Decision time for my second allgrain

I've only got one all grain batch under my belt so far (Bee Cave Pale Ale) and I'm really pleased with the results (even though I mashed a bit too high). Saturday I'm planning to brew my second and I've chosen to try another of Ed's recipes: Bee Cave Brewery Rye IPA.

Today after work is the only opportunity I'll have to get the ingredients, and I just realized that while the Pale Ale I did before used about 10 lbs of grain, this recipe calls for over 15 lbs. It's stronger, so that makes sense, but the cooler I use for my mash is only 5 gallons, and I remember last time it was almost full as it was.

I found this calculator (http://www.brew365.com/mash_sparge_water_calculator.php) and plugged in some numbers and it shows that I'll need over 5 gallons of strike water. That doesn't include the grain volume.

I have two options that I'm debating on. Maybe you folks can think of others...

Option one: Hope that you smarties on this board can help me scale the recipe down to something I can fit in my mash tun. (This means less beer and makes me sad )

Option two: Substitute some DME for part of the 2-row. (Again I'm a noob and will need help with this option too)

What would you do?

Partial mash. Easy to figure out how much DME to add and how much base malt to remove with BeerSmith.

I'd use it as an excuse to get a bigger mash tun, myself.

But, if that's not an option, cut the 2 row and vienna in half. That leaves you with 9 pounds of grain instead of 15. Once it's boiled for about a half hour or so, pull a sample to check your gravity, then add enough DME to get your gravity up to where it should be. I saw some chart somewhere that had the points/pound/gallon of pretty much every malt and extract, I think it might have been in the wiki on here. You could get really technical about it and figure out the difference in hop utilization if you feel like doing some math, too.

Or, make a half batch and lament your lack of gigantic mash tun.

GrizlyGarou said:

I'd use it as an excuse to get a bigger mash tun, myself.

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I'm counting on Santa coming through with a bigger mash tun, but he won't be here before Saturday.

I read on another thread that said to use .6 lbs DME for every pound of grain. So if I have 6 pounds less grain, I would need 3.6 lbs of DME. I'm not sure how specific I can be while buying the DME, but does this sound about right?

Santa needs to work out something for express delivery...

It depends on your efficiency. DME has about 44 PPG, meaning a pound of DME in a gallon of water will have a SG of 1.044. Do you have a reasonably accurate scale, by any chance?

What was your efficiency on your last AG?

GrizlyGarou said:

What was your efficiency on your last AG?

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The recipe I did before was based on 75% effeciency and I hit my numbers pretty much right on the money.

Yeah, you want about 3.6# of DME. If it comes in 3# bags and not 3.6#, get another pound of 2 row and you should be close enough.

Or you could mash thicker at 1qt per pound. You will just have to open the valve very slowly and try to avoid a stuck sparge. You won't be able to mash out but you can just drain the tun and then sparge to stop conversion. This is if you don't want to go the DME route and could lead to a very long frustrating brew day if it gets stuck, but it's what I would do. I like to make things as difficult as possible for myself though?

skeeordye11 said:

Or you could mash thicker at 1qt per pound. You will just have to open the valve very slowly and try to avoid a stuck sparge. You won't be able to mash out but you can just drain the tun and then sparge to stop conversion. This is if you don't want to go the DME route and could lead to a very long frustrating brew day if it gets stuck, but it's what I would do. I like to make things as difficult as possible for myself though?

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I'd rather do this and keep it all grain, but I read that the rye can get pretty sticky and I'm afraid I might be pushing it using less water. I'll probably just chicken out and use the DME. On the bright side, I suppose it'll make it a little easier to hit my target gravity.

After looking up the price of DME and sadly pacing the floor a bit, I'm thinking, why not just mash half the grain at a time. I could just divide the grain up and mash half, collect runnings, then do it again with the other half. Sure it'll take an extra 70+ minutes, but I'm OK with that.

Question: Do I need to be concerned about the runnings from the first half sitting in my kettle for over an hour before boiling? I wouldn't think this would be enough time to spoil... right?

carrotmalt said:

After looking up the price of DME and sadly pacing the floor a bit, I'm thinking, why not just mash half the grain at a time.
<snip>
Question: Do I need to be concerned about the runnings from the first half sitting in my kettle for over an hour before boiling? I wouldn't think this would be enough time to spoil... right?

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This is exactly what I was gonna suggest.
And as for having half the wort sitting, you could keep it at 150F while you're collecting the other half. No bacterial action at that temp.

FYI, I ended up mashing in two batches. I had an OG of 1.06 (recipe called for 1.064), so I consider it a success. Now I'm looking at 10 gallon coolers so I can shave that extra hour and half back off my brew day.

Why stop at a 10 gallon cooler? Go to 15 - that way, when you decide to do a 10 gallon batch of a high gravity beer, you are all set.

phatuna said:

Why stop at a 10 gallon cooler? Go to 15 - that way, when you decide to do a 10 gallon batch of a high gravity beer, you are all set.

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Good call. I'm looking at getting this one (OK, not quite 15 gals ) after work today.