Brewing in the cold

[BSBrewer83]

I'm going to brew tomorrow in Denver and its supposed to be about 38F. I will be brewing in my carport and will be freezing my n**** off!

Does anyone have any tips for brewing in the cold? I plan on preheating my mash cooler. Do I have to worry about a higher evap rate on my boil?

Any tips would be appreciated. I havent really brewed in the cold before and worry I will run across something new.

 

[WildGingerBrewing]

It's gonna take longer to get your boil going. Other than that, put on a coat! ha

 

[munklunk]

It's gonna take longer to get your boil going.

Not so much. I brew Ed Wort's Pale Ale last week up here in Chicago (which is as cold as a witch's ***) and I was able to get my stuff to a rolling boil in roughly the same amount of time. I also have one of those "Rocket" banjo burners, so i never really have issues with boiling.

When it was not in direct contact with the flame, the temp dropped rapidly. As for the mash tun, I would get out many things to wrap it with (plastic wrap, towels), and aim for a few degrees high than what the numbers say (when preheating) because you are going to lose some heat.

Other than that, make sure to drink lots of homebrew whilst brewing. Just to stay warm, that is.

 

[nootay]

i brewed last week and didnt even think about the cold affecting my mash. maybe a few too many brews. anyways, after i stirred in my grain, i hit 156, like i wanted. at the end of 60 minutes, it had dropped to 153. normally it doesnt drop at all, but it was 27 outside, so im sure that had something to do with it.

 

[Ichthy]

Insulate the crap out of your mash tun, you'll be dropping temps much easier.

 

[PVH]

How large a batch are you doing? If it's a 5gal, you should be able to mash inside, then move it outside.

 

[pjwalen]

How large a batch are you doing? If it's a 5gal, you should be able to mash inside, then move it outside.

QFT.

It's in single digits in MN this week and when dealing with brewing outside, I always mash in the house if possible. And be ready with a lot of top-up water post boil.

 

[BSBrewer83]

How large a batch are you doing? If it's a 5gal, you should be able to mash inside, then move it outside.

Its 5 gal and I think I will mash in side for sure.

 

[Gregscsu]

Brewed a Black IPA yesterday while it was 2F outside. Great time and the 20" of snow from the day before really added to the winter brewing.

I don't have any issues brewing in -10F weather because once the boil starts I just go sit inside and only head out for hop additions etc.
I also mash inside during the winter.

 

[Judochop]

I also brewed here in Chicago just last week when it dropped into the single digits.

Honestly, do everything you can inside. Certainly your mash. Let the mash tun sit inside overnight (I normally keep mine in the garage), and dough-in inside the house.
If you can prepare your sanitizer solution inside as well, that’d be nice. It’s no fun dipping your hands into 35 degree water, plus any vinyl tubing goes stiff and gets to be hard to handle.

If you’re running an immersion wort chiller with a hose, as I was, make sure your hose is flowing before you hook it up. Mine had already started to chunk up with ice inside. (I was concerned, perhaps uneccessarily, about my wet hydrometer freezing up and possibly cracking, too.)

The good news is, your wort will cool so fast it’ll break your neck.

 

[steinsato]

My biggest beef with brewing in the cold is getting out the garden hose and using my immersion wort chiller. The hose always freezes up on me and it's a total P.I.M.A.

 

[BSBrewer83]

My biggest beef with brewing in the cold is getting out the garden hose and using my immersion wort chiller. The hose always freezes up on me and it's a total P.I.M.A.

Oh yeah I bet. I'm thinking I might be able to run a hose from a utility sink I have inside to the back yard. I dont know if my hose is long enough though

My garden hose of course

 

[wizardofza]

Yeah, I have to string my hose across my lawn to my garage. If I don't keep it dripping during the brewday it'll freeze.

But I like it. Something about making beer when it's below freezing is cool to me.

 

[sportscrazed2]

only thing good about brewing in the snow

 

[trub quaffer]

A couple of things I've noticed when brewing in sub-freezing temps is: 1) My mash temp at the end of the mash will be a little lower than normal since the air in the mash tun when I put the lid on is COLD. That cold air is going to suck a little heat out of the mash to equalize the temp in the tun. BTW I use a cooler-type mash tun. 2) I loose an extra quart or so to evaporation for a 5 gallon batch during a 60 minute boil.

 

[barrooze]

Reading this thread makes me really happy about leaving MN and moving to TX. My "winter brewing" so far this year has been a balmy 54F. It was raining! Brrrrrr...

 

[rjwhite41]

38F is almost tropical. Quit being a pansy!

 

[SwampassJ]

38F is almost tropical. Quit being a pansy!

Pssshhhh I was happy when I started at 9ish the temp was 79, by dough in it was raining and down into the 60s with tons of wind.

 

[boo boo]

38F is almost tropical. Quit being a pansy!

Ha ha, I could put up with 38f all winter too, although right now that would seem cold enough.
I've often wondered how diverse we are when it comes to climate. Right now I'm enjoying winter at above freezing temps and shudder to think how the central part of the continent is dealing with snow and cold temps.
I do the majority of my brewing this time of the year, mashing inside and boiling/cooling outside. Love it.

 

[mattldm]

Geez and I thought I was "brewing in the cold" when it was 61° in my garage here in So Cal!

 

[WhiskeySix]

Brewed an AHS partial grain Pumpkin Ale yesterday. Had a fire going and O'Dell's 90 Shilling to help keep us warm.

 

[Bottenbrew]

The nice thing about brewing in the cold is it is a lot easier to chill your wort. See the pic earlier in the thread with the pot in the snow. Just pack it up on the sides, and run your immersion chiller, you'll be below 90 degrees in no time. As to the boil, get the pot out of the wind if you can. I brewed yesterday at ~18 degrees and when I had the pot in my garage the ceiling was literally dripping at me, but when I put it on the driveway I couldn't keep a boil because of the wind. If you have to brew in a windy area try to set up something to block some of it, and it will make your boil a lot less of a headache.

 

[SamuraiSquirrel]

I brewed in Illinois this weekend. It was in somewhere in the teens here. I do everything outside. I mash outside, sparge, whole process outside. Everthing went perfectly fine until I got to chilling. I had the problem that a few previous posters mentioned about turning on your water only to find out that your chiller hoses are frozen.

I have been brewing a couple years and have always brewed during the winter. This was the first time I ran into this problem.

Other than that everything else has always gone smoothly for me brewing during the winter. Just dress warm and suck it up.

 

[AnchorBock]

I brought my hose inside about 4 hours before chilling at let it drain a little (it was frozen). I then ran the hose from my kitchen to my garage, worked just fine - just kind of a pain. I just didn't feel good about turning my outside water back on.

 

[passedpawn]

Geez and I thought I was "brewing in the cold" when it was 61° in my garage here in So Cal!

61? Brrrrrr! That's like long pants weather!

 

[mattldm]

61? Brrrrrr! That's like long pants weather!

Almost!

 

[Hoppocrates]

The nice thing about brewing in the cold is it is a lot easier to chill your wort. See the pic earlier in the thread with the pot in the snow. Just pack it up on the sides, and run your immersion chiller, you'll be below 90 degrees in no time. As to the boil, get the pot out of the wind if you can. I brewed yesterday at ~18 degrees and when I had the pot in my garage the ceiling was literally dripping at me, but when I put it on the driveway I couldn't keep a boil because of the wind. If you have to brew in a windy area try to set up something to block some of it, and it will make your boil a lot less of a headache.

FYI, I would not pack snow around the pot if chilling in the cold. That only lengthens the chilling process as it insulates the pot...

 

[millstone]

My biggest beef with brewing in the cold is getting out the garden hose and using my immersion wort chiller. The hose always freezes up on me and it's a total P.I.M.A.

I brewed on Saturday with my son, it was 9° outside. Can't use the outside hose because everything is frozen. So what I do is fill about 6 - 5 gallon buckets with water about 2 days before we brew. This gives the water a chance to cool to 32° and get a nice layer of ice on top. I use a pump from Menards to move the water through the IC. I stick the pump into one of the buckets and keep filling it as it as necessary. I salvage the hot water for cleanup. After about 4 buckets of water, I no longer collect the water but recalculate the water back into the bucket with the pump and now putting in all of that ice that formed on the top surface of each bucket.

tom

 

[SwampassJ]

61? Brrrrrr! That's like long pants weather!

At 61 I'm in pants, long sleeves and a sweater. It's a tough price to pay but I'll take being able to work in 95 with high humidity over the cool.

 

[lweisenb]

I use a short interconnect on my Wort chilled that attaches to the house, no issue with the hose yesterday but today it was frozen. Had to pull out the torch to get the faucet running and move the pot to the side of the hose and connect the interconnect directly . The hose was a no go. Bonus Wort was chilled in about 5 minutes.

 

[OldManHouston]

I mash inside (48qt rectangle cooler and batch sparge), put the kettle on the burner and bring the MLT outside during the last sparge to get things going toward the boil. Then I bring the boil kettle inside and hook my immersion chiller up to the sink. I'd rather carry my 10 gal kettle with 6 gal of wort inside than mess with turning my outside water on and unfreezing hoses etc.

When I built my immersion chiller I used two different fittings on the water inlet hose. The first fitting with the nipple connecting to the hose has a male thread which fits on my kitchen sink (has one of those removable heads I can unscrew and screw this bad boy into), the second fitting is screws onto the first and the other end will fit on a garden hose for when I'm outdoors. I didn't design it this way on purpose, those were just the only fittings I could find that would work, but I found out it had this great side effect!

Brewed yesterday while it was snowing a little. Sat in the kitchen watching the boil through the sliding glass door and only went out for hop additions and occasional stirring and checking boil off rates.

 

[cclloyd]

It's all relative - I brewed yesterday with a temp of about 45F and wind whipping at 20-30mph. Down here that's mighty cold. You can tell it's only temporary though - it still took 45 minutes to get the wort down to 72F with an immersion chiller.

 

[RukusDM]

I'm going to brew tomorrow in Denver and its supposed to be about 38F. I will be brewing in my carport and will be freezing my n**** off!

Does anyone have any tips for brewing in the cold? I plan on preheating my mash cooler. Do I have to worry about a higher evap rate on my boil?

Any tips would be appreciated. I havent really brewed in the cold before and worry I will run across something new.

Come to Ny and do a batch outside, then go back to Denver and think its a heatwave.

 

[bierhaus15]

Brewing a Bohemian Pilsner right now in the garage. Outside temp is 15F and with the windchill it's around 5F. It's bloody cold!

 

[rustbucket]

Come to Ny and do a batch outside, then go back to Denver and think its a heatwave.

Agreed, hell once it warms above 40 in the spring, the shorts come out. (it a heat wave!)

 

[AggieChemDoc]

I brewed on Sunday. Temps were ~20 and snowing all day here in WV. I preheated my mash tun with a gallon of hot water and hit my mash temp of 156 on the nose. Lost 2 degrees in an hour in my Coleman Xtreme mash tun.

 

[Homercidal]

I've brewed in the garage and it was ok, but I planned on losing a few degrees. Maybe next time I'll try wrapping blankets around or something. I've also mashed inside during the winter and crushed and boiled outside. The boils happening right outside the patio doors. Either way works, but I prefer not being so cold if I can help it. Having company and food and drink helps.

 

[mrgreen4242]

Brewed in the garage this week at about 12F. Not bad, really. I mash a little lower anyways as I seem to taste the hops more (my favorite part of beer) at a lower FG, so it works out ok for me.

 

[SwampassJ]

It's 77 outside, I need to go put socks on.

 

[Brewdouche-RuBrew]

I insulated my brewpot with some sheet tin, and fiberglass. That really increased my heat stability.