Another first all-grain... questions and feedback?

I think I did a decent job, but I'm really not too sure. I made a bigger mess than normal, but I did get what looks like beer at the end.

I made (what I hope to be) a Dead Guy Clone based on Yooper's recipe. Here's my recipe:

11 pounds american 2row (added an extra lb anticipating low efficiency)
1 pound Cara-Munich
1 pound Munich
1/2 pound crystal 60L

Mash at 156-158 for 60 minutes. Sparge to get up to boil volume.

Hops:
1 ounce Perle 60 minutes
.5 ounce perle 30 minutes
.5 ounce perle 5 minutes
.5 ounce sterling 5 minutes

I used DeathBrewer's Easy Stove-top All-Grain Brewing guide as my method, slightly adjusted to two 7.5 gal kettles and doing a full-boil as I was using a propane burner.

So my first problem came when I missed my mash temp pretty bad... having forgot that the grains had been in the fridge for several days, I lost a lot more than 12* when I added the grains. I turned the burner back on to get it to the right temp, took about 10 mins. I lost about 1* over the 60 minute mash after that, so that worked out well.

I also managed to spill a lot of wort on the ground while transferring grains from the mash to the sparge and out again, so lost a little sugar that way.

But I ended up with an OG of 1.061 (at the end, measured after transferring to carboy, didn't take SG readings after mash or sparge) which my calculations tell me is about 62% efficiency, not too shabby.

I had about .5 gal too much volume in the boiling kettle so I let it boil for about 20 minutes before adding the first hops and starting the boil timer. This seemed to work well, I had just over 5gal when I moved the wort to be chilled. By the time I filled the carboy (and spilled a little more) it was pretty much dead-on 5gal.

I pitched two swollen smack-packs of Pacman @62*. Ambient air temp in fermentation closet is about 60*. Getting lots of bubbles this morning, so that's good.

However, not much krausen has formed. Maybe that is typical for this type of yeast and this temp (I've never used pacman before, nor started fermentation as low as 60*), but I guess I'm used to a pretty big krausen with a lot of gunky stuff in it forming pretty quickly (in the past I'd usually pitch around 70* and keep the closet in the high 60's).

Also, there's a HUGE (2-2.5 inches) sediment layer on the bottom of the carboy. I'm having trouble believing that it's all yeast, but I suppose it could be. My worry is that I ground my grains too fine or something, and this is coagulated dust or something from the mash and I'm going to lose a gallon+ when it's time to rack off of this stuff. (pic included at the end)

Anyway, that's my situation... any feedback on these potential issues would be appreciated. I know to RDWHAHB, I'm sure I'll get beer when it's all said and done, but I'd still appreciate feedback from the more experienced folks here.

TIA!

Well done.

Being under the Mash temp is not a problem, being over is. If you raised the temp then you may end up with a slightly different wort profile but nothing to worry about. The sediment (Trub) is likely to be the hot and cold break (Protein) and you want this to drop out.

Looks good.

Cool, thanks! So that sediment will settle down, and is normal? i.e., it won't cause a large loss of beer in the end?

It will settle (a bit) It will cause loss of volume. That's why I brew half a gallon more than I want to end up with.

Thanks, glad to know it's normal... next time I will account for it.

Did you use a hop bag or strain the wort before putting it in the carboy? The sediment could be hop particles.

Apollo said:

Did you use a hop bag or strain the wort before putting it in the carboy? The sediment could be hop particles.

Click to expand...

I strained the wort through a colander, which caught the whole hops pretty well, but I think the pellet hops probably made it through more.