Considering getting into All-grain brewing.

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MaaZeus

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Hi. I have been making beer for quite a long time but they have always been from kit extracts. But now I have an itch to learn all-grain and maybe eventually make a recipe that I can truly call my own, but I am wondering where to start and what equipment to get. I'd like to keep things and equipment simple at first, to get my feet wet. Hell, one of the things I am looking forward to making is Sahti, our Finnish national treasure beer and drunkards have been making good Sahti in middle of the woods amongst juniper bushes for centuries, it cant be that hard. :D

Anyway, one of the things that I am wondering how big pot to get? My aim is to make roughly 20-25 liters (I use metric, I dont really understand imperial) of beer at the time so do I need a massive pot to boil the wort fully in that size or can I do it in smaller, more manageable pot and top the fermenter of with cold water? What other equipment I should get and what would be the first recipe to make? Something simple and near impossible to screw up, the kit-and-kilo equivalent of allgrain brewing so to speak?
 
Read up on BIAB technique, as I think that would be simplest. You can do partial boil rather than full boil, keeping in mind that hop bitterness will be slightly less in partial boils.
 
Well since I am not into bitterness almost at all (I am very into fruity hop aromas though) that is not a huge loss. :) Just as long as the mellowing does not ruin the recipe though.
 
I would invest in a 10 gallon (approximately 38 liters) pot to avoid boil over.
If you don't want multiple pieces of equipment BIAB method may suit your needs, but I have not personally done it. That being said, if you are looking at 20-25 liter batches, and want to brew a Sahti, BIAB may be difficult. It's going to be a big grain bill for a big beer like that and I would imagine it would be a struggle to lift the heavy bag of wet grain.

What equipment do you currently have?
 
What equipment is bare-bones? If your local home brew store can crush grain for you, that will work. Otherwise, you'll want a grain mill so you can control the crush you have. Having the LHBS crush it means not buying a grain mill. I did that once or twice before deciding I needed to control that variable, as many/most LHBS will crush very coarsely.

I'm guessing from your preference for metric that you're not in the US. There's a grain mill you can buy here that IMO is perhaps the best price/quality combination. It's called the Cereal Killer, costs $99 here. It can be motorized/driven by a power drill. Very nice choice for the money.

In more traditional all-grain brewing you'd have a mash tun into which you place the strike water, add the crushed grain, mix thoroughly, then slowly drain (lauter) it off after about an hour. You can use a plastic cooler for this--I have one--and it works well for holding temperatures, which you need to be able to do.

A lot of people do Brew-in-a-Bag (I have, it's a good method). The limiting factor seems to be whether you can figure a way to hoist the bag out of the kettle, either by a pulley affixed to a hook in the ceiling above, or some sort of frame arrangement to pull it up.

I'm back to doing a traditional mash tun (with RIMS system) to control things, but I did quite a few batches doing BIAB. It works, it's simple, and it's faster than what I do now. Normally for a 19 liter batch, a 10-gallon/38-liter kettle would be fine. You want somewhat larger batches, which is curious. Most recipes are for 5-gallons/19-liters, so doing something 15 percent larger is....well, strange.

My suggestion to you would be to get at least a 38-liter kettle, and actually do those recipes for 5-gallon/19-liter batches at the start. That way you're using established recipes that should turn out; once you have a bit of experience doing all-grain, then you can alter the recipes to make batches of whatever size you want.
 
Thanks for the information! For the information, I am a 195cm giant who does heavy lifting and carrying with my arms at work all the day so lifting is not a problem. :) Although I figure lifting a bag that is not only wet but also hot may be a pain in the ass.

I did not think about the milling part. You cannot mash whole grains? For now I think I can leave that part for my LHBS.

Right now I have a 30l fermenting bucket, over 30 liter glass carboy for wine and 3 one gallon/4 liter glass carboys which I usually use for meads and occasional experimental brews.

I have beem thinking, maybe I should forget about partial boil and splurge a little and get something like this? https://www.lappo.fi/product/357/keittokattila-brewferm-27-l-ruostumatonta-terasta-sahkokayttoinen

The 20-25l is not a hard limit by any means, I just meant that a huge amount equivalent to extract kits. 19 liters is fine. I do not brew just for myself but also for friends and relatives, trust me they go quick. :) Yeah, I am from Finland.
 
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MaaZeus said:
Thanks for the information! For the information, I am a 195cm giant who does heavy lifting and carrying with my arms at work all the day so lifting is not a problem. :) Although I figure lifting a bag that is not only wet but also hot may be a pain in the ass.
Click to expand...

It's not so much the lifting as it is you want to suspend the bag over the kettle while it drains the wort. That can take 10-20 minutes. Some squeeze the bag of spent grain to wring more wort out--I did. Hard to do at arm's length with what is probably approaches 20# of grain and liquid.

I did not think about the milling part. You cannot mash whole grains? For now I think I can leave that part for my LHBS.
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No, you can't mash whole grains. The crushing breaks apart the grain so the hot water can solubize the starch so that the enzymes can convert that to sugar. One thing you have to make sure when having grain crushed by the LHBS is to not be leaving intact grain, as they won't contribute to the wort.

I have beem thinking, maybe I should forget about partial boil and splurge a little and get something like this? https://www.lappo.fi/product/357/keittokattila-brewferm-27-l-ruostumatonta-terasta-sahkokayttoinen
Click to expand...

It depends on what you expect this to do. If it's just to heat water, perhaps it is fine. The size is too small for BIAB for a normal 5-gallon/19-liter batch. Another variable I'd want information about is how quickly it can heat water.

The 20-25l is not a hard limit by any means, I just meant that a huge amount equivalent to extract kits. 19 liters is fine. I do not brew just for myself but also for friends and relatives, trust me they go quick. :) Yeah, I am from Finland.
Click to expand...

If you look at all the recipes on this site, for instance, virtually all of them are for 5-gallon/19-liter batches. At least initially, I believe that's the volume for which you should aim. This way you aren't guessing about the recipe. Imagine: your beer doesn't turn out. Did you goof up the process...or the recipe? Using established volumes and recipes, at least initially, takes that one variable out of the equation.

Once you get the all-grain process down, then you can look at making larger batches. Just realize that larger means larger grain bill, more water, etc. so your vessels must be able to accommodate that.
 
mongoose33 said:
It's not so much the lifting as it is you want to suspend the bag over the kettle while it drains the wort. That can take 10-20 minutes. Some squeeze the bag of spent grain to wring more wort out--I did. Hard to do at arm's length with what is probably approaches 20# of grain and liquid.



No, you can't mash whole grains. The crushing breaks apart the grain so the hot water can solubize the starch so that the enzymes can convert that to sugar. One thing you have to make sure when having grain crushed by the LHBS is to not be leaving intact grain, as they won't contribute to the wort.



It depends on what you expect this to do. If it's just to heat water, perhaps it is fine. The size is too small for BIAB for a normal 5-gallon/19-liter batch. Another variable I'd want information about is how quickly it can heat water.



If you look at all the recipes on this site, for instance, virtually all of them are for 5-gallon/19-liter batches. At least initially, I believe that's the volume for which you should aim. This way you aren't guessing about the recipe. Imagine: your beer doesn't turn out. Did you goof up the process...or the recipe? Using established volumes and recipes, at least initially, takes that one variable out of the equation.

Once you get the all-grain process down, then you can look at making larger batches. Just realize that larger means larger grain bill, more water, etc. so your vessels must be able to accommodate that.
Click to expand...

Thank you for your response. Heating water for doing the mash is exactly what I would want it to do and most of all where I can do it, in my shower room where in case of boil-overs and such they will flow into the sewer instead of floor and seeping into the structures etc...

Ah, so I severely underestimated the size, need a bigger then. This would be my other question, how much of grains would I need for creating a middle strength wort? I know this is a loaded question because I realise there are a lot of variables like how well I manage to convert the grain starches into fermentable sugars but I need a general point of reference. With extracts, dry or liquid, I am comfortable enough with them that I can pretty much wing it and get my brew into the ABV range that I was considering, but I have no idea how much of grains I would need to buy to make any beer at all.
 
For BIAB you don't need much more than a larger stainless pot (it needs to be somewhat bigger than the batch size because of boil off and to avoid boiling over) and a fermenter that can fit the full volume (you already have) and definitely a grain mill (Corona style is the cheapest and can do it but simple two roller mills are not very expensive either). Of course the grains and some BIAB bags. And you need to ensure that you have a burner / stove that is powerful enough to heat up the large volume & bring it to a good rolling boil. Automatic kettle such as above is one solution, especially if you are limited in space or do not have a suitable power to heat up the pot. Some of these have their drawbacks but I think many people brew with those. There is no good reason to be limited to a single local supplier these times. Some additional places that will deliver to Scandinavia in less than a week include

http://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/
http://www.humle.se
http://www.braumarkt.com
http://www.panimonurkka.fi
 
I read the description of that Brewferm automatic kettle again and it said it is good for up to 20 liters of beer (which I assume means roughly 5% light beer) so it should be perfect for 5 gallons / 19 liters. Regarding straining, it does have a spigot, so instead of hanging it why not drain the wort out into the fermenter and leave the bag inside the kettle with spigot open for half an hour or so to drain it? It would probably not be as effective as hanging it but I can always squash the bag a bit too from up to get everything out.
 
MaaZeus said:
I read the description of that Brewferm automatic kettle again and it said it is good for up to 20 liters of beer (which I assume means roughly 5% light beer) so it should be perfect for 5 gallons / 19 liters. Regarding straining, it does have a spigot, so instead of hanging it why not drain the wort out into the fermenter and leave the bag inside the kettle with spigot open for half an hour or so to drain it? It would probably not be as effective as hanging it but I can always squash the bag a bit too from up to get everything out.
Click to expand...

Good for up to 20 liters of beer, but I don't know what that means. Is that the same as 36 liters of capacity? You cannot do a full BIAB batch for 5 gallons/19 liters with a vessel that only accommodates 20 liters.

I started out brewing with an 8-gallon/30-liter kettle. It was fine for brewing so long as I wan't trying to mash in it, but not sufficient size for BIAB for standard 5g/19l batches.

So I sold it to a friend who was starting in brewing, and bought a 10g/38l kettle. That was a perfect size for BIAB, even allowing for larger gravity beers.

All I'm saying is make sure what they mean when they say 20 liters of beer.

EDITED TO ADD: I went back to look at it, capacity is 27 liters. OK, maybe you can boil a 19-liter batch in there, but it's not big enough for BIAB. Perhaps you might look at a cooler mash tun to produce the wort and boil it in the electric kettle.
 
So I need a bigger pot or preferably automatic kettle because my kitchen and stove is not that great. This is getting expensive and fast. :eek:
 
MaaZeus said:
So I need a bigger pot or preferably automatic kettle because my kitchen and stove is not that great. This is getting expensive and fast. :eek:
Click to expand...

Do you have a space where you could use a turkey burner with a propane tank? You can always look at going that route if you have the room to use that type of setup.

And yeah it can get pricey... I'm looking upgrade from a 10 gallon kettle to a 20 gallon one and with the kettle I want, pumps, a new burner, kegging setup etc. I think I'm going to be close to 1,000 US dolars.
 
Abbas said:
Do you have a space where you could use a turkey burner with a propane tank? You can always look at going that route if you have the room to use that type of setup.

And yeah it can get pricey... I'm looking upgrade from a 10 gallon kettle to a 20 gallon one and with the kettle I want, pumps, a new burner, kegging setup etc. I think I'm going to be close to 1,000 US dolars.
Click to expand...

Jeebus! :eek: I knew allgrain would have high initial cost but possibly cheaper raw materials BUT I would die from alcohol poisoning long before it would have paid itself back. :p Yeah I know its about love of the beer and not about the money but I always think of price vs performance. Anyway, no sorry. My kitchen sucks, its very tiny and poorly ventilated. I have actually manages to make firealarm go off by cooking bacon on pan! And I am not even sure the old electric stove has enough power to boil such huge amounts of water without waiting for hours, hence the automatic kettle idea.

I just had a midnight epiphany. The above breuwland kettle may be too small for a full boil of 19 liters BUT maybe its a perfect size for the partial boil idea that I hastily threw out! Anyone want to chime in?
 
MaaZeus said:
Jeebus! :eek: I knew allgrain would have high initial cost but possibly cheaper raw materials BUT I would die from alcohol poisoning long before it would have paid itself back. :p Yeah I know its about love of the beer and not about the money but I always think of price vs performance. Anyway, no sorry. My kitchen sucks, its very tiny and poorly ventilated. I have actually manages to make firealarm go off by cooking bacon on pan! And I am not even sure the old electric stove has enough power to boil such huge amounts of water without waiting for hours, hence the automatic kettle idea.

I just had a midnight epiphany. The above breuwland kettle may be too small for a full boil of 19 liters BUT maybe its a perfect size for the partial boil idea that I hastily threw out! Anyone want to chime in?
Click to expand...

In my case of upgrading to a 20 gallon system, I'm going the expensive route. I'm buying a kettle with custom welding and a lot of extra equipment. I could do everything cheaper, but want quality products, tailored to my specifications, that will last me as long I want to brew. I doubt after this I will need to/want to purchase anymore equipment for a long time with the exceptions of some accessories here and there.

Can't chime in on the partial boil unfortunately.
 
Thanks anyway, you have been very helpful. I now know much more than yesterday. Few blank spots remain but this little project of mine will happen eventually. :mug:
 
A few thoughts/comments based on the helpful advice already given...just going to throw my 2c in.

mongoose33 said:
It's not so much the lifting as it is you want to suspend the bag over the kettle while it drains the wort. That can take 10-20 minutes. Some squeeze the bag of spent grain to wring more wort out--I did. Hard to do at arm's length with what is probably approaches 20# of grain and liquid.
Click to expand...

You do not need to squeeze the bag. It's not necessary; although, yes you will get more volume. I've never done side-by-side comparison, but it's likely negligible. You can just chuck or re-use the spent grain.

ps: I used to be a squeezer.

ESBrewer said:
For BIAB you don't need much more than a larger stainless pot....
Click to expand...

I disagree. It completely depends on the styles that this person wants to brew and the grain bill for those styles. A 5 gallon Cream Ale will have a different amount of grain volume than say a 5 gallon IPA or a 5 gallon stout, etc. If you are doing 5 gallon batches, I recommend at least an 8 gallon kettle (you can convert to that other thing ... errrrrr, metric). You will have a very difficult time doing a 5 gallon anything in a 5 gallon kettle (speaking from experience).

I assure you that you will not be upset if you have a larger-than-needed pot, but you will be upset if it's not big enough. Size matters!

MaaZeus said:
Jeebus! :eek: I knew allgrain would have high initial cost but possibly cheaper raw materials BUT I would die from alcohol poisoning long before it would have paid itself back.
Click to expand...

Use the pot you are using now, buy a BIAB bag, and that's it. You can always spend more, but start there and see if you like the idea of making your own recipes and potentially brewing better beer.


And that's all I got folks
 
MaaZeus said:
Jeebus! :eek: I knew allgrain would have high initial cost but possibly cheaper raw materials BUT I would die from alcohol poisoning long before it would have paid itself back. :p Yeah I know its about love of the beer and not about the money but I always think of price vs performance. Anyway, no sorry. My kitchen sucks, its very tiny and poorly ventilated. I have actually manages to make firealarm go off by cooking bacon on pan! And I am not even sure the old electric stove has enough power to boil such huge amounts of water without waiting for hours, hence the automatic kettle idea.

I just had a midnight epiphany. The above breuwland kettle may be too small for a full boil of 19 liters BUT maybe its a perfect size for the partial boil idea that I hastily threw out! Anyone want to chime in?
Click to expand...
I bought an 8 gallon (30 liter) pot with a valve on it and a bag for doing biab. If I make a big beer I figure I may have to go partial mash but th is size pot will work on my stove. Important when I don't want boil outside at -30
 
I partial mash (mash + extract). I brew 6.5 gallon batches (about 24 liters) and do it on my stove.

I use 8 lbs of grain for every brew (sometimes squeeze in a little more). Grain is limited by the 5 gallon pot I use on my stove - I boil 4 gallons. I could do a 5 gallon (19 liter)/1.045 brew all-grain, but I like the extra volume - less time brewing, so I add extract as part of my recipe to reach the desired starting gravity.

I add any extract at the end of the boil to sanitize it. After I have finished the boil.

I have a plastic cooler that I have modified to use as a mash tun, and use a 5 gallon bag to line the cooler to hold the grains. I mash with 9.5 quarts of water, and sparge twice with 5 quarts (each time), and get about 4 gallons in the boil.

In my experience, anything larger than a 5 gallon pot (19 liters) on the stove will not work and you will need a different set-up to boil the wort. Obviously a larger volume requires more heat, but also does a larger pot, even if not filled.

The cooler + fitting for mashing would be about $40 (US of course), bag is about $2 from a hardware store (paint straining bag). I use a Corona mill for my grains (about $35). From what I have read, a mill is important, you can crush the grain finer than you will get from your home-brew store, and will improve extract efficiency of the grans. The mill will pay for itself very quickly.

Unless you are planning on doing highly hopped IPAs, the lower bittering from lower boil volume should not be a problem. This is a very 'fuzzy' area, but an estimate would be that using a 5 gallon boil for a 5 gallon batch would limit the max IBUs to 60.

Do some research, but partial mash is a possibility. I planned to go to all grain, I have the kettle, and a burner, but never made the step to go outside and do the boil. Seemed less convenient, and once I do it, my Wife would probably not let me brew inside again.
 
I was thinking lately, which is usually a bad idea, that maybe I should go big or go home. I was seriously considering getting an All-In-One solution, either Brewster Beacon or Brew Monk depending on which is in stock. My wallet would hate me and it would be years before it would pay itself back. UNTIL I found this:

http://www.thehomebrewcompany.co.uk...iler-chiller-mashing-bag-mash-kit-p-3313.html

A starter BIAB kit with 33 liter electric kettle and a wort cooler! This seems like a dream come true and its cheap enough that I could order one right now. And it also comes with a free all-grain kit of my choice to get my feet wet. What do you think? This should be big enough for 5 gallon BIAB brewing, yes? I mean, it has 14 liters of overhead for grains, thats quite a lot of space if I think about it.
 
Well, they have other bigger starter kits that also come with this set and they say it is for 5 gallons so... I ordered it. The basic one I linked, not the bigger one. And together with free English Pale Ale all-grain kit. So I am now officially getting into the all-grain game, finally! :ban: Lets see what kind of mess I end up making.
 
When the equipment arrives and I start brewing I'll post in this thread. I have been binge watching BIAB videos and learning everything I can in theory, but usually no theory survives the first contact with practice. Its going to be ugly and amazing at the same time. :D
 
The set is here and I am now in process of mashing. I was actually quite worried if I made a poor purchase, considering the kettle is basically a fermenting bucket made from heat resistant plastic and with a small heater element drilled into it. But to my surprise, it heated the water up into mashing temperature surprisingly quick. Boiling will probably be a pain but it does pack a punch. We'll see what happens when I get there.

But I did have some troubles too. The English Pale Ale AG kit that came with it was for 23 liters where as the kettle is optimal for 5 gallons. Also the instructions that came with the AG kit were for traditional mashing. So I had to rely on calculators, BIAB instructions and a healthy dose of "guesstimates" and so on. The kettle is an eenyweeny bit too small for BIAB brewing 23 liters if I were to mash in full boil volume, so I went couple of liters less. According to the internet the efficiency does not take a big hit with such a small difference so I'm not worried about that. What I am worried about, or more like pissed, is that I completely forgot to buy clamps! In panic and searched through the house and found a lock-plier and a guitar capo. Not even nearly enough to keep the bag properly in place during adding grains, mixing amd breaking clumps. So about a handful got spilled over into the wort. Also my digital thermometer decided to break. My strike temperature was about 70C, after adding the grains the temperature changed between 62-67C (recipe calls for 67) and then it gave a ghost. So I was well within the mashing temperature but actual one is a mystery. I wrapped the keg under sleeping bag to prevent temperature dropping too much, in case I ended up on lower end of the range. But now it is mashing, soon I will lift the bag to drain it and start boiling. Here is a pick too, I just finished pouring the rest of the grains and was about to start breaking the clumps.
 

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Looks good. Don't fret about the mash temp, the lower temp might make a somewhat drier beer than if you'd hit 67, but relax.
As for not mashing full volume, that's FINE.
You'll be guessing at your efficiency and volumes at first (I didn't see you mention testing boiling water for an hour to see what boil off rate you'd have).
If possible, measure your SG once it's cooled, then you can calculate the "Top Off" water to add at the end, as if you were doing an extract batch. Use for instance this calc.

I brewed for a while with a 5G pot, topping off, before getting a larger boil kettle.
 
A little update, done mashing. I do not want to brag but after seeing those crazy pulley systems on Youtubes I was a bit worried for a second. For nothing really, honestly compared to stuff I lift at work that bag weighted nothing, easily up with one hand and strainer under it with other. Bah, noodle armed weaklings... :)

Anyway because I mashed in less water than necessary I decided to sparge a little with cold water tap. I ended up with pre-boil gravity at 25 liters near 1.050. Even though I had to resort to guessing and estimating that seems quite high, after boiling and concentrating it should be even higher, yes? I think I am doing something right. The recipe calls for OG of 1.057, lets see where I end up in. I am now waiting for a boil.
 

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balrog said:
Looks good. Don't fret about the mash temp, the lower temp might make a somewhat drier beer than if you'd hit 67, but relax.
As for not mashing full volume, that's FINE.
You'll be guessing at your efficiency and volumes at first (I didn't see you mention testing boiling water for an hour to see what boil off rate you'd have).
If possible, measure your SG once it's cooled, then you can calculate the "Top Off" water to add at the end, as if you were doing an extract batch. Use for instance this calc.

I brewed for a while with a 5G pot, topping off, before getting a larger boil kettle.
Click to expand...

Yeah I completely forgot to test that. Since I am starting boiling from 25L I have severely less boiling water than needed, so this is a winged up partial boil. After this I will stick to strict 5 gallon recipes and measure an accurate boil off rate, no more guessing.
 
Sounds like it is working out.

You mentioned clumping and breaking them up... Stir the heated water and add the grain slowly while continuing to stir. If you keep it moving the paddle should mix the grains without forming dough balls.

Might have been more difficult with the loosely attached bag but should be easy enough once that is solved.
 
BrewInspector said:
Sounds like it is working out.

You mentioned clumping and breaking them up... Stir the heated water and add the grain slowly while continuing to stir. If you keep it moving the paddle should mix the grains without forming dough balls.

Might have been more difficult with the loosely attached bag but should be easy enough once that is solved.
Click to expand...

Yeah the loosely attached bag was what caused issues. I tried to pour a little bit and stir but the bag kept slipping. So I had to speed things up a bit so I could free my other arm for holding the bag and stirring with another. I'll buy a bunch of clamps the next time I am out in town, this issue won't repeat itself. Good thing this AG bag was free with the kit, I can do all the mistakes I want and learn from them without worrying about losing money. :p
 
Re: bag. It looks large enough to fit over edge of bucket, and has a drawstring which could then be tightened below the bucket's ridged edge and clamped with those pliers and that *SHOULD* hold the bag in place I would think..
 
balrog said:
Re: bag. It looks large enough to fit over edge of bucket, and has a drawstring which could then be tightened below the bucket's ridged edge and clamped with those pliers and that *SHOULD* hold the bag in place I would think..
Click to expand...

Well... that would have been too smart solution for me. :oops: But its now boiling and first hops have been added. After this I leave it to cool overnight in the kettle. I cannot use the wort cooler yet vecause I lack the necessary pipes and also because I should have gone to sleep over an hour ago and I have work tomorrow, but I'm too excited about this so the sleep can wait for yet another hour.
 

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Now it is the fermenter, topped up to 23 liters and sprinkled a package of US04 yeast on it. The temperature (according to the stick-on thermometer on my bucket) was about 25C which is higher than I'd like but I couldn't wait anymore. I have to leave for this weekend and come back on sunday. Leaving the wort alone for that long would have infected it for sure so I pitched the yeast and placed the bucket in coldest place in my house. Hopefully the temperature drops a couple of degrees before the yeast starts working. The gravity before pitching is about 1.052 so I missed my mark by .005 points. Not bad for my first AG attempt I think, and the sample tasted delicious. I was worried that leaving the wort to cool alone would enhance the bitterness but that was for nothing. The bitterness was just right for me, meaning low enough.

So, now the worst part, waiting. I'll be back around Christmas holidays when this thing should be ready and enjoyed with my family, we'll see what kind of hooch I end up with.:cask: My AG journey is now moving along in full speed now. Thanks everyone for tips and advices, they were needed and helpful. :mug:
 

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