Caramalt & Extract Brew

[Jase71]

Ok, have taken this on board, don't over-agitate the hot wort. Being that I've read that cold wort needs to be aerated, I can see now why people want to chill their concentrated boil down quickly. And Ive a 2kg block of ice ready for that very purpose.

Just measured out the pot's capacity, whilst it may be 8ltrs filled to the lip, in reality it's only able to hold 6ltrs with enough headspace to be a comfortable working vessel. Personally apart from the grain steep & the hop infusion, I can't see why capacity is essential. Don't know the figures (or the scientific terminology) with it, but with many plant-material aqueous or solvent extractions, the main point to consider is how much of the target alkaloid, or in this case malt, can remain suspended in the liquid before it reaches capacity extraction, then potentially having your remaining material partly unextracted. With cracked grain, I would think that 6ltrs is ample steeping capacity. As always though, I stand to be corrected if there are fugures to substantiate - I'll buy a bigger pot if I really need to, but remember all I'm working with is 250grams grain and a small amount of hops material........

 

[Gavo]

In regards to the steeping and boiling volumes. I steep about 500 grams of grain in 3 litres of water then sparge through a strainer until I get my boil volume. As far as the amount of malt in the boil and the boil volume is concerned, yes you could boil all of the fermentables at once. However the higher concentration of the fermetables in the wort lowers the hop utilisation, hence why only biol the LDME in the resultant liquid from the steeping and the sparge. I generally have kept my preboil gravity at around 1044 as according to beersmith I get good hop utilisation ( the best use out of the hops).

If you can only boil 6 litres then 700 grams of LDME added to the boil is probably better and then add the rest of the fermentables at flamout. This will give you a preboil volume of 1050 and better use of the hops.

Don't worry too much about the figures though, Just get a proceedure that works for you. You will make a good beer.

Cheers
Gavo

 

[buttersd70]

I can't see why capacity is essential.

give that man a cigar.

It takes some guys ages to realise this. The volume of the boil is irrelevant (other than making sure you have enough so that it doesn't boil away). What you lose on the swings, you gain on the roundabouts, because as far as volume is concerned, its only the final volume that is relevant. 8L+15L=23L, but so does 6L+17L. or 10+13, or 13+10. It all comes to the same in the end.....

Gavo is 100% as far as concentration of the boil is concerned....that is relevant as far as hop utilisation. What I do is make up the boil to whatever volume I need.....at the same concentration as the final volume will be. It makes the numbers easier. There are other ways of doing it, but thats how I do it. Imagine a hypothetical....lets put sanitation to one side for a minute.....

Imagine, you have so much malt, so much hops and so much water required for the full recipe. You mix the malt and water up to 23L in your fermenter. You then draw 6L of that liquid out, and you boil all your hops in it. You then add that back into the fermenter. As far as gravity and hops are concerned, you have achieved the same result as you sould have if you had boiled all 23L with the hops. Obviously, you wouldn't do it this way, just using it to illistrate the point. 6L of wort of the same dilution as the OG has enough hops for all 23L boilled in it...this would make this 6L very very bitter, but when its diluted back into the rest of the (unhopped ) wort......it all equals out again.

 

[Jase71]

Hmmm, so I have an OG of 1.062 on 21 litres :huh: . is this something I need to be concerned about ? I have no idea how this is going to translate after fermentation is complete.

I will hold off on pitching my yeast to see if there's any suggestions. I have some headspace to play with should I need to make any last minute additions.

 

[buttersd70]

Hmmm, so I have an OG of 1.062 on 21 litres :huh: . is this something I need to be concerned about ? I have no idea how this is going to translate after fermentation is complete.

I will hold off on pitching my yeast to see if there's any suggestions. I have some headspace to play with should I need to make any last minute additions.

what was the recipe, Jase? what was the BG, hop alpha, and target OG?

 

[Jase71]

Recipe almost as above, being:

1.5k LDME,
Can of liquid caramalt,
2 x 30 minute steeps of 200g crystal grain,
500g Dex

Hops boil was 60 minutes:
15g Fuggles at start
10g Cascade at 45 minutes (ie a 15 min boil)
10g Cascade at end

EDIT: and in the event that same varieties are non-standardised, my pellets are marked as Fuggles 4.4% alpha, Cascade 6.3%)

Uh, excuse my ignorance, but what's BG ? The gravity reading (isnt this the 'original gravity?) after everything was added to the fermenter is what I thought should be the first reading...

And I didn't really have a target FG in mind, simply went on your number crunching earlier in the thread, sbut didnt anticipate 1060 :huh: So this means a potentially high strength beer ? If it's a bit high or a bit low, makes no difference to me (1060 will mean high strength though right?) but I could always add a couple of litres more water. My concern is that this might be a bit too sweet, and I'll need to do another hop boil. My other concern is that th yeast may not fement out all the 'sugars' in sufficient time, and I'll have some delicate bottle conditioning situations....

All a learning curve, but if I can make some quick adjustments now (like in the next few hours) i will do so before pitching. It would probably (but not imperative) be better if I could drop the final ABV down, but if not, I'm sure it'll find some welcome lips !

As long as its tasty Criteria No. 1

Your suggestions at this crucial time would be much appreciated !

 

[buttersd70]

sorry jase, bg=boil gravity...ie, what went in the boil and what volume, I can work it out.....
I'm concerned slightly sweet too, depends on the alpha of the hops....

Given the time constraints, and wanting to get it fixed to pitch, check your pm.....give me a call. We can then add the details into the thread as an fyi for everyone later.

 

[Jase71]

Once again, Butters has come to the rescue with some great infomation to those with less experience in the field of homebrewing. After a couple of phone calls between us, I'll be able to rebalance this brew with a 15min Cascade boil and a couple more litres water. Cheers mate, I thank you for giving up your time to help out. Pitching tonight

Butters may go into further detail as to the science behind the remedy so it's on record for others to read about, but ultimately just about anything at this stage can be fixed.

And for the record, extract brewing is fun ! Counting down the weeks till this one's ready for drinking.

 

[buttersd70]

OK, so an update on Jase's brew....we discussed it, and he asked me to post the details

There were a few concerns that Jase had about the gravity, and also he was concerned it would be underhopped....

Given that it had already been made and was sitting around waiting to pitch, I got Jase to give me a call. I wouldn't normally, but I felt bad because he posted his hopping schedule, in a thread I've been reading, and the penny didn't drop on me that it was going to go tits up....I feel I should have picked up on this before he started brewing.....

Anyway, there are a couple of things I advised him as far as fixing it...The 60min fuggle addition was too small for the projected gravity, so more bitterness was required. Secondly, the volume was down, and the OG, as a result was too high.....

So I entered the recipe in software, and came up with the folowing conclusion...boil 15g more cascade in a water only boil, and add that in, lifting the final volume to 23L. This would change the OG to 1054 (from 1062), and raise the IBU to 28IBU (from 19IBU). I advised the cascade, because the 60min addition was fuggle, and the 15min addition was (originally) 10g cascade, with another 10g at flameout. I figured it would be better leaving all the later addition as cascade.

From the 1054 gravity, only 1045 of that is from malt, the remainder is from the dex....so as far as hop balance is concerned, (for those interested in such things), you have a BUGU of 62%. The water boil will throw things off slightly, but the resulting beer should be somewhere in the ballpark of this....adn I would expect a final gravity somewhere in the region of 1012-ish.

We decicided it would be good for the community, particularly those that are reading this thread with a view to moving into extract brewing, to get a full breakdown of the problems that occurred, in order to learn from it. So, the main issues that Jase ran into were;

Getting confused with the hop additions; a common problem, as sometimes it is referred to as 'from the start of the boil' and at other times is reffered to as 'before the end of boil'. This depends on who you're talking to, and the software they use. But generally, if its mentioned as 60,15,0, its counting from end of boil....if its 0,45,60, it means from the start of the boil....in both cases, the first addition is boiled for 60 minutes total time, the second is added 45 minutes later, and boiled for 15 minutes total time, and the third addition is flameout....(obviously those times change depending on what you're doing, this is just a common example)

confusion about what to add (as far as malt) into the hop boil;
this one can be very confusing, because there are so many ways of doing it, that are all correct. But imho, the easiest way is to calculate what gravity all you r malt will give you for the volume you are aiming at, and then make the boil you will be doing the hopping in match. So if your boil size is 5L, and your total volume is 20, it is 1/4 of the final size....add 1/4 of the total fermentables. That way, the hopping is easy to work out, regardless of what software you're using.

Not calculating the hopping, and just guestimating;
if the actual alpha, the gravity of the boil (either calculated, or read on a hydrometer before heating), are known, then the actual IBU can be calculated. It can be guestimated, and often is, with a bit of experience...but particularly when starting out, or even when experienced but doing a new recipe, working out the hopping (at least reasonably) accurately will reduce error, and lead to a more consistant brew.

I think the most important lesson can be learned by what Jase did do....don't panic about it, seek advice from the community. Theres not a lot that cant be fixed with a bit of help from your mates.....instead of pitching the yeast straight away, and trying to fix it later, advice was sought, and I think there will be no problems at all with this beer.


Jeez, this post is long winded, even for me...... :lol:

 

[Pollux]

Jesus man, I drank nearly a whole schooner reading that......

I have my first all extract on the stove right now....What's your number??


One thing I recommend to Jase is download beersmith and run your recipes through that and then post them up here to let butters and other with experience have a gander before you are sitting there wonder what went wrong.....

 

[Jase71]

I have my first all extract on the stove right now....What's your number??

Still on the stove? You're getting slow in your old age. :lol: I just pitched my yeast.

 

[Pollux]

I started steeping at 7pm, then got the little one to bed, by the time my piss poor stove got the 10L to the boil it was 8pm.....

20min hop additions to be added in 5 mins.....

 

[Jase71]

Hope it all goes well for you, Pollux. We should consider New Years 6 pack swap being as it's the first extract brew for both of us.

And Butters, FYI the OG on the final was 1052. Happy with those figures.

 

[Pollux]

Sounds fair...


Will remember to put aside a sixer when I bottle.....You are aware I bottle in stubbies yeah??


EDIT: Mine is now in the fermenter and pitched at 19deg..... Target OG = 1053, Actual OG = 1052....But given my tap and I had a fight and I wore 1L out of the 20 on my foot while clearing the tap, I can live......

 

[Gavo]

Jase, glad it all went well for you in the end. That OG did seem high 1060, as I had punched this one into Beersmith myself.

Here is something I have picked up on and you probably sorted in the phone calls with Butters. In your original post you listed 1 KG of Morgans Caramalt in your recipe and on post #4 suggested 22 litre batch size. I did wonder what you were going to do with the other 500 grams. Now punch those numbers in at 1.5 KG of the morgans and top up to 21 litre and there is the discrepency.

A little higher BG and higher ABV could have called it the wobbly boot Caramalt Brew.

Once again glad it all went well, you will be hooked now. :icon_cheers:

Cheers
Gavo.

 

[buttersd70]

Hope it all goes well for you, Pollux. We should consider New Years 6 pack swap being as it's the first extract brew for both of us.

And Butters, FYI the OG on the final was 1052. Happy with those figures.

Excellent...I didn't want to confuse you too much earlier, but when I entered all the details, I couldn't get the numbers exactly as you were on the hydro, I thought that even for that volume it was a little high....I calculated 1054 after the dilution based on your hydro reading, but all my software was telling me that based on the ingredients, it should have been 1059 down to 1051....so I edged the bets on that last hop amount anyway, and split the difference. Give it a few days then taste a sample, it should (hopefully) knock your socks off.

Polux, good to see you hit your targets, man....beersmith is usually pretty damn accurate.

Gavo, the morgans specialty malts are in 1kg tins. It turned out that after the first post today, which was listed as 21L, it settled back down to 20L when the frothing subsided...so It was purely the 3L less pushing the grav up.....But all worked out in the end.

 

[goomboogo]

"I couldn't get the numbers exactly as you were on the hydro" :huh:

 

[buttersd70]

"I couldn't get the numbers exactly as you were on the hydro" :huh:

Ok, rephrase that to "by entering the volumes and the ingredients that were used into software, the calculated gravity didn't correspond to what was being read on the hydrometer."

Jase may or may not have actually been on the hydrometer, but if he was, I hope he washed it afterwards.

 

[Pollux]

Butters, your advice becomes more Yoda like as the night passes.........


Speaking in random order you do begin...

 

[DKS]

Butters, Gavo, Jase and others. This has been a great thread for info and entertainment. Thanks for following through with fixes and explanation info.
I have a question, This beersmith thing is it expensive?, free ? download ? puchase a disc or sharewear? : :icon_cheers: :
Daz