Did my first all grain on Sunday

Brewed a witbier Sunday. First all-grain. It was batch sparging. Ended up getting some plastic buckets from a guy. 1 bucket had a bunch of holes in bottom. NEsted inside another bucket with a spigot. Had to replace the spigot when I got it, but after I sanitized it all. Idea was to hit 155 F for 45 minutes to 1 hour. I went to some on-line calculaters to determing strike temp. Had notes and everything went according to plan until I added grain to the water. The volume of water added was correct. But I didn't account for the 1 gallon of deadspace between the buckets!
There went my carefully thought out plan. HA! Winged it. Trying to get 7 gallons into kettle. Plan was to get 3.5 gallons from the runnings. Ended up getting the 7 gallons.
Wort chiller I used for 1st time was awesome. The LHBS gave me some Fermentis S-33 or something. I had about a gallon left to fill the 5 gallons in glass carboy, added rehydrated yeast. 2 hours later at 62 F, already seeing fermentation activity. Woke up Monday morning, to watch it (can't help it!!) it looked like kreusened already?!?!?!? There was a ring above the brew in carboy indicating this. I was shocked. I was expecting maybe today or something it'd pick up. Very pleased. So on safe side, brought it upstairs this evening to get it warmer (72 F) to see if anything picks up.

Sounds like beer! Cheers

Sounds like you used a zappap as an mlt. To echo brightspot, congrats, you made beer!

It's a beautiful thing.....gotta love it

Zappap??

I've made extract and always get excited. Try to have patience to sit in fermenter a while before bottling. Then wait over a week to bottle condition. Problem is.... last batch. I bottled after 10 days. 3 days after bottling, tried it. Delicious. Problem was, it was about 3 weeks later and down to last bottle. It was the best. So trying my patience this time around.

Wait till you start kegging...even harder to wait

I have a keg. Bought one for $40 or so. No regulator, no tubing, no CO2 tank yet though.

StusBrew said:

I have a keg. Bought one for $40 or so. No regulator, no tubing, no CO2 tank yet though.

Click to expand...

Bvrgelements.com has killer deals on refurbished tanks and new regulators

Amazon.com has good tubing prices

Birdmanbrewing.com has the best prices on faucets

Cheers!

Awesome. I've have been shopping around. I don't mind bottling. Though I can say that now, since it's been a month since bottled last brew. Bottling is like what my wife has said about labor. You have 1 kid, then it's about a year, year and a half later and you forget what labor was like. Decide to get pregnant. 2nd kid and it all comes flooding back.
That's kind of what I thought when I bottled last. "Oh I can't wait to bottle this, share it, drink it. It'll be great!" Then bottling comes around and you're done. It's been over an hour. Trying not to drop any of it on floor because IT NEEDS TO GO INTO THE BOTTLE! So you get done. And usually sanitizing bottles the same day you're bottling to decrease any contamination. And you're thinking of buying a keg that very moment. Then you think about brewing another batch. Get to brewing again. You forget what bottling was.
But, it's a good thing. From mashing, boiling, fermenting and to packaging something you created. All that labor is worth it.

StusBrew said:

Zappap??

Click to expand...

Charlie Papazian made this type of MLT famous in his book. He called it the "Zapap", which is part of his last name backwards.

yep, one bucket with tons of tiny holes drilled in it, nested into another in-tact bucket. Lauter-tun.

StusBrew said:

I've made extract and always get excited. Try to have patience to sit in fermenter a while before bottling. Then wait over a week to bottle condition. Problem is.... last batch. I bottled after 10 days. 3 days after bottling, tried it. Delicious. Problem was, it was about 3 weeks later and down to last bottle. It was the best. So trying my patience this time around.

Click to expand...

Stop fussing and get the next beer in the fermenter. There's only 1 solution for anticipation; P-I-P-E-L-I-N-E. Congrats. Just wait until you start making adjustment recommendations to commercial brews. I had a draft the other day at a restaurant, and thought " that really needs some chocolate malt" It was a little brewery in Ireland that goes by the name Guiness. Heard of it? They MAY have made a few more batches than I :fro:

Honestly after having a few quality stouts I don't fancy Guiness that much at all nowadays.

I've felt the same way. I have a buddy who's more adventurous than my other buddies when it comes to beers. He loves Guiness. I've had it a time or two and think more chocolate as well. I've had better stouts. In fact I meant to give him a bottle or two of my stout but ran out. HA.
My problem now is my Wits been in carboy for 16 days. Was planning on bottling tonight. But putting it off. NOT looking forward to it. If I had one of those bottle trees, I might look forward to it more. Pretty much it's soak in 1 Step for a minute or so (I can fit 13 -14 bottles in a 6.5 gallon bucket with 5 gallons of 1 Step), take out of solution and drain bottle a little. Fill it. Put a cap on it. Get 18 - 20 bottles done. Cap them. Do 18 -20 more. Cap. Then finish. So waiting until Saturday now. Tomorrow and Thursday aren't good. Though maybe Friday. Almost 21 days in fermenter.

When I bottle I do this:

First, I make sure bottles are clean...but I know they are because I rinse them vigorously after I pour from them. I do the cleaning well in advance of bottling. I put them in 6-packs or 12-packs and carefully turn those upside down on a towel on top of a counter or stove. I let them dry for a few days.

On bottling-day I simply grab enough clean bottles, fill a bucket with sanitizer and set it under the bottling wand. I take a bottle, dunk it in sanitizer and swish around, then empty it, fill it with new beer, and set it on the counter. The bucket of sanitizer also catches any drips or overfill.

I put as many up on the counter as I can before stopping to cap. I cap and put each bottle back in a 6-pack or 12-pack. Usually can do a 5-gallon batch in two "runs" of fill-cap.

Well kids are begging to "help" bottle. So.....Maybe I can get them to hold 3-4 bottles upside down after coming out of sanitizer.
I have a problem. I do the thorough rinsing of my bottles. But then when buying commercial beers to taste and try. I think to mysef to keep a couple of bottles because I always end up short because of sharing my homebrew. I end up rinsing those guys out too. I then go downstairs and all my empty holes are filled. That's not the problem. I find myself rinsing bottles out!!! Oh well.

De-labeling is my least favorite part, especially with some brands and the glue they use. New Belgium, Abita, Empyrean all come off relatively easy. Sierra Nevada requires some scrubbing and there's one brand I can't think of that the labels seem to require a side-grinder to remove...and yes I'm soaking in oxyclean or PBW for sometimes days on end.

I haven't tried de-labeling yet. Luckily, my buddies are pretty good about returning the bottles to me.
Looking forward to it though. I've been coming home after work every day ready to bottle. But then I think: Do I really want to do this now???!?!?! I got to get my kid doing his homework. Some house chores, daily life really. So I calm myself down and think 20 days is fine in fermenter. relax, no hurry. I think the only thing to make it better would be if I could brew something after I bottled on Saturday. Oh well. Gives me time to get a measuring stick for my brew kettle and maybe work on a Venturi thing. Just to play and try it out. See what I think of it!!

Bottled the Wit. Took 3 readings. 1 of the readings as I was transferring to bottling bucket. The other 2 over the 20 days in carboy. Gravity reading hasn't changed. Got 48 bottles of 12 oz. Perfect. Had a little left of course. Poured a glass. Put in fridge. Get another taste test later. (Tastes good!!) Now if can get act together I can get stuff together to make a Belgian Golden Strong Ale. Though am wondering about maybe making a Belgian Golden Ale. Could take till end of summer to mature and stuff. Kind of want it around July/August. I think if brew an 8 - 9% brew, might take longer than I want it too.