I was in Aldi the other day and they were clearing a pallet of 36L eskies for $19.95 and in an instant it occurred to me that for very little extra outlay $$ I could do two brews in far less time than two separate BIAB brews end to end, by piggy backing a mash tun onto a standard full volume BIAB mash.
Batch #1 is a Malt Bomb Vienna ale with Vienna, Munich, Melanoidin, NZ Hallertau and US-05
Batch #2 is a Pom with Halcyon, Crystal, the usual suspects hops and Wy 1768
Equipment: one urn, one esky, one bag - and two grain bills.
Batch #1 is mashed as a bog standard BIAB in urn, which I won't elaborate on, further details here.
As shown I have a skyhook with double pulley, and the brewstand is on castors and can be accurately positioned.
While the bag is draining in #1, prepare 30L strike liqour in the esky, using immersion heater to adjust temp.
When bag drained and emptied, wash it out and fit into esky, while bringing #1 to boil.
Dough in #2, seal esky and mash while #1 is boiling.
When #1 boil is complete and BrewBright has been added, put lid on urn and allow to sit for 20 mins to settle trub
Meanwhile slide brewstand along so that #2 is under skyhook, and hoist bag, allow to drain.
(notes: the schedule really slotted in well, as I was waiting for the trub to settle in the urn prior to cubing, the mash of #2 was complete and I had time to bring it to mashout with the OTS element and also hoist the bag, so by the time the cube was full, #2 was begging for its shot at the urn. Noice)
Fill cube with #1 while #2 is draining.
Immediately clean and wash urn with particular attention to the element.
Return urn to brewstand and start jugging in wort #2, turning on power once element well covered.
Remove drained bag from #2 and pour remainder of wort into urn.
Complete boil of #2
Wash bag and esky and dry.
Continue with #2 as normal.
Cube the #2 brew
Result is that I completed (from dough in of #1 to 2 cubes) two brews in five and a half hours (dough in 2.30, two cubes at 8.00 godzone time), as opposed to around nine hours for a back to back series of 2 full BIAB brews. All I need now is to clean up the urn, everything else done during the boil of #2.
Very happy.
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A couple of answers in advance:
Q Briber, haven't you got into your thick skull yet that here's an opportunity just screaming out to fit some braid and do a full sparge method and throw away the carcinogenic curtain material?
A World Health Organisation statistics now reveal that braid is the number two cause of botulism (after no chill cubes). Anyway voile pisses all over braid any day of the week.
Q Hahaha laugh @ Bribie, I thought the idea of BIAB is that it's dead simple for dirt-poor wannabe brewers who can't be bothered to do real brewing and here you are complicating it with extra vessels, why not just go the whole hog and build a simple HERMS with Blichmann vessels, an Arduino, multiple pumps and PIDS, all on a laser welded titanium frame and brew real beer from the comfort of your remote laptop.
A Actually BIAB is a bit of a misnomer, if the founding fathers of BIAB had their time over I don't think they should have called it Brew in a Bag, because it's not an entire brewing method, it's really just Sweet Wort Production that uses a bag as one single stage in the grain to brain pathway. The resulting wort produces excellent beer as has been tested in comps for several years now. In this instance I have used the bag twice for this exact purpose. #1 was single vessel methodology, #2 was two vessel methodology, but apart from a bit of jugging, no extra complexity that anyone with an IQ over single digits couldn't handle. And no need to fit pumps or drill the poor esky etc. Also I need my laptop for porn. I should point out that of course I'm not really knocking HERMS or any other method of sweet wort production, and I am glad that there is a HERMS fellowship out there, beats hanging around in parks, the poor little mites.
Q Why would a semi retired bloke want to do double batches?
A Comp season is fast approaching, so I'll be able to do my comp brews without interrupting my regular house brews. Anyway it's not double batches of the same beer, it gives me the flexibility of doing two entirely different styles in one session as I have done today.
B) B) B) B)
Batch #1 is a Malt Bomb Vienna ale with Vienna, Munich, Melanoidin, NZ Hallertau and US-05
Batch #2 is a Pom with Halcyon, Crystal, the usual suspects hops and Wy 1768
Equipment: one urn, one esky, one bag - and two grain bills.
Batch #1 is mashed as a bog standard BIAB in urn, which I won't elaborate on, further details here.
As shown I have a skyhook with double pulley, and the brewstand is on castors and can be accurately positioned.
While the bag is draining in #1, prepare 30L strike liqour in the esky, using immersion heater to adjust temp.
When bag drained and emptied, wash it out and fit into esky, while bringing #1 to boil.
Dough in #2, seal esky and mash while #1 is boiling.
When #1 boil is complete and BrewBright has been added, put lid on urn and allow to sit for 20 mins to settle trub
Meanwhile slide brewstand along so that #2 is under skyhook, and hoist bag, allow to drain.
(notes: the schedule really slotted in well, as I was waiting for the trub to settle in the urn prior to cubing, the mash of #2 was complete and I had time to bring it to mashout with the OTS element and also hoist the bag, so by the time the cube was full, #2 was begging for its shot at the urn. Noice)
Fill cube with #1 while #2 is draining.
Immediately clean and wash urn with particular attention to the element.
Return urn to brewstand and start jugging in wort #2, turning on power once element well covered.
Remove drained bag from #2 and pour remainder of wort into urn.
Complete boil of #2
Wash bag and esky and dry.
Continue with #2 as normal.
Cube the #2 brew
Result is that I completed (from dough in of #1 to 2 cubes) two brews in five and a half hours (dough in 2.30, two cubes at 8.00 godzone time), as opposed to around nine hours for a back to back series of 2 full BIAB brews. All I need now is to clean up the urn, everything else done during the boil of #2.
Very happy.
################################################################################
####
A couple of answers in advance:
Q Briber, haven't you got into your thick skull yet that here's an opportunity just screaming out to fit some braid and do a full sparge method and throw away the carcinogenic curtain material?
A World Health Organisation statistics now reveal that braid is the number two cause of botulism (after no chill cubes). Anyway voile pisses all over braid any day of the week.
Q Hahaha laugh @ Bribie, I thought the idea of BIAB is that it's dead simple for dirt-poor wannabe brewers who can't be bothered to do real brewing and here you are complicating it with extra vessels, why not just go the whole hog and build a simple HERMS with Blichmann vessels, an Arduino, multiple pumps and PIDS, all on a laser welded titanium frame and brew real beer from the comfort of your remote laptop.
A Actually BIAB is a bit of a misnomer, if the founding fathers of BIAB had their time over I don't think they should have called it Brew in a Bag, because it's not an entire brewing method, it's really just Sweet Wort Production that uses a bag as one single stage in the grain to brain pathway. The resulting wort produces excellent beer as has been tested in comps for several years now. In this instance I have used the bag twice for this exact purpose. #1 was single vessel methodology, #2 was two vessel methodology, but apart from a bit of jugging, no extra complexity that anyone with an IQ over single digits couldn't handle. And no need to fit pumps or drill the poor esky etc. Also I need my laptop for porn. I should point out that of course I'm not really knocking HERMS or any other method of sweet wort production, and I am glad that there is a HERMS fellowship out there, beats hanging around in parks, the poor little mites.
Q Why would a semi retired bloke want to do double batches?
A Comp season is fast approaching, so I'll be able to do my comp brews without interrupting my regular house brews. Anyway it's not double batches of the same beer, it gives me the flexibility of doing two entirely different styles in one session as I have done today.
B) B) B) B)