Esben
Member
- Joined
- Apr 21, 2018
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- 8
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I recently brewed my second ever all-grain recipe. My first all-grain brew was a borderline-disaster, even though the resulting beer ended up quite drinkable. I felt a lot more confident and made less errors for my second attempt - progress I read Palmers “How to Brew” (an excellent book) back-to-back to get a sense of the basics and now I use it for looking up details and when in doubt about something. But during this second brew I ran into some issues that I was hoping You could help me clear up. It is important for me to understand not only the how but also the why, so please be explicit in Your answers so I can understand the thoughts behind
Recipe
Style: Blonde Ale
Batch size: 22.5 L
3.00 kg of 2-row Pilsner Malt (replacement since I couldn’t get american 2-row pale malt).
1.85 kg of Vienna Malt.
25.82 g of Hallertauer Mittelfrüh @ 60 minutes (13.1 IBU).
32.97 g of Hallertauer Mittelfrüh @ 15 minutes (8.3 IBU).
California Ale Yeast (White Labs WLP001).
Mashing at 66.7 C for 60 minutes.
Mash-out by heating to 75.6 C over 10 minutes.
Sparge with 75.6 C water to reach boil volume.
60 minutes total boiling time.
Yeast starter prepared a few days before brew-day to propagate a single package to roughly 200B cells. Ferment at 17 C. After fermentation slows down, raise to 22 C for a diacetyl rest.
Equipment
Ace Micro Brewery: An all-in-one type kettle. A (too) cheap Grainfather knockoff.
How it went (and a lot of questions)
First mistake: I use Beersmith 2. When preparing i used the software to calculate the proper strike water temperature. But when adding the grain to the water the temperature didn’t drop all the way down to the target 66.7 C mash temperature - not even close - so something is completely off in my equipment profile i think.
I know this was a proper wall-of-text. Thanks for reading through if You got so far! Explanations and answers will be greatly appreciated. Hopefully I will make even fewer mistakes for my next brew
Recipe
Style: Blonde Ale
Batch size: 22.5 L
3.00 kg of 2-row Pilsner Malt (replacement since I couldn’t get american 2-row pale malt).
1.85 kg of Vienna Malt.
25.82 g of Hallertauer Mittelfrüh @ 60 minutes (13.1 IBU).
32.97 g of Hallertauer Mittelfrüh @ 15 minutes (8.3 IBU).
California Ale Yeast (White Labs WLP001).
Mashing at 66.7 C for 60 minutes.
Mash-out by heating to 75.6 C over 10 minutes.
Sparge with 75.6 C water to reach boil volume.
60 minutes total boiling time.
Yeast starter prepared a few days before brew-day to propagate a single package to roughly 200B cells. Ferment at 17 C. After fermentation slows down, raise to 22 C for a diacetyl rest.
Equipment
Ace Micro Brewery: An all-in-one type kettle. A (too) cheap Grainfather knockoff.
How it went (and a lot of questions)
First mistake: I use Beersmith 2. When preparing i used the software to calculate the proper strike water temperature. But when adding the grain to the water the temperature didn’t drop all the way down to the target 66.7 C mash temperature - not even close - so something is completely off in my equipment profile i think.
- How much do some minutes at a wrong temperature mean to the end result?
- Is it better to undershoot or overshoot the target mash temperature?
- When should i start my mash timer: After adding the grain or when i hit the target temperature?
- When mashing in a kettle as i do, is it better to just heat the strike water to my target mash temperature and let the kettle heat to hit the mash temperature?
- Obviously I am going to assemble correctly next time, but in this situation what should i have done?
- Should I have compensated with DME to hit my 1.042 target?
- How would I choose which DME to use (since the recipe uses two malts)?
- Should I also have compensated in the hop amounts?
- What if the pre-boil gravity had ended up above target. Should I prioritise hitting my planned boil volume and accept this, or add water to hit the gravity target?
I know this was a proper wall-of-text. Thanks for reading through if You got so far! Explanations and answers will be greatly appreciated. Hopefully I will make even fewer mistakes for my next brew