 

[Bribie G]

Re oglennyboy's post, back in Victorian times when normal drinkin' beers were around 7% ABV the strong beers would be done on the first runnings from the mash tun, and weaker beers would be brewed from the spargings. Hence the term "small beer" that even schoolkids would quaff for breakfast.

Nowadays it's still more or less the same, if you want a strong beer out of a 40L urn then you collect the first runnings, with plenty of squeezing of the bag, and do a second runnings after sparging.
However if you don't intend to do a separate brew with the second runnings, but put them back in with the first runnings of course there are only two sensible options to get a really strong beer:

1. Add fermentables like da sugaz, or malt extract to bring up to gravity
2. Boil for long enough to get up to your desired gravity

I did #2 with a BIAB Russian Imperial Stout a few years ago, no problems lifting the grain with my skyhook and about a two and a half hour boil if I remember.