Boiling all five gallons?

I am fairly new to the brewing scene, and so far I have had great success brewing extract kits using an old 4 gallon enameled stock pot that I stole from my mother's kitchen.

Recently I purchased a turkey deep frier setup with an 8 gallon stainless steele stockpot and a propane burner and stand.

I thought it would increase the sanitation of my brew if I boiled all five gallons in the stockpot, instead of boiling 3 and than adding 2 gallons of fresh water like I had done in the past with my smaller pot.

To my dismay, upon sampling the cooled wert it was overwelmingly bitter.

I am wondering if this is because all five gallons of water were exposed to the hopps and therefor extracted more of the hopp oil, or was it something else?

Do I need to adjust the way I use the hopps if I boil all five gallons and add no additional water?

Is there any real advantage to boiling all 5 gallons(I actually started with 5.75 gallons, to end up with 5.0 at the end)or is boiling 3 and adding 2 the standard?

What do most people do that have the boiling capacity?

The two main advantages to full boils are:

1. Better hops utilization (as you discovered)

2. Less carmelization of the wort, which can be a problem with partial-boil extract brews.

You can use commercial software like ProMash or Beersmith, or the free spreadsheet at Beer Recipator (http://hbd.org/recipator/) to adjust your recipe so that the IBUs will be the same with a full boil. (You'll need to reduce the bittering hops by something on the order of 20-30%).

I tend to start with 6-8.5 gallons for all grain and anywhere from 2.5 to 6 gallons for mini-mash and extract. CW is right on for the adjustments.

Very bitter brew: age it longer, dry hop or add lactose to sweeten it. Depends on the style.

Most recipes I've seen (particularly in Beer Captured) recommend using 17-20% less hops in a full boil due to the increased utilization. This means the bittering hops...the flavor/aroma can pretty much stay the same.

i unfortunately have an electric stove so I am going to go back from a 5 gallon boil to a 4 gallon. I like to walk the razor's edge too and will cover my kettle, otherwise it takes me several hours to do a extract/parital mash brew.

mrkrispy said:

I like to walk the razor's edge too and will cover my kettle, otherwise it takes me several hours to do a extract/parital mash brew.

Click to expand...

Keeping it covered to reach a boil is okay (assuming you're watching it), but it's important to conduct the main boil without the lid. Otherwise you will trap in unwanted compounds that should be boiled off.

For full boils I recommend getting some brewing software such as Promash or Beersmith. It takes the guesswork out of trying to figure the right amount of hops, etc. for those of us that like to brew as "from scratch" as possible but aren't really up on the science of it all.

Oh and mrkrispy a heatstick or two would help speed your boil....
but use a GFCI receptacle!!!!!!

http://hbd.org/pcalinsk/HeatStk3.htm