eggraid101
Well-Known Member
So, I did my first all-grain batch yesterday, after 3 extract batches. It was fun, and it did turn out to be a brewing day. With 3 kids running around, I was interrupted a few times, and even had to put the brewing on hold between collecting the sparge and starting the boil to go to a birthday party for about 2 hrs. Oh well. It was a slight modification of BierMuncher's Centennial Blonde, using Cascade hops. I used a 5 gal rubbermaid MLT modified w/ a ss braid like the 10 gal cooler type poplular here. Some details:
5 gallon batch
9 lbs of grain ( a little more than BM's recipe)
I heated the water to 183, and then added about 12 qts to the cooler. It only went down a few degrees to 179 after about 10 mins, so I went ahead and added the grains. This brought it down to 158, which was higher than I wanted, so I added some ice, and then another 2 cups of hot water to end up at 151 to start. This went down to about 148 after 60 mins. I was pretty happy with this, but I was worried that the water I added was too hot to start with? Doesn;t hot water extract tannins? So I collected the first runnings, and they were coming out at about 1.060. I then added sparge water at about 179 again, and collected that. I did another run of sparge water after that, too, which was coming out at 1.010, and I thought I remembered that was about the goal there.
But, after all the collections, I only had 5-5 1/2 gallons, which was surprising. The boil went well, although it was my first time trying foam control. I got it from Midwest, and there were no instructions. I tried using about 10 drops at first, but then when the boil started it almost boiled over, so once I got it settled down I added two whole eye-dropper fulls, and that improved things, but then when I added the first addition of hop pellets, it foamed up a lot again, and I added like 2 more eye dropper fulls. Is this too much?
I used Whirl-floc for the first time, too, and added it at 15 mins left in the boil. Then, I don't have a immersion cooler, so I had to use a water bath, which took awhile to cool it, but I had time. The OG was 1.042, which is right about what I thought it would be. The final volume was about 4 1/2 gallons, less than I was shooting for. I put it in the fermenter, and added Safale 05 yeast, and it's bubbling away down there this AM. :rockin: It smelled good when brewing. I'll have a hard time resisting popping open a bottle before it's time.
So what do you think about the strike temp, the foam control, and the final volume?
5 gallon batch
9 lbs of grain ( a little more than BM's recipe)
I heated the water to 183, and then added about 12 qts to the cooler. It only went down a few degrees to 179 after about 10 mins, so I went ahead and added the grains. This brought it down to 158, which was higher than I wanted, so I added some ice, and then another 2 cups of hot water to end up at 151 to start. This went down to about 148 after 60 mins. I was pretty happy with this, but I was worried that the water I added was too hot to start with? Doesn;t hot water extract tannins? So I collected the first runnings, and they were coming out at about 1.060. I then added sparge water at about 179 again, and collected that. I did another run of sparge water after that, too, which was coming out at 1.010, and I thought I remembered that was about the goal there.
But, after all the collections, I only had 5-5 1/2 gallons, which was surprising. The boil went well, although it was my first time trying foam control. I got it from Midwest, and there were no instructions. I tried using about 10 drops at first, but then when the boil started it almost boiled over, so once I got it settled down I added two whole eye-dropper fulls, and that improved things, but then when I added the first addition of hop pellets, it foamed up a lot again, and I added like 2 more eye dropper fulls. Is this too much?
I used Whirl-floc for the first time, too, and added it at 15 mins left in the boil. Then, I don't have a immersion cooler, so I had to use a water bath, which took awhile to cool it, but I had time. The OG was 1.042, which is right about what I thought it would be. The final volume was about 4 1/2 gallons, less than I was shooting for. I put it in the fermenter, and added Safale 05 yeast, and it's bubbling away down there this AM. :rockin: It smelled good when brewing. I'll have a hard time resisting popping open a bottle before it's time.
So what do you think about the strike temp, the foam control, and the final volume?