My first all-grain, BIAB, and no-chill

I've posted several questions on this forum after having brewed 4 purchased kits. After 5 months, I finally brewed and decided to go all out:

1. I brewed Reno eNVy's Punkin ale found on the following thread. It's not a beginner recipe, although several others have done it as their 1st AG brew:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f76/punkin-ale-145060/

2. It was my first brew on the keggle I made:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/keiths-cut-keggle-353760/

3. It was my first all-grain

4. I no-chilled

Here are the details of my brew, the original recipe can be found on the link above:

10.5 lbs Pale Malt - US 2-rwo
1 lb Crystal 60L
1 lb Victory malt
4 29oz cans of Libby's pumpkin

1 lb Brown Sugar at 60 min
1 oz Hallertaur 40 min (instead of 60 min due to no-chill)
1.5 Tbsp McCormick's Pumpkin Pie Spice at 10 min
1.5 oz Hallertaur at 5 min

Procedure:

BIAB using full volume, 90 minute mash, mash temp of 154-156, no dunk sparge, 60 min boil.

Using a calculator on the Biabrewer.com forum, entering the O.G., brew length, and keggle diameter, it provided the following volumes:

Water required: 8.2 gal. This takes into consideration brew length of 5 gal, water absorbed by grain, boil off, trub.
Estimated start of boil volume at 100*C: 7.57 gal.
End of boil volume at 100*C: 6.25 gal.

1. Baked the pumpkin at 350* until turning brown
2. Steeped pumpkin in a grain bag while heating water to strike temp of 162*F.
3. At strike temp, pulled the bag of pumpkin out and squeezed it some.

First small problem: dropped a wooden clothespin into the keggle while removing bag of pumpkin. Couldn't find it with spoon, so decided to leave it.

4. Placed the BIAB bag - graciously sent to me by thughes as a birthday gift with the admonition that I was to get off my (_!_) and brew something - into the kettle and added the grain.
5. After stirring, temp settled at 154*. Great so far.
6. 90 minute mash during which time I had to add heat only twice to keep temp 154-156.
7. Mashout to 170* for 10 min.
8. Pulled the bag; squeezed it a bit, and heated up for boil.

Major problem of the brew day occured here: I removed the temp probe when the temp got to 210. It seemed to be taking a long time. After an hour of seeing the water look as if it were just about to boil and realizing that I was simmering away my volume, I figured that I was low on propane. I shut it down, ran 5 min up the street to get another propane tank, hooked it up, and had loud flame. Added fresh water to bring my volume up to the calculated pre-boil level. Had boiling in 10 minutes.

9. Added brown sugar at 60 minutes and set the timer. I decided to follow "The Pol's" recommendation on his no-chill hop adjustment for the 60 min hop addition and moved it to 20 min.
10. Added the spice and 2nd hop addition at the time specified in the recipe.
11. During boil, I sanitized the Aquatainer and the tubing to transfer the wort.
12. At 60 minutes, I shut off the heat, attached the tubing to the barb, and transferred almost everything into the container. After sealing the Aquatainer, I turned it every which-way to heat all interior surfaces before placing it onto a table to cool.
13. Just before transferring, I took a sample for O.G.
14. Then I rinsed out the keggle and had things cleaned up in no time. I found out that you shouldn't grab the bottom of a keggle to dump it when it's only been about 20 minutes since flameout. Didn't burn too badly.
15. After the sample had cooled, the O.G. was 1.066 (recipe called for 1.065).

So far so good for my first AG brew.

I'll post pictures in the next posting.

I do appreciate the encouragement I've received from several of you these past 9 months since I joined. I look forward to beginning my electrical build as soon as we get moved into the new house.

Thanks,
Keith

Here are photos of the brew.

Pumpkin on pan ready for baking:


Pumpkin after baking:


After taking my great dane for a walk!



No, really that was the pumpkin in the bag for steeping. The original recipe called for the pumpkin to be mashed with the grain. In 3 vessel brewing, many folks get stuck sparges. One BIABer recommended steeping the pumpkin first.

Strike temp of 162



Steeping the pumpkin in water while heating to strike temp



Removing bag of pumpkin and letting it drain (and squeezing)



Placing bag for BIAB (bag gift from thughes)



Adding grain



Temp probe stuck thru plastic lid floating above grain


Mashing. Note mash temp of 156. Only had to add heat twice during 90 min mash.



Pulling the bag after 10 min mashout at 170. The look on my face is not due to the weight of the bag. I was having trouble getting my son to take photos of this project.



Squeezing the bag



Enjoying glass of Northern Brewer Smashing Pumpkin Ale kit I bottled last April - overcarbed.



Finally, the boil


First of 2 hop additions:


Spice addition:


Clothespin hop found after transferring



Transfer of hot wort into appropriate container for no-chill. Hope to transfer to carboy tomorrow night and will pitch yeast then.



Aquatainer filled with hot wort expanding some. Now up on table. Plan to tip it over when I leave for work in the morning so trub will settle enough that I hope to not get too much thru the spigot.



My purpose for posting all these pics is twofold:
1. to prove that I actually did brew something.
2. to help anyone who might be considering BIAB. Of course, Seven has an excellent thread that has been made into a "sticky" I believe.

Thanks, again, for all the help. Thanks, Todd, especially for getting me motivated.

Keith - gotta get to bed.

1. Nice job, and thanks for the photos.

2. >>12. At 60 minutes, I shut off the heat, attached the tubing to the barb, and transferred almost everything into the container. After sealing the Aquatainer, I turned it every which-way to heat all interior surfaces before placing it onto a table to cool.

That is correct. It's important to make sure everything inside is dead. Perhaps even squeeze out some air. Messing up a no-chill can lead to a lost brew.


3. I like your idea of the floating temperature probe. Pretty high tech.

4. I use a similar over rack, for the drain & squeeze. With similar gloves.


It looks like you just dumped in the hops pellets. Don't you get some residue in your fermentor?
Might I suggest using a hops bag or hops spider?

Well done

It's about time!

Great job, thanks for the pics.

If you are going to BIAB go all the way and hop in a bag too!

Seriously though. Looks good!

I'm going to try the floating lid temp probe

This evening after I got home from work, I was able to move the wort from the Aquatainer into the 6 gal Better Bottle and pitch the yeast.

I'm going to answer a couple of the posts probably tomorrow.

I turned the Aquatainer on its side with the spout in position. I sprayed sanitizer around the small vent lid as well as in and around the spigot. Then I slowly opened the small cover to release the vacuum.



Here's transferring thru the sanitized funnel into the Better Bottle. I allowed it to splash in order to oxygenate it.



I wanted 5.5 gallons into the carboy. The last 1/2 gallon was a real sloppy puree of pumpkin - most likely. It smelled great so I went on ahead and transferred it as well. I figured that it would be good for flavor in the primary. It'll be gotten rid of upon transfer to secondary.



Here's the carboy down in the 7 cu ft Holiday freezer turned fermenter. The blow off tube is in place.



I rehydrated 2 packets of Safale US-05 and pitched. The recipe specifically called for 2 pkts.

Now to bed. Hope there's some action when I get up in the morning.

Enjoy,
Keith

Awesome! It looks like taking those pics was as much work as the brew, I know I hate doing anything extra on brew days. But thanks for sharing they are pretty cool, especially the floating temp probe.

Awesome.

Tonight will be day 7 in the fermenter. I've kept the ambient temp around 61-62. The adhesive thermometer strip on the Better Bottle has been 62-64. There was a lot of activity days 3-5. Minimal bubbling now. I stole a sample from the spigot this morning. Tastes great. Recipe gives O.G. of 1.065 and F.G. of 1.017. My O.G. was 1.066. Today, it is 1.020. So, I'm getting close. Recipe calls for 3 weeks in primary. Past 2 days, I'm moving the fermenter temp up a bit. Supposedly, that enables the yeast to do a better job of cleaning up.

So far so good for my first.
Keith

I've been trying to figure out how to incorporate my remote bbq thermometer into my brew day, but usually by the time I start pondering it, I'm a few homebrews in and the answer eludes me! Problem-solved! Simple, graceful solution to the problem - thanks for posting it.

Any updates? Have you kegged/tried this yet? I'm looking to try my second no chill BIAB with this recipe this weekend.

cbehr said:

Any updates? Have you kegged/tried this yet? I'm looking to try my second no chill BIAB with this recipe this weekend.

Click to expand...

Thank you for asking. This coming Monday night (Oct 15) will be the 21st day in the primary. After seeing your message, I decided to go get my 2nd taste/test sample. The temp has been between 64-66*F. The gravity is 1.020. The spice has mellowed since my previous taste test. I did pitch with 2 pks of Safale US-05.

I will need to leave it in the primary an additional week: the recipe calls for 21 days in primary and 3 days in secondary. I will be flying out for a week-long convention on the 15th. I'll be off the following Monday, the day after I return, so I'll move it to secondary then.

It's gotten a little chilly here, so I may need to round up a little space heater and ramp the temp up to 68 for the duration. My previous little space heater lasted a few months. Now, the element will come on, but the fan won't.

Edit: I don't yet have a keg setup. I will be bottling this. I may rack it into 1 or 2 of the Tap-A-Draft bottles. I'd like to have some bottles to share with others. I requested and was given that setup for Christmas last year, but haven't yet used it.

We are moving to a new (for us) house in a few weeks. As soon as we're moved, I'd like to brew another batch of this to have around for Christmas.

Thanks,
Keith

kzimmer0817 said:

I will need to leave it in the primary an additional week: the recipe calls for 21 days in primary and 3 days in secondary. I will be flying out for a week-long convention on the 15th. I'll be off the following Monday, the day after I return, so I'll move it to secondary then.

Click to expand...

This is really vain to quote myself, but . . . as I said in the previous message, I transferred this to secondary on Monday, 4 days ago. I ended up with appr 4.5 gallons in the secondary. Today, I bottled. My F.G. is still 1.020. According to an online calculator, to have 2.5 volumes of CO2 in 4.5 gallons, I would need 3.9 oz (by weight) of corn sugar, so that's what I did.

I filled one of the bottles for my Tap-A-Draft and filled 36 standard bottles. I capped the final 1/2 bottle and put it into the fridge to taste cold.

We'll see how this goes.
Thanks,
Keith