XXXX Brewer
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- Joined
- 10/2/08
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Hi all,
Just spent all of yesterday making my very first AG brew (listed my expirence below). I have just pitched my yeast but tried to re-hydrate using water that had only cooled down to 60dC. I realised what I had done about 5min later and decided to pitch it straight away in the hope that I hadn't killed off all the yeast and cool down the slurry. I know I'm going to have some lag time but do you think I might have killed the yeast (craftbrewer english ale).
Anyway here's how my first AG brew went.
I must say when I read Airlocked article which spoke about everyone doing something wrong the first time and not to expect it to be perfect, I think like most other people thought I was different.....not me I have planned my method exactly nothing will go wrong.....boy was I wrong.
Firstly I'll run through my set up. I have spent about 6 weeks trying to get all the gear together. I have two Stainless kegs (from an English Brewer not stolen). One is my kettle and the other my mash tun. I had a three ring urner as a heating device until I discovered while doing a dry run on thursday that it took over an hour to get the kegs to boil even with a starting temp of 60dC. So I went out yesterday and bought a Rambo Burner. Everything works on gravity so no pumps. My biggest mistake was going cheap on the false bottom. My mash tun already came with a outlet at the bottom of the keg (right in the centre) so I though it would be easy to use a splatter guard (stainless steel mesh disc with a handle) from the kitchen and take off the handle.
Anyway everything was going great I had heated my water transferred to the mash tun and doughed in my grains. The ph was perfect so I let it rest for 60min. The trouble came when I went to sparge. Of course the grains had snuck under the spalter guard had clogged the outlet so absolutley no wort was coming out. I made several frustrated attempts at unblockiing it but to no avail. So faced with the prospect of wasting the entire days worth of work I decided to pull out the guard and use it as a sieve to collect the wort. I scoped out the entire contents of the keg through the sieve and into a bucket. Then added the rest of my sparge water and did it again.....I suppose it was almost like batch sparging. Needless to say my efficency was shocking aroung 65% and I wouldn't be supprised to get some astringincy.
The boil went without incident and so I chilled the wort and put it in the fridge overnight ready to pitch today. I just hope the yeast will be fine.
All in all it was a trying day but it was fun. Loads of things I learnt and things I need to learn. I will definatly be back in a couple weeks with another go.
Thanks to Ross witht he help over the phone.
Cheers.
Just spent all of yesterday making my very first AG brew (listed my expirence below). I have just pitched my yeast but tried to re-hydrate using water that had only cooled down to 60dC. I realised what I had done about 5min later and decided to pitch it straight away in the hope that I hadn't killed off all the yeast and cool down the slurry. I know I'm going to have some lag time but do you think I might have killed the yeast (craftbrewer english ale).
Anyway here's how my first AG brew went.
I must say when I read Airlocked article which spoke about everyone doing something wrong the first time and not to expect it to be perfect, I think like most other people thought I was different.....not me I have planned my method exactly nothing will go wrong.....boy was I wrong.
Firstly I'll run through my set up. I have spent about 6 weeks trying to get all the gear together. I have two Stainless kegs (from an English Brewer not stolen). One is my kettle and the other my mash tun. I had a three ring urner as a heating device until I discovered while doing a dry run on thursday that it took over an hour to get the kegs to boil even with a starting temp of 60dC. So I went out yesterday and bought a Rambo Burner. Everything works on gravity so no pumps. My biggest mistake was going cheap on the false bottom. My mash tun already came with a outlet at the bottom of the keg (right in the centre) so I though it would be easy to use a splatter guard (stainless steel mesh disc with a handle) from the kitchen and take off the handle.
Anyway everything was going great I had heated my water transferred to the mash tun and doughed in my grains. The ph was perfect so I let it rest for 60min. The trouble came when I went to sparge. Of course the grains had snuck under the spalter guard had clogged the outlet so absolutley no wort was coming out. I made several frustrated attempts at unblockiing it but to no avail. So faced with the prospect of wasting the entire days worth of work I decided to pull out the guard and use it as a sieve to collect the wort. I scoped out the entire contents of the keg through the sieve and into a bucket. Then added the rest of my sparge water and did it again.....I suppose it was almost like batch sparging. Needless to say my efficency was shocking aroung 65% and I wouldn't be supprised to get some astringincy.
The boil went without incident and so I chilled the wort and put it in the fridge overnight ready to pitch today. I just hope the yeast will be fine.
All in all it was a trying day but it was fun. Loads of things I learnt and things I need to learn. I will definatly be back in a couple weeks with another go.
Thanks to Ross witht he help over the phone.
Cheers.
