Break material?

[hoplobster]

Just did my first AG today and things went well, except I ended up with 1 gallon less on primary than I thougt I would and added 1 gallon of water, which resulted in a pretty low (sub 1.040) gravity.

Im guessing I lost more than anticipated during the boil, but more than likely, most was lost in the break material, which I filtered from the wort in a mesh bag. Rather than let it drain or squeezing it, I must have been in a panic and just removed the bag-o-poo and filled the carboy, leaving precious wort behind.

SO, my question is, if I am fermenting for 7-10 days and doing a secondary, couldn't I just cool the wort and dump it all into the carboy, breakmaterial and all? I've never had this much break material as I've always done extract w/ steeping grains and while I can estimate loss and compensate for a lower gravity due to topping off with a larger grain bill or extract, I want to KISS and I'm guessing dumping wort+break material is the easiest way to do that.

Thanks!

 

[D*Bo]

If you boiled off more water than anticipated and made up the diffrence it would have brought you back to where you should have been.
Your problem lies in your efficiency, or not enough grain for your lautering method.


What was your pre boil gravity?
Method?
Recipe?

 

[Lil' Sparky]

SO, my question is, if I am fermenting for 7-10 days and doing a secondary, couldn't I just cool the wort and dump it all into the carboy, breakmaterial and all?

D*Bo's right about the low gravity / efficiency. I thought I'd address this question, though. Many of us who use a CFC get all of the cold break in the fermenter. Even when I was using an immersion chiller, I didn't strain the wort on the way to the fermenter. I've never had any problems with it. It all settles to the bottom and doesn't make it into the secondary.

Another thing to remember is that if you're using whole hops, they can absorb a lot of wort, too.

If I've ever come up short on volume, I just live with it. I've never tried to top up the fermenter.

 

[ajf]

I've never filtered the wort on the way from kettle to primary as I thought that the risk of contamination from the filtering medium was too great. (Just because I thought that, doesn't necessarily mean it is true.)

When I used an immersion chiller, and siphoned from the kettle, I whirlpooled the wort after cooling and before siphoning. This left most of the break material and hop residue in the kettle.

Then I got a bigger kettle with a spigot and false bottom, where whirlpooling wouldn't work. The hops (I use whole hops) filtered out most of the break material, saving me the trouble of whirlpooling.

Then I got a CFC which dumped all the cold break into the primary (but left most of the hot break filtered by the hops in the kettle). This looks pretty ugly, but doesn't seem to cause any problems. The cold break acts as a yeast nutrient, and has settled down hard by the end of the primary so it doesn't make it's way into the secondary.

All three methods have worked well for me, but I only brew ales, and never use hop pellets in the kettle.

If I were brewing light, delicate lagers, I might pay more attention to getting rid of the hot break before the primary. With robust ales, I don't believe this is a problem.

If I used pellet hops, I'd get a lot more hot break in the primary, but I don't, so I can't say what effect this would have.l

-a.

 

[hoplobster]

Recipe was from Beersmith for the Scottish Export Ale. I scaled it down to a 3 gallon batch... but here is what it states 5 gallons.

8lbs 5.3 oz 2 row
15.2 oz Munic
3 oz crystal
1.5 roasted barley
.9 chocolate malt
.61oz EKG 60 min
.76oz EKG 15 min
.61oz EKG 5
.46oz EKG 0

WLP028 Edinburgh Scottish Ale Yeast


According to The Beer Recipator, I got 70% efficiency. I batch sparged and got an SG of 1.042 from the sparge. The OG after adding the top off water was 1.033.

I used a mesh bag to filter, and I understand what you mean by evaporation + top off water bringing me back to the beginning... So I think I just lost quite a bit of liquid in the mesh bag, which was full of gunk.

Next time I'll just dump the whole thing in to the carboy. I expect it shouldnt cause any problems and my final volume should be closer to my calculations.

 

[boo boo]

Your main concern should be to keep most if not all of the hops out of the fermenter. A lot of people dump the trub into the fermenter and make great beer.
IMO, it is better to keep as much of the trub and break material out of the fermenter.

 

[ajf]

With the CFC, I always end up with the cold break in the fermenter, and it doesn't seem to to affect the taste at all. But over Christmas last year, I forgot to put the false bottom in the kettle, and ended up with all the hot break in the fermenter as well. I took a sample yesterday by mistake. (I hooked up the wrong keg.) It wasn't undrinkable, but it was definitely not up to my normal standards. It is possible that something else caused the off flavors, but unlikely. I am not going to try this again (at least, not deliberately), and hopefully, the beer will improve over the next 3 - 4 weeks when all previous brews have been exhausted.

-a.