Mashing once, boiling twice?

[CallMeZoot]

Hey all,

Sorry I sort of dropped off the planet after the spring MD Big Brew Day -- found out my wife's having a baby so my priorities have been shuffled around a bit!

Anyway, I'm looking to brew again next week and have a question: I accidentally bought ingredients for a 10-gallon batch, and I'd like to do the whole thing, but I can only boil enough for 5 gallons at one time.

I have a 10g MLT and can mash the entire batch at once, but I need to split it into two boils -- I don't have the capacity to boil both simultaneously so half the batch will have to wait... what's the best way to go about this? Can I just leave half in the tun for an extra hour until it's ready to go? Should I drain it into a carboy and just leave it "on deck" at room temperature until the boil?

P.S. If anyone has a recommendation for a CHEAP stockpot with enough headroom for a 10 gallon batch, that's another option. It needs to fit on a standard bayou whatzit turkey fryer.

 

[david_42]

The biggest problem is each running has a different gravity. The hop utilization will be different and it isn't linear. If you have a fermenter large enough for the whole batch, you can mix at that point & other than the IBUs being a bit high, you'll be ok.

I'd leave half in the tun. Less chance of contamination and unless you have a pyrex carboy, less change of explosions.

Depending on the style, you might want to ferment the two batches separately. One will be roughly double the gravity of the other.

 

[Seawolfe]

I think I would try to partygyle that if I could - the idea of two different beers just tickles me, YMMV.

We keep finding cheap aluminum pots at the local Hispanic markets, often used as tamale pots. Our latest find was a 52 quart pot for $32

 

[mykayel]

check your local craigslist for a used keg, then just cut the top off of it and you'll have a big enough pot for more than a 10gal batch.

 

[Kauai_Kahuna]

I would do the whole batch, split each drawing in half, store half in your bottling bucket / carboy while you boil the first batch. If you batch sparge though I would do a mashout which may hurt your eff.
Hey, two batches in one day, how can you argue against that.

 

[Bobby_M]

Ok, so I'd go for it. Collect all 13 gallons in various containers and blend to whatever OG you want. I mean, you could make half of it say 10 points higher to see how they vary.

I would suggest heating up the second boil volume to about 180F to fully halt conversion, then put it into a holding vessel (how about the cleaned out mash tun?) while you boil the first batch.

 

[camiller]

We keep finding cheap aluminum pots at the local Hispanic markets, often used as tamale pots. Our latest find was a 52 quart pot for $32

I am so going to try that. I had been looking at a 60qt AL kettle in the $55 range but I could get by with 52qt for 10G batches.

 

[DeathBrewer]

split it and do two batches.

do a parti-gyle (first runnings for one big beer, 2nd runnings for a seperate smaller beer) so you can have two completely different beers

you could do the whole mash at once and boil them seperately or you could save half the ingredients and do an additional mash later and make two of the same beer.

 

[aa8jzdial]

We had the same issues with 30+ gallon brews.
Mashing 40 pounds of malt and having only 2-15 gallon kettles (and a couple of 5 gallon units as backup) we pulled the wort out of the 160 qt mlt with a pump and sent it into a tee that then feed both 15 gallon kettles.
It was hard to balance the flows properly as we wanted both brews to be about the same gravity. Try as we would, the valves on the outlets of the tee never could be set just right.
We struggled with this for quite a while until our pipe fitter friend fabricated a 46 gallon kettle.
Now 4 brewers take home about 8-9 gallons of fresh wort per brew day.
Good luck.
rick

 

[jay075j]

split it and do two batches.

do a parti-gyle (first runnings for one big beer, 2nd runnings for a seperate smaller beer) so you can have two completely different beers

you could do the whole mash at once and boil them seperately or you could save half the ingredients and do an additional mash later and make two of the same beer.

I vote for doing two separate brews of the same thing. Just grab a bathroom scale and divide your grain in half and then split your hops in half and run with it.

It just seems easier to me to go this route.

 

[j6ppc]

I'd just split the grains and do 2 5 gal batches.