Classic mistake - late night brewing

Hey everyone,

Talk about a rookie mistake. It's 4:51 AM my time and it looks like the 5 hour brewing sessions turned into a 7.5 or 8 hour session. The roommate and girlfriend are both asleep and I just finished cleanup. I figured I'd offer some newbie wisdom to others starting out.

When you need to be up early for work the next day, don't start brewing at 9:00 PM even when you think you'll only be up until 2:00 AM.

The good news is, I don't think I made any stupid mistakes. We'll see. My favorite part was when I set alarms to wake me up every twenty minutes on my phone to check the temperature of the wort cooling in the sink. Good times.

Anyway, that's it for the late night babble. Off to bed!

Best,
Mark

sympathies from a fellow insomniac/poor time manager. on the upside, you now have beer

Always brew on the weekends! I start at 10am. That way, even if it runs late, I still have a large part of the day left! Congrats anyway, you made beer! Remember to control your ferm temps.

I did that last week, but I still got a few hours of sleep.

Sounds like you need a quicker chilling method, brother.

@sweetcell - Very true. Beer makes it worthwhile.

@gcdowd - I normally do, and I also typically start around late morning or early afternoon. Nice way to spend an afternoon. What's the best temperature to try and keep ti at for a pale ale?

@mux - I feel your pain!

@Fizzycist - I definitely do, but right now I'm going to have to make do with ice and the sink.

Thanks everyone!

Mark

My brew sessions are about 3 hours every time. I mash the grain for 60 minutes, takes 15 min to start boil, 60 minute boil, 20 min cool down with wash tub and multiple ice baths, 15min to transfer to fermenter and pitch yeast, 10 min clean up.

Pre-weighing all your ingredients and putting the hop additions in little zipper baggies makes a huge difference on brew day.

MarkIafrate said:

@sweetcell - Very true. Beer makes it worthwhile.

@gcdowd - I normally do, and I also typically start around late morning or early afternoon. Nice way to spend an afternoon. What's the best temperature to try and keep ti at for a pale ale?

Mark

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What type of yeast did you use?

Jayhem said:

My brew sessions are about 3 hours every time. I mash the grain for 60 minutes, takes 15 min to start boil, 60 minute boil, 20 min cool down with wash tub and multiple ice baths, 15min to transfer to fermenter and pitch yeast, 10 min clean up.

Pre-weighing all your ingredients and putting the hop additions in little zipper baggies makes a huge difference on brew day.

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That doesn't take into account heating the water for the mash to the strike temperature or sparging.

I do a 90-minute partial mash with about a 10 minute warm-up and dedicate about 15 minutes to sparging. There's about 15 minutes between that and the boil, which lasts 60 minutes. It takes less than 10 minutes for me to cool the wort with a chiller, but I usually allocate that much time to it. There's 5 minutes to transfer and about 15 minutes of aerating the wort.

I bottle during the mash, which makes things more complicated.

I typically go in expecting it to take 5 hours if we run into a snag.

the last issue of BYO gave tips to speeding up an all grain brewday. they clocked it at 3:30 with a 45 minute mash.

ludomonster said:

That doesn't take into account heating the water for the mash to the strike temperature or sparging.

I do a 90-minute partial mash with about a 10 minute warm-up and dedicate about 15 minutes to sparging. There's about 15 minutes between that and the boil, which lasts 60 minutes. It takes less than 10 minutes for me to cool the wort with a chiller, but I usually allocate that much time to it. There's 5 minutes to transfer and about 15 minutes of aerating the wort.

I bottle during the mash, which makes things more complicated.

I typically go in expecting it to take 5 hours if we run into a snag.

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That's true. The good thing about brewing is you can do other things during the brewing as long as you set timers. I do a 60 min partial mash and set timers to stir and check temp every 15 min, get some other things done around the house while it works. Same with the 60 min boil. I know what setting the stove needs to be at to prevent boil overs and just stir every 5-10 min.

Start to finish does tend to take longer than planned on any endeavor, not just brewing.

my first batch we were up till about 4 am. We started at 11 pm though... We didn't cool the top-off water and we didn't use an ice bath. It was about 30 degrees outside and we figured it would be cold enough to cool the wort down quickly. Boy were we wrong! My friend and I sat there on the couch nodding off waiting for the wort to cool. Fun!
Now we cool the wort in 20 minutes. The joys of trial and error.

Even though I brew inside, I cannot brew at night for some reason.

Fizzycist said:

Sounds like you need a quicker chilling method, brother.

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I have limited space and kettle volume so i do partial boils. I learned quickly the value of 2-3 gallons of refrigerated water used to fill/cool

First AG brew this weekend. Starting about 2 hours earlier than normal to account for mash ans sparge times. Picked up some more fermcap too. Have never had any issues with boilovers though

I do most of my brewing in evening once kids go to bed. I have had only 1 beer go for 8 hours, that was because tap water was too hot for steeping grains at 120 degrees.

My beers would be all f'ed up if I brewed at night. Brewing in the very early morning, while everyone is asleep, almost always goes really well for me.

I know there seems to be this unwritten rule that you need to drink while brewing, but that doesn't work for me unfortunately.

Jayhem said:

Start to finish does tend to take longer than planned on any endeavor, not just brewing.

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I can think of at least one endeavor my wife would disagree with you on.

passedpawn said:

My beers would be all f'ed up if I brewed at night. Brewing in the very early morning, while everyone is asleep, almost always goes really well for me.

I know there seems to be this unwritten rule that you need to drink while brewing, but that doesn't work for me unfortunately.

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Me either. Except I always end up doing it anyhow. If I am by myself I usually wait until I am chilling or at least very late in the boil. Usually that doesn’t result in too many screw ups.

The worst is when my one brew-buddy comes over. We don’t get to hang out too often so its almost more about catching up than the actual brewing. One time we got too drunk and forgot about a keg I was filling with water in the laundry room, until we heard the 3 inches of water cascading into the garage. Good thing the wife wasn’t home for that.

I should mention that I always start my brewdays no later than 9AM.

passedpawn said:

My beers would be all f'ed up if I brewed at night. Brewing in the very early morning, while everyone is asleep, almost always goes really well for me.

I know there seems to be this unwritten rule that you need to drink while brewing, but that doesn't work for me unfortunately.

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I usually brew on weekends and I start at around 7:30AM.. By the time lunchtime rolls around I'm usually chilling, so I'll grab something to eat and pour me a brew. Then, after I pitch yeast and clean everything up I need coffee! :cross:

Sometimes it's the beer I'm drinking that prompts me into brewing! So some of the time I get mixed results. I can't help but drink while brewing-I thought it was a law or something.

I've been doing the ice bath myself up to now and it's really the only part of the brewing I don't like, so this weekend I'm gonna try to DIY a coil chiller. That said, I like to throw together cider batches at night but it's easy when you don't have to mash, boil, or cool.

Fizzycist said:

I've been doing the ice bath myself up to now and it's really the only part of the brewing I don't like, so this weekend I'm gonna try to DIY a coil chiller. That said, I like to throw together cider batches at night but it's easy when you don't have to mash, boil, or cool.

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How difficult are those to get together? At least while I'm brewing in the apartment on a stove top I'd like to have some more portable to use for aid in chilling.

Mark

I feel you, OP. I feel you.

Why not just use the no-chill method for late night brews? Cover the pot and let it sit overnight, pour into the fermenter and pitch in the morning.

strambo said:

Why not just use the no-chill method for late night brews? Cover the pot and let it sit overnight, pour into the fermenter and pitch in the morning.

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I've never done "no chill" , but I'm interested in it. I was under the impression that you're supposed to transfer the hot wort into a bucket or something that you can put an airtight lid on so that the heat creats a vacuum. Thus, protecting the wort form bacteria and such. I would think you couldn't do this in the kettle. How many times have you actually used this method?

How many times have you actually used this method?

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I haven't...but I recently went to an All-Grain brewing class at the LHBS. After class, as the open kettle was cooling with a chiller, I asked the instructor about sanitation and stuff getting inside while cooling since I cover mine up.

He said he isn't overly concerned about it, then said he doesn't personally use a chiller, just puts the lid on the pot and leaves it over night and he has never had a bad batch. Of course he wasn't teaching that method to beginners...

His view was that you should over-stress sanitation to beginners so they know it is important, but as an experienced brewer you know where it is important and what is overkill. He is also from a wine-making background where sanitation isn't as critical.

Personally, I would try it vs. staying up all night, worth the risk. Besides, the lid on the boiling hot kettle is sanitized when it goes on...

I almost always have to brew at night since I've always had to brew somewhere other than my apartment. I was brewing at a friend's house and now that he no longer wants to do it I've been doing it at my parents'. With extract beers I pretty much got it down to about 2-3 hours and now that I'm doing all grain I have a feeling I will be having many more late nights. My dad tries to help, but he wakes up at 5 AM and is usually falling asleep on his feet halfway through the boil.