brewmaster27
Member
- Joined
- Oct 16, 2005
- Messages
- 11
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Hey guys,
Fairly amateur brewer here with a BIG (?) problem. This is my 4th batch of beer, and I am far from perfecting it to a science. Two of the the three beers I have made were more-or-less "all-extract" brews, and one was a Vienna lager kit which came with grain to steep in. One beer was a real disaster (it tasted terrible) and the lager, though it seemed to come out ok, had an astringent "wet cardboard" kind of taste which I assume was from over-oxidation.
The last batch I just made I purchased grains to steep into the wort. But I'm afraid I used the grains all wrong. The two grains I used in my 'Christmas Ale' were Flaked Barley and 60L Crystal Malt (for amber color). Before I start explaining my problem I would just like to say I know very little about partial mashing, lauter-tuns, etc. I didn't realize that mashing grains was as complicated a process as it actually is.
This is where my problem comes into play. I just basically crushed the flaked barley and crystal malt together (to make grist) and steeped it into the wort(keeping a steady temperature of 152 F which I know is important) using a sanitized grain bag in the brewpot. After doing this, I sparged the grain bag with 170 F water until the runoff was clean). I did not realize I had to do anything with lauter-tuns, false bottoms, tubing, pressure, and god-knows-what-else! I'm so confused with this process and now I'm afraid that my beer which I spent 3 hours on will be a tremendous failure because I did not mash the grains properly. AGHHHHHHHH!
Some brewmaster I am... I'm so untalented
I feel like giving up on homebrewing and just calling it quits.
Fairly amateur brewer here with a BIG (?) problem. This is my 4th batch of beer, and I am far from perfecting it to a science. Two of the the three beers I have made were more-or-less "all-extract" brews, and one was a Vienna lager kit which came with grain to steep in. One beer was a real disaster (it tasted terrible) and the lager, though it seemed to come out ok, had an astringent "wet cardboard" kind of taste which I assume was from over-oxidation.
The last batch I just made I purchased grains to steep into the wort. But I'm afraid I used the grains all wrong. The two grains I used in my 'Christmas Ale' were Flaked Barley and 60L Crystal Malt (for amber color). Before I start explaining my problem I would just like to say I know very little about partial mashing, lauter-tuns, etc. I didn't realize that mashing grains was as complicated a process as it actually is.
This is where my problem comes into play. I just basically crushed the flaked barley and crystal malt together (to make grist) and steeped it into the wort(keeping a steady temperature of 152 F which I know is important) using a sanitized grain bag in the brewpot. After doing this, I sparged the grain bag with 170 F water until the runoff was clean). I did not realize I had to do anything with lauter-tuns, false bottoms, tubing, pressure, and god-knows-what-else! I'm so confused with this process and now I'm afraid that my beer which I spent 3 hours on will be a tremendous failure because I did not mash the grains properly. AGHHHHHHHH!
Some brewmaster I am... I'm so untalented
I feel like giving up on homebrewing and just calling it quits.