Greetings fellow homebrewers! I'm still a pretty new homebrewer, with 7 batches under my belt, including two partial mashes. I've gotten to the point where I want to develop my own recipes. The SMaSH concept seems like a logical starting point. Here's my plan:
Goals:
-Develop a good American Pale Ale recipe
-Learn the flavor contributions of different base malts and hops
-Hone in on my all-grain setup and procedures
My setup:
-5 Gallon mash tun w/DIY braided screen
-5 gallon kettle
-4 gallon kettle
-another beverage cooler to hold sparge/strike water
-Electric stove
-Wort chiller (using for the first time)
-6.5 gallon fermenting buckets
-Lotsa bottles
Round 1, busy brew day:
3 or 4 two gallon SMaSH Ale batches using different base malts. All recipes will use the same:
-brew system as used for 5 gallon batches
-Mash temp around 152F with 170F mashout.
-US-05 dry yeast.
-Same amount and hopping schedule using chinook since I have a plant in the backyard.
-Size of fermenting bucket, 6.5 gallon.
-Fermenting temp around 70F.
-Fermenting time, priming sugar, conditioning time, temp, etc.
Since I want an American Ale, I'm shooting for the lower end of the IBU's (30ish) so I can taste the base malt (hopefully??)
I was thinking 0.2 oz @ 60 and 0.2 oz @ 8 min. I'm a little nervous that my scale's accuracy is 0.05 oz, but we'll see how it goes.
I've been tinkering with iBrewmaster for a couple months, and it says my boil size is 2.7 gallons, which seems high. Shouldn't boil off be more like 20%? Or 2.4 gallons boil size? I've never tried to calculate what my boil off typically is.
Any issues with using 6.5 gallon buckets for 2 gallons of beer? Will there be enough C02 from the yeast so that all that headspace isn't an issue?
Thoughts on the 3 or 4 base malts? I was thinking 2 row, Maris Otter, Munich. If I'm really motivated, maybe Vienna or Pilsener. Is Pilsener close to 2 row?
I've never done more than one brew in a day, so I like that this experiment is forcing me to try things to speed up my process, like using an extra cooler to hold strike/sparge water. I always seem to be waiting for my cheap electric stove to heat up water.
I'm also working to hook up a wort chiller to my kitchen faucet. I usually use an ice bath, so there's another time saver.
I'll have a friend helping me, as well.
What do you guys think? After the taste test, we'll chose a base malt and then go to the next round which will be toying with hopping schedule, and amounts. That should be easier since I'll mash one big batch (instead of 3 small ones), then split to different pots that are boiling different hop schedules.
Or, the next round could be playing with caramel malts... so many choices... Then next, add more malt and hops to do an IPA, or add dark malts to make a brown ale, or porter, add this and that and make it a stout, add lactose to make it a milk stout, add coffee, oatmeal and on and on...boy this is fun! I really want to learn what the ingredients are contributing, and build my own recipes. :rockin:
Goals:
-Develop a good American Pale Ale recipe
-Learn the flavor contributions of different base malts and hops
-Hone in on my all-grain setup and procedures
My setup:
-5 Gallon mash tun w/DIY braided screen
-5 gallon kettle
-4 gallon kettle
-another beverage cooler to hold sparge/strike water
-Electric stove
-Wort chiller (using for the first time)
-6.5 gallon fermenting buckets
-Lotsa bottles
Round 1, busy brew day:
3 or 4 two gallon SMaSH Ale batches using different base malts. All recipes will use the same:
-brew system as used for 5 gallon batches
-Mash temp around 152F with 170F mashout.
-US-05 dry yeast.
-Same amount and hopping schedule using chinook since I have a plant in the backyard.
-Size of fermenting bucket, 6.5 gallon.
-Fermenting temp around 70F.
-Fermenting time, priming sugar, conditioning time, temp, etc.
Since I want an American Ale, I'm shooting for the lower end of the IBU's (30ish) so I can taste the base malt (hopefully??)
I was thinking 0.2 oz @ 60 and 0.2 oz @ 8 min. I'm a little nervous that my scale's accuracy is 0.05 oz, but we'll see how it goes.I've been tinkering with iBrewmaster for a couple months, and it says my boil size is 2.7 gallons, which seems high. Shouldn't boil off be more like 20%? Or 2.4 gallons boil size? I've never tried to calculate what my boil off typically is.
Any issues with using 6.5 gallon buckets for 2 gallons of beer? Will there be enough C02 from the yeast so that all that headspace isn't an issue?
Thoughts on the 3 or 4 base malts? I was thinking 2 row, Maris Otter, Munich. If I'm really motivated, maybe Vienna or Pilsener. Is Pilsener close to 2 row?
I've never done more than one brew in a day, so I like that this experiment is forcing me to try things to speed up my process, like using an extra cooler to hold strike/sparge water. I always seem to be waiting for my cheap electric stove to heat up water.
I'm also working to hook up a wort chiller to my kitchen faucet. I usually use an ice bath, so there's another time saver.
I'll have a friend helping me, as well.
What do you guys think? After the taste test,
we'll chose a base malt and then go to the next round which will be toying with hopping schedule, and amounts. That should be easier since I'll mash one big batch (instead of 3 small ones), then split to different pots that are boiling different hop schedules.Or, the next round could be playing with caramel malts... so many choices... Then next, add more malt and hops to do an IPA, or add dark malts to make a brown ale, or porter, add this and that and make it a stout, add lactose to make it a milk stout, add coffee, oatmeal and on and on...boy this is fun!
I really want to learn what the ingredients are contributing, and build my own recipes. :rockin:
