Couple of beginner BIAB questions for a recipe

[Keqwow]

I've only done one beer so far, it was an all-grain BIAB Hefeweizen that I did a year ago. I'd like to get back into it and I need a little refresher on a couple of things. I'm doing BIAB and I'd like to stick with the all-grain. I have come across a couple of different recipes for a Lake Placid Ubu Ale clone I'd like to try.

I've attached below the recipe I'll be following. Here are a couple of questions:
#1) Since I'll be doing all-grain, should I steep all my grains for that 45 minutes before proceeding to the 60 minute boil since I wont be using DME?

#2) Should I be steeping all of my grains in the full 6.5 gallons of water before proceeding to the boil (instead of starting out with 2.5 gallons since I won't be using DME)?

#3) Review questions: I'm grinding up all of the malts in this recipe and just adding them all together in my bag right? (Not much of a recipe list when I did my Hefeweizen, so there is a lot more going on here).

Last question: When I come upon these recipes...if I want to do a small test-batch, like 1 gallon or 2.5 gallons, can I just decrease the recipe list proportionately, or doesn't it work like that?



Fermentables
Fermentable Amount Use PPG Color
English Crystal, 50-60 L
1.0 lb 10 % Steep 34 55 °L
Bairds Black Malt
0.06 lb 0 % Steep 30 550 °L
Briess 2-Row Chocolate Malt
0.06 lb 0 % Steep 34 350 °L
Light Dry Malt Extract
6.75 lb 73 % Boil 44 5 °L
Wheat DME
1.25 lb 13 % Boil 44 3 °L
Hops
Hop Amount Time Use Form AA
Fuggle (US)
2.0 oz 40 min Boil Pellet 4.2%
Willamette (US)
2.0 oz 20 min Boil Pellet 4.9%
Chinook (US)
1.0 oz 20 min Boil Pellet 13.0%

Yeasts
Name Lab/Product Attenuation
London Ale III
Wyeast 1318 73.0%

Extras
Name Amount Time Use
Irish Moss
1.0 tsp 20.0 min Boil
Notes
• Steeped specialty grains and moss in 2.5 gallons of water at 154 degrees for 45 minutes.
• Remove grains and add DME . Bring to a boil and boil for 20 minutes.
• Add Fuggles and boil for 20 minutes.
• Add Chinook in bag and boil for 18 minutes. Added Willamette (in bag) and boiled for 2 mins more.
• Remove from heat. Cool to about 72 degrees and then transfer to fermenter. Top up to 5 gallon and pitch yeast. Ferment at 70-72 degrees for 7-10 days, or until fermentation is completed. Rack to secondary fermentation, or bottle or keg with priming sugar. Age for several weeks.
All Grain Version:
Substitute 9 pounds Maris Otter pale ale malt and 1.5 pounds wheat malt for the 7.25 pounds of DME.
. Used Wyeast and did starter culture for 2 days Pitched at 70 degrees and had big time fermentation for 36 hours, C02 was just hissing out. Then it really slowed to no bubbles after 48 hours. After 4 days I racked it to the carboy and in hindsight should have waited a few more days as there was about 2 inches of sludge in the bottom that could have settled more and I probably wasted a couple bottles of Beer. OG 1072 G after 2 days 1028 G after 4 days 1022 Final G 1022

 

[doug293cz]

How big is the pot in which you will be brewing? Pot size will determine whether you can do a full volume mash, or if you will need to do a sparge. Also, what is your target volume to the fermenter?

Brew on

 

[btbnl]

Yes, you want to steep (or mash, since you're extracting sugar) all of your grains - typically for an hour.

Yes, for BIAB you want to mash in the total volume of water (though some people mash in most and sparge with the rest just to flush the sugars out).

Yes, you're grinding all the grains and throwing them in together; personally, I double grind for BIAB.

Yes, you can scale proportionally.

 

[Keqwow]

I've got a 15 gallon pot and a typical 5 gallon (5.5??) plastic pail fermenter. But I've been beginning to think about scaling things down. I'd rather be able to test out several different recipes and make smaller batches than one beer that lasts me an entire season. While a 5 gallon batch would be fine for a beer I really like, I figure smaller batches are the way to go for testing new recipes.

 

[doug293cz]

With a 15 gal pot you can do full volume mash for any 5 gallon recipe. So, you could put all your water in for the mash step. Your boil off will be about 1.25 - 1.5 gal/hr with that size pot, so it may be too big for smaller size batches. Do you have a smaller pot you could use for smaller batches? There is an easy to use calculator here, that will tell you how much water you need to start with.

If you're using the LHBS standard crush for your grains you might want to increase the mash time from 45 min to 60 min. If you get it double crushed, then 45 min should be enough.

You might also want to think about your mash temperature. When steeping specialty grains for extract brewing, temp is not so critical. But, when you are depending on the mash to get your fermentable sugars, then the temperature is much more important. Lower temperatures (~148 F) will give you a dryer, less full bodied beer, and higher temperatures (~154 F) will give you a more full bodied beer with more unfermentable sugar. 152 F is a very common temp for a single infusion mash.

Good luck, and brew on