First batch - Looking for pointers

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Huff360

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So I've made a batch of Coopers from a can, but I've never tried any thing with grain. My wife has Celiac, so to justify all the brewing equipment I have to do a GF batch. I've read around a lot and have joined the local homebrew club. I've gathered together all my ingredients and am about ready to give it a shot.

The plan is a simple APA recipe that I found somewhere else, it's called Hammerhouse GF APA. The recipe is for a 5 gal batch, but I'm going to cut it to 2.5 gallons. The list below is the cut recipe.

3 lbs Northern Brewer Sorghum Syrup
.5 lbs Flaked Corn
4 oz Flaked Rice
.5 oz Hallertauer pellets (60 min)
.5 oz Cascade whole (30 Min)
.5 oz cascade whole (2 min)

Safale S-05

The recipe doesn't give any info on temperatures though, so I am a bit unsure what to do. I've read a lot on the Brew-In-A-Bag method, which is what I will be trying.

I am thinking the following is what I should do -
Add the Sorghum Syrup and water to make a 3 gallon boil
Bring up to Strike temp of about 68c (155F)
Place bag in pot and add corn and rice
Mash at 65c (150F) for 60 minutes stir and add heat to hold temp
Remove grain bag and collect the draining wort
Add the collected wort back to the boil pot (should be a little under 3 gallons at this point)
Bring to a boil - add hops at times shown in recipe

Hopefully end with about 2.5 gallons of wort and ferment as usual.

Does this seem right? Am I missing anything? Have I lost my mind?
 
seems to me that your trying a mini mash (though im still pretty new to this whole thing) and as far as i can tell it looks good, the only thing i would change thou is

add water to make a 3 gallon boil
Bring up to Strike temp of about 68c (155F)
Place bag in pot and add corn and rice
Mash at 65c (150F) for 60 minutes stir and add heat to hold temp
Remove grain bag and collect the draining wort
Add the collected wort back to the boil pot (should be a little under 3 gallons at this point)
Add the Sorghum Syrup
Bring to a boil - add hops at times shown in recipe

Hopefully end with about 2.5 gallons of wort and ferment as usual.
 
Well, I'm actually not sure what the flaked corn and flaked rice will add besides some starch haze. Look at this thread for a discussion. Also, we aren't 100% sure if it is in fact gluten free.

So, just to be safe, do a regular extract brew minus the corn and rice. If you want to dry it out a bit add some corn sugar to the boil and you can also add the extract in the last 15 min to have better hop utilization.
 
I don't hink you will need to do a mash at all, the corn and rice won't be malted so you won't get much sugar from them.
I would just steep the rice and corn pre boil, then continue with an extract brew.
I always add some irish moss at about 10min.

The cascade hops are quite citrusy and I have found that combining them with the sorghum creates a very 'tangy' beer. But that is just my taste buds and your wife might love it.
 
I'm with Lcasanova on this one. The corn and rice flakes aren't roasted and so won't add much if anything without being mashed with something that will convert them. Since you aren't doing a mash they won't be converted and since they aren't roasted won't have any flavor to add. So it seems that as Lcasanova mentioned you'll just be steeping out some starches from them. Not sure what they had in mind with them in the original recipe???
 
I'm with Lcasanova on this one. The corn and rice flakes aren't roasted and so won't add much if anything without being mashed with something that will convert them. Since you aren't doing a mash they won't be converted and since they aren't roasted won't have any flavor to add. So it seems that as Lcasanova mentioned you'll just be steeping out some starches from them. Not sure what they had in mind with them in the original recipe???

Or, you could add some amylase enzyme to your mash and convert them to sugars that way.

All in all, I would suggest you listen to Logan's and others advice and go all extract for your first brew. Brown rice syrup would make a fair substitute for rice...corn would be more difficult as it imparts a very specific flavor, corona esque. Not sure on that one.
 
Also, can you point us to that recipe? I would like to see the original post and how they did it.
 
Here's the thread I originally found the recipe in...

http://www.brew-wineforum.com/shwmessage.aspx?forumid=1&messageid=143199

I've also seen the same guy talk about it a time or two elsewhere. Seems he makes it on a regular basis from what I've read. Maybe I should PM him and ask about it.

Hmmmm- I shoulda posted here before I placed my order! All the stuff is already in the mail. Not a big deal though. I can save it for later.

Also - Concerning the corn/rice not being GF: I was concerned about that as well. In fact, I don't think that we can get much of anything (except prepackaged) from the LHBS or mail order and assume it is 100% GF. I went to the closest store, who is a fair sized mail order outfit, and with as much grain as they have in those places there is no way to completely prevent cross-contamination. I wouldn't be surprised to find wheat dust in the hops and dextrose!

I guess I should rethink my first attempt. I will look over some of the recipes here and see what I can scrounge together ingredient wise to make something happen. I will have to give the recipe a try at some point as is just to see. No harm in trying.
 
Well, that thread is remarkably unhelpful, as was that Hammer guy, but the one guy who attempted his recipe ended up with 1.040, which happens to be the exact amount you get from 6lbs of Sorghum in 5gal Water.

This means the Corn and Rice did nothing but add starch. I would not recommend this.
 
It looks to me(but I"m admittedly guessing) that he converted a conventional recipe to GF by substituting Sorghum extract for the base and specialty malts and left in the GF adjuncts, copying their contributions as if you were still doing a mash.

You could do a mini mash with them using Apha amylase as Dkershner suggested which would probably get the OG closer to what the original recipe call for, but even still they wouldn't add a lot in the way of flavor(IMO).

It would of course be helpful if he had posted what the original recipe he was working from as that would give an idea the specific character to shoot for, but since we don't have any real equivalents I guess it's moot.

I'd sub out the corn and the rice for BRS(brown rice syrup) a 1lb 5oz jar if I was doing a full batch so maybe half that for your 2.5gal batch and go to a food coop or something and get some gf grain like millet or amaranth or quinoa and roast it in your oven, then give it a couple of weeks in a paper bag to air out and grind it up and steep it as a "specialty" grain for color and flavor. Save the corn and rice for your next batch using them in a mini mash with the GF grain of your choosing.
 
You could do a mini mash with them using Apha amylase as Dkershner suggested which would probably get the OG closer to what the original recipe call for, but even still they wouldn't add a lot in the way of flavor(IMO).

I feel flaked corn actually does add a fair bit of flavor in beers, I call the flavor "trash can", but I am sure there is a better description. It is the flavor that is in beers like Coors and Budweiser, Corona, Pacifico, and the like. I actually like the flavor fine, but to me it takes "spoiled" or something.

I have been looking for a good way to integrate flaked corn into a recipe, but am hesistant since I would need to buy a whole bag of it to ensure it was GF, or at least that it had the best chance of being so.
 
So - for an educational point, not a suggestion for this recipe -

Would adding something malted, like Fawcett's Oat Malt, provide the needed enzymes to convert the starches in the corn/rice.

I've seen a few references to using this in GF brews. As Fawcett's is supposed to be located in a place where they grow very little other than Oats, some suggest it may be GF.

Again, I'm not trying to save this recipe, I'm asking so that I can better analyse recipes in the future. I'm doing a lot of reading, but sometimes asking the question directly gets the clearest understanding.

Thanks
 
If it were me, I'd want to get something from Fawcett's that certifies that their oat malt is gluten free before I would even consider using it. That said, some people with celiac or gluten intolerance can still have a reaction to oats, even if they are gluten free. To each his own I guess, but if it was not gluten free, I wouldn't use it.
 
If it were me, I'd want to get something from Fawcett's that certifies that their oat malt is gluten free before I would even consider using it. That said, some people with celiac or gluten intolerance can still have a reaction to oats, even if they are gluten free. To each his own I guess, but if it was not gluten free, I wouldn't use it.

Yeah, its tough to enjoy a beer if it has a heyday on your insides, no matter how good it tastes.
 
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