New brewer

Hi guys,

Brand new to brewing and just wanted to a bit of advice before sorting. I was just wanting to know about that starting process. If I'm using specialty grains should I steep them in a separate pot first and then get my other water boiling and then take of the heat to add the extract? Once I've put the extract in and it's dissolved do I add the steeped water and increase to boil again and then add my hops for various boiling times?


I brought a brewing for dummies book but just wanted to be sure before I started.

Cheers and your help is much appreciated.

That's one way, and it will work.

Or just steep grains in the boil pot. To do this, start by raising water to just 2 or 3 degrees above steep/mash temperature. Add specialty grains (in a bag), hold temp. Then remove grains, rinse grains into pot with water at or just above mash tmp, then raise to boil. Most recipes call for all or part of extract at beginning of boil. Then add hops. Add remainder of extract at -15 minutes.

Awesome thanks for your help, makes much more sense now. I'll start my first batch soon, can't wait.

Make sure to take your pot off the heat when adding LME(Liquid Malt Extract) Stir and add the extract, then put your pot back on the heat. (LME can easy burn in the bottom of the pot)

dazjones said:

I brought a brewing for dummies book but just wanted to be sure before I started.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure how the brewing for dummies book is, but you should check out The Complete Joy of Home Brewing by Charlie Papazian or How to Brew by John Palmer. Both books are really helpful to keep on hand.

One thing you might want to consider is to:
1. Bring half of the water to 158*, steep your grains for the recommended amount of time.
2. Rinse your grains with water that is ~170*
3. Assuming you are doing a 5 gallon batch, bring the water level up to the 4.5 or 5 gallon mark (depending on how much extract you have to add) and start your boil. (You ultimately want to end up with about 5+ gallons or beer so you get about 5 G after siphoning into your fermenter (less the left over trub). Once the boil is happening,
4. Add your first hop addition.. the bittering hops. Follow the schedule for adding hops at the proper time.
5. Add the Whirlfloc or Irish Moss or ?? in the last 5 minutes.
6. Turn off the heat and add your extract. Use a ladle or large glass measuring cup to dip wort out of the pot, pour into the container(s) and rinse them well back into the boiling pot. Get as much as possible out.
7. Stir this well to dissolve it all. No fear of burning/scorching the extract this way.
8. Chill to pitching temp and you should be good to go...

Your beer color will be truer adding the extract at the end. The wort will still be hot enough to sterilize either the liquid or dry malt extract. Some people believe the hop utilization will not be good doing it this way.. but, tests seem to indicate otherwise. If you want, you can add, say, half of the extract.. or some portion of it initially (after turning off the flame) and stirring it in well. I've found adding it at the very end works very well.

When I was doing extracts I had very good success by putting hot tap water in the kettle and turning on the heat. I then added the steeping grains started a timer and watched the temperature.

The aim was to steep for 20 minutes and hit 170 degrees. The two usually met within a couple of minutes of the 20 minute mark. Then I rinsed the grain and raised the temperature for the boil.

This saved some time as the stove burner was on all the time and the temperature was increasing throughout.

This is mostly post boil kind of help but I think useful nonetheless. It's a bit of a work in progress but was a bunch of stuff I messed up right off the bat and stuff I repeatedly see popping up on these forums:

http://inhousebrew.weebly.com/things-i-wish-i-knew-when-i-started.html

There is a lot of good advice on this page, however for a first batch, I would not vary too much from the instructions you have in your book or your kit. There are a lot of issues that impact the final profile. I say KISS. Variation from recommended mash temperature, extract timing, hop timing, etc., will change the beer's flavor.

My advice is to follow basic brew procedures, there will be plenty of time to explore these issues later.

Good luck.

Thanks once again for all your help guys. Will let u know how it's goes