Adjusting recipe for a higher efficiency brewhouse - really?

[philipCT]

I'm prepping to brew for the very first time using my new ElectricBrewery setup. I was getting good, consistent efficiency on my old system - total brewhouse efficiency was 73-75%. For the new system, I'm expecting to get 85% (I know that seems high, but this is a Kal Electric brewery setup, and many who have gone this way before have said to expect this - or more).

My issue is this:

I have a recipe for an APA (10g, Dales Pale Ale) that calls for an OG of 1.060 with this grain bill:

16# Maris Otter
7# Munich
1.5# Caramel/Crystal 60L

and quotes brewhouse efficiency at 75%.

When I put this into Beersmith, with my new brewery efficiency of 85%, it's telling me I need to scale these numbers down to this:

12.8# Maris Otter
5.6# Munich
1.2# Caramel/Crystal 60L

Could that be right!!!??? That just seems like such a huge reduction in grain...

 

[Gameface]

Without doing any math that looks about right to me.

 

[poptarts]

I get,

14.12 MO
6.18 Munich
1.5 Caramel 60

are you sure your keeping batch size the same?
using this site
http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/calculator/

 

[philipCT]

For the curious, I did end up getting 92.6% mash efficiency on this batch per BeerSmith. Kinda overshot OG a bit and tossed in a monster starter and overshot the FG with 79% attenuation. ABV too high for style, so I'll be scaling down a little more next time.

 

[TexasWine]

For the curious, I did end up getting 92.6% mash efficiency on this batch per BeerSmith. Kinda overshot OG a bit and tossed in a monster starter and overshot the FG with 79% attenuation. ABV too high for style, so I'll be scaling down a little more next time.

So how did you end up scaling the recipe?

 

[aangel]

Newbie question: couldn't you just dilute the final product (or even before fermentation) with water to hit your numbers?

 

[TexasWine]

Newbie question: couldn't you just dilute the final product (or even before fermentation) with water to hit your numbers?

Sure. That's a completely acceptable approach. But sometimes it's inconvenient when you end up with more beer than you want/need. Putting 6 gallons in a 5 gallon keg ain't happening. So then you have to break out the bottling bucket, and sugar, and capper, and sanitize the bottles, and so on and so forth.

 

[philipCT]

So how did you end up scaling the recipe?

Stupid answer but the only one I got: When I ordered, my LHBS put all the grains in one bag, so when I went to scale the recipe, I couldn't reliably scale each grain the way I wanted to. So I brewed with the full, original recipe.

Naturally, I overshot the OG massively and did not end up with the intended beer (but it was still good).

 

[philipCT]

Newbie question: couldn't you just dilute the final product (or even before fermentation) with water to hit your numbers?

Yes, I think I could have done that, but I'm not sure if it's a best practice for getting the best beer.

 

[TexasWine]

Stupid answer but the only one I got: When I ordered, my LHBS put all the grains in one bag, so when I went to scale the recipe, I couldn't reliably scale each grain the way I wanted to. So I brewed with the full, original recipe.

Naturally, I overshot the OG massively and did not end up with the intended beer (but it was still good).

I've been doing a little reading on this scaling topic because I'm in the same boat as you. Most recipes that you see out there are for something around 75% brewhouse efficiency. Mine is consistently better than that, but I usually just roll with the punches and end up with a higher ABV. Oh well.

 

[philipCT]

I've been doing a little reading on this scaling topic because I'm in the same boat as you. Most recipes that you see out there are for something around 75% brewhouse efficiency. Mine is consistently better than that, but I usually just roll with the punches and end up with a higher ABV. Oh well.

Yeah, I had the same attitude for a while. But I'm getting interested in executing recipes more faithfully, and brewing some lower ABV beers.

For what it's worth, I had a really good response from Kal at the Electric Brewery on this. Turns out it's not that uncommon for lower ABV beers and he will continue to collect wort to achieve target vols even though the runnings go below 1.008. That said, he recommends tasting the wort and making a brewers call whether to continue to collect wort if it's not too tannic, or to stop and top up with water.

Hope that is helpful.

 

[aangel]

My (very incomplete) knowledge of tannin extraction was that it's a function of temperature and pH, not gravity? Of course if you don't treat your water, pH will rise as the grains become depleted.