1-Gallon Brewers UNITE!

[dtfleming]

Has anyone tried the AHS 1 gal recipes?

 

[Antler]

I been doing 5 gallon BIAB on a propane burner since this spring. Lately it's been really cold and windy so holding mash temps outside will be a nightmare. I already have 2, 2 gallon pots. Been thinking about just doing 1 gallon batches in the kitchen until I can afford an electric setup to put in my 5g system.

I already have 3 batches worth of grain here, mixed and crushed, in large vacuum sealed bags. How can I brew these in 1 gallon batches and combine in fermenter?

I was thinkin to start it all in my 7.5g fermenter. 1g at a time and each couple days brew up another 1g batch and add to the fermenter.

 

[paul_111]

Fill in the blanks on this http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/brew/widgets/bp.html
And racking in this case is siphoning from your fermenter to bottling bucket.

How necessary is it to rack to a bucket? Why not just fill the bottles directly from the fermenter? I was going to use a mini autosiphon and spring-tip bottle filler. Any reason not to go this route?

 

[jwalk4]

Would you wait until you had 5, 1-gallon batches in the fermenter before you pitched your yeast?

If so, I foresee a problem if any bacteria should find its way into the fermenter. The sugars may be (in part), already consumed by bacteria by the time you finally pitch your yeast, and thus, you'll have competing cultures. Also, you'd risk oxidation.

If you pitch your yeast after 1 1-gallon brew, then just continually add wort, I would be concerned about the under pitching your yeast.

You would have to re-pitch yeast everytime you add more wort, but with the reproduction of yeast cells in the wort already, you would have to account for the number of daughter cells to gain an accurate amount of how much yeast you'd have to pitch every time.


Honestly though, I have no experience in this matter. These are just my .02 on possible outcomes. I would love to hear a Mod's opinion.

 

[jwalk4]

How necessary is it to rack to a bucket? Why not just fill the bottles directly from the fermenter? I was going to use a mini autosiphon and spring-tip bottle filler. Any reason not to go this route?

The only reason to not go that route is because you'd have to find a way of mixing in the priming sugar solution without stirring the yeast back into suspension and get a lot of trub in your beer. That why we have bottling buckets.

You can bottle from primary if you use tabs, but you'll have to put up with the over carb issue.

 

[paul_111]

The only reason to not go that route is because you'd have to find a way of mixing in the priming sugar solution without stirring the yeast back into suspension and get a lot of trub in your beer. That why we have bottling buckets.

You can bottle from primary if you use tabs, but you'll have to put up with the over carb issue.

That makes sense. Thanks!

 

[Antler]

Would you wait until you had 5, 1-gallon batches in the fermenter before you pitched your yeast?

If so, I foresee a problem if any bacteria should find its way into the fermenter. The sugars may be (in part), already consumed by bacteria by the time you finally pitch your yeast, and thus, you'll have competing cultures. Also, you'd risk oxidation.

If you pitch your yeast after 1 1-gallon brew, then just continually add wort, I would be concerned about the under pitching your yeast.

You would have to re-pitch yeast everytime you add more wort, but with the reproduction of yeast cells in the wort already, you would have to account for the number of daughter cells to gain an accurate amount of how much yeast you'd have to pitch every time.

Honestly though, I have no experience in this matter. These are just my .02 on possible outcomes. I would love to hear a Mod's opinion.

No I'd pitch the yeast With the first gallon.

I thought the yeast would grow with every addition of wort, sort of like stepping up a starter 5x.

 

[Ostomo517]

Would you wait until you had 5, 1-gallon batches in the fermenter before you pitched your yeast?

If so, I foresee a problem if any bacteria should find its way into the fermenter. The sugars may be (in part), already consumed by bacteria by the time you finally pitch your yeast, and thus, you'll have competing cultures. Also, you'd risk oxidation.

If you pitch your yeast after 1 1-gallon brew, then just continually add wort, I would be concerned about the under pitching your yeast.

You would have to re-pitch yeast everytime you add more wort, but with the reproduction of yeast cells in the wort already, you would have to account for the number of daughter cells to gain an accurate amount of how much yeast you'd have to pitch every time.

Honestly though, I have no experience in this matter. These are just my .02 on possible outcomes. I would love to hear a Mod's opinion.

I agree you would be riaking oxidation big time plus exposing to chance of infection every addition.

 

[zeg]

I'm not sure there'd be much of an oxidation risk---wouldn't the yeast kick back into their aerobic metabolism mode and remove the oxygen like they do with the intentionally oxygenated wort at the start of a standard process?

 

[Leadgolem]

I'm not sure there'd be much of an oxidation risk---wouldn't the yeast kick back into their aerobic metabolism mode and remove the oxygen like they do with the intentionally oxygenated wort at the start of a standard process?

Hmm, this seems likely. If it was my project I'd probably just keep the batches separate if I had the fermentors for it. That way you could make variations with each batch.

If not, then I'd try and shorten the total time to full liquid volume. IE: Do 2-3 batches a day for 2 days. That should mean that all of the oxygen has been introduced in the batch before the yeast has actually changed metabolic modes. As opposed to waiting 2 days between additions, which would give you a total introduction time of 8 days.

Each batch would still have it's own chance of infection, so a pitch rate on the high side would also probably be a good idea. That would limit the impact of the introduction of wild yeast into the brew.

 

[Jbird]

Well I don't have time to read them all and I'm sure this was said already but here you go. I brew 5+ gal batches but now I'm into brewing 1 gal batches also. I don't have all the space for two big batches and I can brew something made up or a new kit. So if I don't like it I dump 10bottles not 50. I like to brew and I can brew a 1gal batch more often.

 

[Antler]

I'm not sure there'd be much of an oxidation risk---wouldn't the yeast kick back into their aerobic metabolism mode and remove the oxygen like they do with the intentionally oxygenated wort at the start of a standard process?

I'm really not sure about the oxidation risks either. I know most nano breweries do this during fermentation. Say they do 1bbl batches, a lot of them use 2bbl fermenters. Brewing 1 and pitching yeast, next day brew and add the second bbl.

I'm not sure what member(s) did the Sam Adams Utopias clones, but they used to brew so much, aerate, pitch yeast. Brew, add to fermenter, aerate. Brew, add to fermenter, aerate, over and over again to not over stress the yeast which huge quantities of high gravity wort.

Hmm, this seems likely. If it was my project I'd probably just keep the batches separate if I had the fermentors for it. That way you could make variations with each batch.

I don't have the fermenters for this. Even if I did, the 10-12lb grain bills for each batch are in a large bag. So theres no way of splitting the different types of grain. Basically I take the complete grain bill for a 5g batch, have it crushed and vacuum sealed in a large bag, so on brew day just cut a corner off the bag and dough in.

 

[Jbird]

Honestly Jeff, I haven't seen many brewers turn their noses up and small batch brewing, and if they do, we hit them with a rolled up newspaper. Over the last few years small batch brewing has been looked at as being OK....Even one gallon batches thanks to the Brooklyn Brew Kits.

The basic brewing folks I think went a long way into given 1 gallon batches cache.

Plus it's never been sneered at for wine/mead and cider makers. I gallon batches are quite common on that front.

I prefer 2.5 gallon batches for small batch beer brewing, because 2.5 gallons = 1 case of beer.

But there's nothing wrong with 1 gallon batches if folks want to brew them. In fact I'm looking for some 1 gallon wine jugs as we speak.

I have seen one gallon wine jugs filled with sangria for about $10. Thought I would buy one and them I would have two 1gallon batches brewing at the same time.

 

[cheesecake]

I have seen one gallon wine jugs filled with sangria for about $10. Thought I would buy one and them I would have two 1gallon batches brewing at the same time.

Yum sangria. . .post a pic or info I want a gallon of sangria

 

[Jbird]

Yum sangria. . .post a pic or info I want a gallon of sangria

http://www.thebeveragestore.com/med...5fb8d27136e95/c/a/carlo_rossi_sangria_1_1.jpg

Here you go!

 

[zeg]

I'm not sure this sounds like such a good idea. You'll probably end up with a pretty significant overpitch after the first addition or two.

Science experiment aside, I think Leadgolem's suggestion to try to get your wort processed and added as fast as possible is the best bet. It shouldn't take a heroic effort to do this in a weekend. Using both 2-gallon pots together, you should be able to mash and boil 2-3 gallons in about 3 hours, depending on your boil off rate. With the reduced volumes, the process is going to seem really easy. Start early on Saturday, do 2 gallons by lunchtime, cool and add to the fermentor. Later that afternoon, do it again. Sunday morning, do one more batch and you've got 6 gallons ready to go. As long as you're careful about sanitation, waiting 24 hours to pitch is not a big deal. (Hopefully you have an immersion chiller that fits in your smaller pots, that will be key to keeping your throughput up!)

If that process won't work, I think the next best thing would be to separately ferment each gallon and then blend the beers. This won't take advantage of your big rig, though.

Or you could just try the science experiment.

*edit* Just saw your post. Doing a next-day addition should be fine, I'd think. My worry was that you were (for some reason) thinking of letting each addition ferment farther along before the next addition. Not sure where I got that idea.... I think my preference would still be to amass all the wort pre-pitching, just to keep the process more like the usual practice.

 

[Leadgolem]

I'm really not sure about the oxidation risks either. I know most nano breweries do this during fermentation. Say they do 1bbl batches, a lot of them use 2bbl fermenters. Brewing 1 and pitching yeast, next day brew and add the second bbl.

I'm not sure what member(s) did the Sam Adams Utopias clones, but they used to brew so much, aerate, pitch yeast. Brew, add to fermenter, aerate. Brew, add to fermenter, aerate, over and over again to not over stress the yeast which huge quantities of high gravity wort.

Good to know.

I don't have the fermenters for this. Even if I did, the 10-12lb grain bills for each batch are in a large bag. So theres no way of splitting the different types of grain. Basically I take the complete grain bill for a 5g batch, have it crushed and vacuum sealed in a large bag, so on brew day just cut a corner off the bag and dough in.

I didn't mean splitting the different types of grain. I meant mixing all the grain very thoroughly, then splitting the mixed grain into 5 parts by weight. Then you could vary the hop additions and/or timing with each small batch.

You would end up with 5 different batches with the same base grain mix. That would give you a good chance to see what the difference is with changing the timing of the hop additions, and/or what exactly a specific type of hop addition did since you would have a good baseline with the same grain mix.

Alternately, you could use the 5 batches to refine your small batch brewing process. IE: Pick up some efficiency with each batch. You can actually still do that using 1 final fermentor anyway.

If you don't have the space though, you don't have the space. Let us know what you decide to do, and how it comes out please. I'm always interested in different techniques, and I've not heard of somebody doing multiple wort additions like you are talking about.

 

[divrguy]

I been doing 5 gallon BIAB on a propane burner since this spring. Lately it's been really cold and windy so holding mash temps outside will be a nightmare. I already have 2, 2 gallon pots. Been thinking about just doing 1 gallon batches in the kitchen until I can afford an electric setup to put in my 5g system.

I already have 3 batches worth of grain here, mixed and crushed, in large vacuum sealed bags. How can I brew these in 1 gallon batches and combine in fermenter?

I was thinkin to start it all in my 7.5g fermenter. 1g at a time and each couple days brew up another 1g batch and add to the fermenter.

Are you able to do multiple batches in a day and then combine them?

 

[hoppyhoppyhippo]

Worst part about experimental beers is waiting for them. My Simcoe/Amarillo IPA is currently fermenting and I have over 2 weeks to wait, just to dry hop, lame. This one I open fermented for the first 3 days. I wanted to see what would happen. Hoping to get an estery IPA but we'll see. I figured this batch was more or less a throw away anyway since I didn't test it to see if I was hitting my target efficiencies. I think I created too sweet of a wort with not enough fermentable sugars just gauging by my temps. Going to do it differently next time to see if it works easier.

 

[Antler]

Are you able to do multiple batches in a day and then combine them?

Yes I can do that. I can do one batch after another, or maybe try doing them side by side. Maybe I can attempt to end up with 1.25g post boil. Do two side by side sessions, ending up with 5g into the fermenter in a single day?

 

[zeg]

Do two side by side sessions, ending up with 5g into the fermenter in a single day?

That sounds like a plan! If you have an immersion chiller, just stagger the parallel tracks by half an hour to give you time to chill and then swap the IC over.

 

[Antler]

That sounds like a plan! If you have an immersion chiller, just stagger the parallel tracks by half an hour to give you time to chill and then swap the IC over.

This route seems like the best to take. I do have an immersion chiller, but not sure it'll fit into these 2g pots, it's made for a 10g Blichmann.
I'll probably use a no-chill method. Let it sit airtight in the fermenter until next morning then pitch the yeast.

 

[zeg]

Ah. My IC fits both my 5-gal and 2-gal pots, and it's absurdly fast in the 2-gal.

Are you using a bucket? This is probably obvious, but it's a serious safety issue so I'll point it out anyway, do be cautious pouring hot wort into a fermentor. It can bust glass carboys, shrinky-dink Better Bottles, and [something something] buckets. (I have no idea what, if anything, it might do in a bucket, but it'd be worth checking out the temperature tolerance of the plastic).

 

[hoppyhoppyhippo]

Picked up my 5 gallon paint bag today. Hell of a deal.

 

[Antler]

Ah. My IC fits both my 5-gal and 2-gal pots, and it's absurdly fast in the 2-gal.

Are you using a bucket? This is probably obvious, but it's a serious safety issue so I'll point it out anyway, do be cautious pouring hot wort into a fermentor. It can bust glass carboys, shrinky-dink Better Bottles, and [something something] buckets. (I have no idea what, if anything, it might do in a bucket, but it'd be worth checking out the temperature tolerance of the plastic).

Thanks I didn't know that. I usually don't have more than one batch fermenting at once. I use a 7.5 gallon sanke keg, but I do have a bucket and 3-4 carboys I secondary in.

 

[Adrenaline-Junkie]

So what do you typically use as a primary for one gallon batches? I ask because im considering some smaller runs on experiments. A one gallon glass jug wouldnt leave enough room for a krausen would it (or do people usually run blow tubes in one gallon jugs)?

 

[Thunder_Chicken]

1-gallon jugs do work, but there is some danger of blowout especially if your yeast are extra-happy or overpitched. Just run a blowout tube for the first few days and then put the airlock on (or leave the blowout tube, it's all good).

Remember, a blow-out means your yeast are really in on the effort to make beer for you. They love you and want you to be happy. Rejoice as you mop the suds off the ceiling.

My first batch in a 1-gallon glass jug was great, the second was a blowout mess. It keeps life interesting

 

[Adrenaline-Junkie]

Thanks, i kinda figured that was the case. At any rate im going to buy some jugs and try it out. Ill just buy a few extra jugs in case things get crazy.

 

[muleskinner90]

I am thinking about adding the priming sugar to the batch next time instead of using the NB "fizz drops." Do I add 1 oz of corn sugar to water, stir, bring to boil, cool to room temp, pour to bottling bucket then rack wort to bottling bucket?

 

[dadshomebrewing]

Hi guys... Just passing thru.

Been a while