Why Not Biab

[unrealeous]

Sorry OP, but Unrealeous where did you get ur 180L pots? I'm currently trying to source some....

ebay - they came out of a commercial kitchen. Got em for a steal.

 

[hazard]

One reason for me why not BIAB - I conduct my boil on the stove, and there is less than 12 inches of clearance between the top of my kettle (44L s-s kettle) and the range hood above the stove. Would make it hard to hoist the bag out!!

So for me, a minimalist system consists of an esky for mashing/lautering and one kettle for hot liquor (19L) and one kettle for the boil. Yes, 3 vessels is more than BIAB but the advantages for me are:
- I don't have a burner and gas bottle
- don't need a bag hoist
- all brewing is done inside in the kitchen (well that's good for me, but my wife does get a pissed if she wants to cook something and I've got 30L of wort boiling away). (And the kids reckon boiling hops make the houise stink).

Horses for courses, if I was going to do something different I would love to gat a Speidel brewmaster as described in another thread, by $$$!!!

 

[yardy]

Hi All,

I've been happily BIABing for a while now, and rather than drag one of the other threads off topic, here's a new one.

Why would I switch to something else? I know this could be troll bait, but I'm not out for that kind of sport.

What are the advantages of (e.g.) traditional 3v brewing? In practice!

T.

what's biab ?


seriously, i've never seen it done but it sounds like an easy stepping stone for newbs, 3V for me is all about the build.

cheers

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

what's biab ?


seriously, i've never seen it done but it sounds like an easy stepping stone for newbs, 3V for me is all about the build.

cheers

Is this a serious question? I'm happy to answer if it is, but with your post count, I assumed you'd have read a BIAB forum somewhere.

Peace out.

Goomba

 

[Scruffy]

Stands for Boil In The Bag...

 

[[email protected]]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but I've just started looking on this forum a bit and BIAB sounds very easy and appealing. I currently use a bucket with a false bottom to mash and sparge.

However it seems that the BIAB method would let a lot of small grain particles into the beer. This is why people sparge so that the grain bed filters these out. I would think a meshed bag would be horribly inefficient at removing these particles. If I remember correctly the problem with getting small grain particles into the boil is that at above 85C the tannins within the grain are released into the liquid creating a horrible bitter taste. So is this a problem with BIAB or is the difference in taste fairly miniscule?

 

[whitegoose]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but I've just started looking on this forum a bit and BIAB sounds very easy and appealing. I currently use a bucket with a false bottom to mash and sparge.

However it seems that the BIAB method would let a lot of small grain particles into the beer. This is why people sparge so that the grain bed filters these out. I would think a meshed bag would be horribly inefficient at removing these particles. If I remember correctly the problem with getting small grain particles into the boil is that at above 85C the tannins within the grain are released into the liquid creating a horrible bitter taste. So is this a problem with BIAB or is the difference in taste fairly miniscule?

Haha do you think anyone would brew BIAB if it created a "horrible bitter taste"? I think many people on this forum would agree that the taste difference is not only miniscule, it's probably non-existant. Just look at the recent results from the national brewing comp.

Common fabric used for the bag is swiss voile (or some other kind of voile) which is pretty frigging fine mesh - I doubt much in the way of tannin-carrying grain gets through.

 

[[email protected]]

Haha do you think anyone would brew BIAB if it created a "horrible bitter taste"? I think many people on this forum would agree that the taste difference is not only miniscule, it's probably non-existant. Just look at the recent results from the national brewing comp.

Common fabric used for the bag is swiss voile (or some other kind of voile) which is pretty frigging fine mesh - I doubt much in the way of tannin-carrying grain gets through.

Well a lot of people drink VB despite a horrible everything taste about it.

I guess having just started reading about BIAB this is what would scare me most about not doing a proper sparge. But as you've pointed out everyones doing it and noones complaining. I'd be interested from hearing from someone whos done both about how much extra tannin flavour if any there is in BIAB. A downgrade to BIAB sounds like a much easier way to brew.

 

[Bribie G]

With traditional German decoction mashing, a third of the mash is taken out and actually boiled, then returned to the mash tun to raise the temperature of the mash to the next stage. So tannin extraction is not an issue, I believe it's to do with pH of the mash and in the mash tun it's at the right pH for not extrating tannins.

For sure the wort in the kettle is a bit more turbid than most 3V systems but a good boil and use of floccing compound results in crystal clear wort out of the kettle into the chiller or cube. Scuse me while I trot out old piccie:

I just 'clear the throat' of the pour - left hand glass - then continue pour into cube and it runs nice and bright. Nowadays I actually pour off a whole 500ml initially and let that settle overnight in a Schott bottle and use it for the yeast starter.

 

[Bizier]

I am switching to HERMS when I can sort it out.

I have done maybe 30-40 BIAB batches of 50L+ volume. While it worked and I made some beers that did well both in my belly and at comp, I have niggles with the whole thing, especially at 50L. ALL of the niggles could probably be solved if I had a permanent place to fine-tune a BIAB rig, but I guess I would rather just build a new shiny toy with more potential to go wrong.

I really want to achieve reliably consistent wort production so I can focus on the finer points of fermentation, especially with higher gravity beers such as barleywine or RIS.

The byproduct of all this will be that I appear more masculine, dynamic and virile in the eyes of those around me, especially my GF.

BIAB is a fantastic technique that got me into AG. Other people are happy to continue with it, and more power to them. I would like to play with new ideas and toys. There is a good chance I will go back to BIAB temporarily when I move interstate, because it will allow me to brew AG again while piecing together a 3v.

 

[Silo Ted]

I wish people would stop referring to 3V systems as 'traditional' <_< Pretty sure the Egyptians didnt have setups too similar.

 

[argon]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but I've just started looking on this forum a bit and BIAB sounds very easy and appealing. I currently use a bucket with a false bottom to mash and sparge.

However it seems that the BIAB method would let a lot of small grain particles into the beer. This is why people sparge so that the grain bed filters these out. I would think a meshed bag would be horribly inefficient at removing these particles. If I remember correctly the problem with getting small grain particles into the boil is that at above 85C the tannins within the grain are released into the liquid creating a horrible bitter taste. So is this a problem with BIAB or is the difference in taste fairly miniscule?

Well a lot of people drink VB despite a horrible everything taste about it.

I guess having just started reading about BIAB this is what would scare me most about not doing a proper sparge. But as you've pointed out everyones doing it and noones complaining. I'd be interested from hearing from someone whos done both about how much extra tannin flavour if any there is in BIAB. A downgrade to BIAB sounds like a much easier way to brew.

My advice... keep reading about BIAB...especially here and if you like, even here that'll answer most of your questions.

As someone who has done many BIABs and now quite a few 3Vs i can tell you there is no detectable difference in the end product. No extra tannin flavours at all.

If anything my 3Vs are not as good as the BIABs.. only because i knew the BIAB system backwards and I'm still getting used to 3V

 

[Thirsty Boy]

3v systems might not be "traditional" if you are willing to take your time frame all the way back to the sumarians...but certainly a system based on a vessel with a sieve like false bottom for liquid/solid separation - has been the dominant, if not virtually exclusive, paradigm for western brewing over the last half a milennium or more. And that qualifies as pretty damn traditional to me.

BIAB is the new kid on the block, it's doing pretty well at proving itself to be on equal terms with systems based around traditional techniques - but traditional it isn't; and the majority of other common home brew techniques kind of are.

Paxxy - biab probably does give you a few more tannins than the best run traditional systems. But generally not in a way that would be considered excessive. It certainly doesn't give you the sort of levels of tannins you can get by oversparging in a fly sparge system... You can't oversparge a BIAB, what with there not being a sparge step and all.