Move To All Grain For Thirty Bucks

[levin_ae92]

Reading this makes me want to at least try a partial!! damn i wish the weather wasnt so warm here right now, but ill be on holidays soon and then i'll have no excuse not to give it a try!!

i think i might start with a DSGA partial? how much ale malt would it take to substitute the can of light liquid malt abouts?

thanks NickJD for the article too, found it easy to follow, i honestly get a bit confused just simply reading about all grain brewing it does my head in!!

 

[MarkBastard]

From memory 1.5L of LME could replace about 2kg of grain, depending on a few factors.

 

[levin_ae92]

Thanks Mark,

so i could safely mash 2kg of traditional ale malt and the crystal at the same time? , use this for the hop boil, then add the wheat malt at flameout, chill, top up to 20L and off i go?

 

[MarkBastard]

The regular grain bill on that is...

2.4 kg Weyermann Pilsner
0.8 kg Weyermann Pale Wheat
0.8 kg Weyermann Munich I
0.25 kg Weyermann Caramunich I

To be safe what I'd probably do is have...

0.6kg Weyermann Pilsner
0.8kg Weyermann Pale Wheet
0.8kg Weyermann Munich I
0.25kg Weyermann Caramunich I

And then 1.5L of LME at flameout

But that said I haven't done this recipe and I don't know if because that mini mash only has a relatively small percentage of non-wheat non-speciality malt it will be good enough for the hop boil etc. Someone else will have to tell you that.

There are easier recipes to start a partial mash with IMO. I'd go for an amber ale.

 

[mintsauce]

Three common styles of beers that newbies tend to start off with - and which are a great 'apprenticeship' are:

Australian Standard "Quaffing" beers

UK Bitters

Australian Sparkling Ales (Coopers Style)

If you can get a couple of the above brews under your belt then you are off and running. I tend to cringe when an enthusiastic AG brewer announces "my first brew is going to be a wonderful Alt Winterbier dark Prussian Imperial Poodleheffemeister with Belgian yeasts and added licorice and molasses........."

Keep it simple initially and happy brewing :icon_cheers: :icon_cheers:


bb

Thanks for the Advice - was just what I was looking for, just so happens that I love the Coopers style Sparkling Ale so I'll work on those as well as quaffers to keep the boys happy.

 

[stm]

I simply removed the base plate, used the little plates below that to screw it to the bucket and cut a hole to match in the lid.

The drive is transferred with a 10mm dynabolt, with matching bit on my drill.

Works a charm.

Hi Pollux

Did you reinforce the lid of your bucket/pail with something when you bolted the marga to it, or is it strong enough as is? Thanks!

stm

 

[Pollux]

I used the two plates from the base of the marga, they are the ones with the little rubber feet on them...

While the lid may not be superstrong, my rainwater diverter hopper holds 3kg and it's never collapsed.

 

[humper_zim]

I just put down my first mini BIAB this afternoon. I used a recipe similar to that described in this thread and made it up to 10 litres. I dont think I made any big mistakes, im sure there are plenty of places I could improve, but im not too worried about it at this stage, just getting a feel for it all.

I hit my mash temp spot on, and only lost 1 degree over the 60 min mash so was pretty happy. According to Beersmith my predicted OG was 1.055, my measured OG was 1.056 so really happy with that. that makes my efficiency a touch over 75%, not bad for my first attempt i think.

Anyways, its in the fermenter at 18 degrees as I type, so hopefully it'll come out good. Unfortunately my camera battery was flat when i took it out to take photos of the brew. I'll take photos of my next one in teh next few weeks. I have everything I need for 3 of these mini brews...

Looking forward to taste the results! I'll let everyone know how it goes

Cheers :icon_cheers:

mike

 

[DanFranko]

Nick,

just wanted to add my thanks for this tutorial - for a new brewer like myself it has given me the insight i need to have a go at AG brewing!

cheers

Dan

:beerbang:

 

[Nick JD]

Nick,

just wanted to add my thanks for this tutorial - for a new brewer like myself it has given me the insight i need to have a go at AG brewing!

cheers

Dan

:beerbang:

No worries.

 

[Nick JD]

Since a lot of people want to use this method to make a "full size" brew the size of a Kit I thought I'd try to push some boundaries to show what can be done.

A few other members have already shown this but I thought I might as well add a little addendum to this thread at this stage, mainly because I had the camera out when doing some mashing today.

So here's the motherlode of ground up malt. There's 3.7kg of base malt, 200g of Carared and 100g of Carapils.

And my 15L pot (15L is the pot full to the brim).

Notice there is actually less water in the pot than when using 2kg of malts. This is to make room for the grain.

Then we add the grain.

There a bit more room there, so I added a liter of 65 degree water (my coffee kettle has a temperature setting - very handy).

Then the towels go on to keep it snug for an hour.

 

[Nick JD]

Made up some hops in a bag. I'm aiming for roughly 20L in the fermenter, and this pot is going to have some seriously thick, syrupy, sweet liquor in it ... and that's not so good for getting bitterness out of hops. But that's easily solved - you just use a little bit more (roughly half again for this kinda thing). If it's not bitter enough, I'll fix it next time - it'll still taste waaaaay better than a kit beer.

So here's a "fruit salad" of hops. About 7g each (20g) of galaxy, nelson, simcoe and southern cross. They are all highly bitter hops - so not too much is needed. I'm not after an IIPA - just to cut back the sweetness of the malt.

And after an hour here's where the hydrometer (a shitty Big W one that only reads to 1.040) sits in 57 degrees. 1.058 @ 57C is 1.073 in roughly 12 liters.

So when I dilute it to 20L in the fermenter:

12/20 = 0.6 and 0.6 x 78 is 46.8 (1.047 is about right for a tastybeer).

So it needs a boil with those hops for about an hour.

So to sum up - the only real difference here between the initial tutorial are:

1.) Make sure less water is used before the grain is added so there's room for all of it (in 15L pot ~8.5L of water for 4kg of grain).

2.) Wash grain in bucket (sparge) twice. There's more sugarz trapped in the big whack of grain.

3.) Use up to twice the hops to get the same bitterness.

4.) Add 8L of cold water in fermenter before you add the yeast.

 

[levin_ae92]

Nice one Nick, i was thinking if this would be possible myself, this would be a better alternative to partials!

 

[Nick JD]

Nice one Nick, i was thinking if this would be possible myself, this would be a better alternative to partials!

Not to mention 1.073 with the hops just coming into their bitterness during the boil is so delicious I think I had about 100ml in spoonfulls.

Just one more ... just one more ...

 

[RdeVjun]

Yep, you got it NickJD- same equipment, more grain, less water, sparge, more hops, then some dilution= more beer!

I've found it can be bit hit and miss with bittering (lower hops utilisation efficiency >1.050), some software can handle higher- gravity boils, not all, mine doesn't seem to get it quite right, but having a regular 'house ale' I can adjust things as I see fit, but different recipes batch after batch might get frustrating. Measuring SG at each step can give you a handle on just how much sagaz remains if unsparged.

I do this sort of thing regularly, but this caper is probably not for the novice BIABer, but once familiar with the equipment, the sky is the limit! Some top work mate, and with pics too! :beerbang:

Ps. Be a good lad and Santa might bring you that new hydrometer soon!

 

[Nick JD]

...having a regular 'house ale' I can adjust things as I see fit...

Great point.

Everyone should have their own "house ale". The kind of thing you can refine to become your staple brew - something without too many bells and whistles.

It's nice to have strange and interesting beer in the cupboard, but sometimes you just want a "normal" beer.

For me that's a 7 EBC, 15-20 IBU malted barley SMASH ale with no flavour/aroma addition. Pretty much what I just did in this example. It's boring, but it's ever so nice on a summer evening while watching the chops burn on the barbie.

And the hydrometer? I like it. It gives me an excuse to brew with guesswork precision. I only use it for testing the mash SG. SHOCK/HORROR! I don't use it for fermenting - if the beer has stopped fizzing and it tastes like beer and not malted cordial ... I bottle it (PET).

 

[wise1080]

could i do this in an urn?

 

[Cocko]

could i do this in an urn?

BribieG is the man for this one!! Linkathon!

 

[mintsauce]

Gee I thought this thread was going to be allowed to die but since it's not:

I brewed my first around 2-3 weeks ago and kegged it just over a week ago then started drinking at the weekend (got impatient and turned up the regulator for a short while to speed up the carbonating) a f*ck me, I made beer.....from grains & hops.

Thanks for the inspiration Nick - I've done a second of this 'house ale' as you say just to get the procedure down a bit - also moved to a LPG burner in the garage last week to be a bit more of a man (brewing with propane in the garage with the cricket on - priceless) I've got the ingredients for Dr smurtos Golden Ale (As I like the JSGA) then I was going to get a big bag of Pale Ale malt and work through that with the simple suggestions given above (as I like coopers sparkling too)....

All good fun, and again, bloody hell it smelt and tasted like beer without 'that funky homebrew' taste.

 

[mintsauce]

Bugger, the keg's empty - don't last long when they're nice