First All grain BIAB gone wrong? Picture inside

CornyKegs 728
Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
M

Mx750ktm

Well-Known Member
Joined
Oct 21, 2013
Messages
117
Reaction score
6
Location
Circleville
I thought my day was going great.
Here is the recipe I was shooting for
Amount Item Type % or IBU
7.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (1.8 SRM) Grain 73.68 %
1.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 15.79 %
1.00 lb Candi Syrup Amber* (40.0 SRM) Sugar 10.53 %

0.78 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (60 min) (First Wort Hop) Hops 40.2 IBU
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -
1.00 oz Willamette [5.50 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -

1 Pkgs American Ale (Safale #S-05) Yeast-Ale
Started with 4.75 gallons of water for 8.5 lbs of grain.
Mashed at 155-150 for one hour. I use the variable because I dropped roughly 3 degrees within the hour.
took sample for hydrometer
pulled the bag and let drain and then poured 170 degree water over the grains and let drain again. The water I poured over the grain brought me to 6.25 gallons as I was shooting for a 5.25 gallon batch.
Not sure what its worth but my before boil gravity was 1.060
My boil went fine added my hops at the right time, added my candy syrup with no issues and cooled the wort to 70 withing 12 mins.
When I gathered my last wort sample before putting it into my primary I let it sit for a while and when I came back I saw this?? not sure what it is but I am almost certain its just grain particles. The wort tastes like the smell of grain and its very strong tasting not what I was hoping for. Any ideas if this is worth pitching my yeast. WIll this make decent beer or whats my outcome looking like.
11lsbnt.jpg

Thanks Jake
 
Looks toxic! Send it to my house ASAP! Just kidding... That's usually how my beer looks when I use whirl floc tablets
 
awesome thanks guys!!!! appreciate the quick responses as well.
What about the taste of grain is it simply the bill is almost all 2 row so thats all i can taste right now?
 
A bunch of nicely-settled Cold Break. It's a good thing, it means you should have some pretty clear beer if you let it settle and leave that stuff at the bottom of your fermenter.

I had a pile of cold break on my last batch. I ended up using the "sedimentation vessel" method of letting the wort sit in a carboy while chilling in my fermentation fridge, and then when it was down to pitching temp, I siphoned it into a new vessel and pitched. It worked great, I'm not sure why I don't see very many people talk about that technique here.

Don't worry about the taste right now, it should be sweet but other than that as long as it doesn't have some kind of completely horrendous flavor, pitch and don't worry about it!
 
JPrather I haven't brewed a whole lot but do read around here as much as I can and I cant say I have ever ran into this sedimentation vessel. I will be sure to read into it and thanks for the response

I feel so much better now, I had a bad gut instinct when I saw all that in the hydrometer tube.
Can you get this cold break sediment when doing partial mash or is this new to me because comes with the all grain?
Also completely off topic with the notes I left above can someone walk me through getting my brewhouse efficiency for the day?

Thanks again so much to all that replied
 
Mx750ktm said:
JPrather I haven't brewed a whole lot but do read around here as much as I can and I cant say I have ever ran into this sedimentation vessel. I will be sure to read into it and thanks for the response
Click to expand...

The sedimentation vessel method is just one of many ways to get rid of trub/cold break. Basically you let the whole thing settle out (like that hydrometer reading did) in one carboy and then transfer it to another before pitching. It's not too common but I decided to give it a shot and it worked well.

Can you get this cold break sediment when doing partial mash or is this new to me because comes with the all grain?
Click to expand...

I've only done partial mashes (no all grain) and always get cold break. I got a ton of cold break on this last batch only mashing ~4lbs of grain. Anytime the wort cools quickly, you will get some cold break.

Also completely off topic with the notes I left above can someone walk me through getting my brewhouse efficiency for the day?

Thanks again so much to all that replied
Click to expand...

I'll let someone else handle that because I do it by dicking around with BeerSmith to figure out what my efficiency was.
 
Even before I cooled the wort I feel like I could see this stuff floating around once I pulled the kettle off the burner before inserting the chiller?
 
So this morning I was thinking and I wanted to run this by you guys to see if what I did could have caused this or if this is something I shouldn't do.

After mashing and draining the bag, it took me roughly 25 mins before I poured the 170 water over the grains. Is this too long for the wort to just sit there without any heat?
only reason I did this is because I had no idea how much grain absorption ect. being my first BIAB. So I wasn't sure how much water I would end up needing
 
I like to separate the cold break, and use it as part of my aeration routine. After chilling ,I whirlpool, let it settle, then syphon into another bucket the end of the tube goes through a hop bag and splashes into the bucket, then leave it to settle, washout the hop bag, re sanitise, clean out the original bucket, re sanitise , then syphon it back again through the hop bag with much splashing, I call that rough filtering out of the cold break and aeration, my brew is then ready for pitching.
 
Your pre-boil gravity wasn't 1.060 - pre-boil is your full-volume of wort before it comes to a boil. What you pulled was more like the first runnings of a more traditional all-grain setup. To get your pre-boil gravity, you would have had to measure the gravity of the wort after your pour-over sparges.

Not to criticize the process, nor that it matters particularly, but if you're calculating pre-boil gravity in the future and find that your numbers are off, that's why.
 
FatDragon said:
Your pre-boil gravity wasn't 1.060 - pre-boil is your full-volume of wort before it comes to a boil. What you pulled was more like the first runnings of a more traditional all-grain setup. To get your pre-boil gravity, you would have had to measure the gravity of the wort after your pour-over sparges.

Not to criticize the process, nor that it matters particularly, but if you're calculating pre-boil gravity in the future and find that your numbers are off, that's why.
Click to expand...

No thank your for your response as this was my first biab I wanted to try to keep notes and be able to calculate my efficiency just so I knew where I stood at the end of the day. I wasn't sure I was taking the gravity reading at the correct time. I also do even understand how taking a gravity reading can be used to find efficiency. I do know the recipe I used wanted me to have a 1.050 SG And mine was 1.052 with following the recipe with no extra ingredients so I guess I did fine !!!!
 
Mx750ktm said:
No thank your for your response as this was my first biab I wanted to try to keep notes and be able to calculate my efficiency just so I knew where I stood at the end of the day. I wasn't sure I was taking the gravity reading at the correct time. I also do even understand how taking a gravity reading can be used to find efficiency. I do know the recipe I used wanted me to have a 1.050 SG And mine was 1.052 with following the recipe with no extra ingredients so I guess I did fine !!!!
Click to expand...

Basically, pre-boil gravity helps you gauge your mash efficiency - how much of the available sugars ended up in your boil kettle. After the boil, you take your original gravity, which, calculated along with your volume into the fermenter, determines your brewhouse efficiency - how much of the available sugars ended up in your fermenter.

Sorry if I'm repeating something you already know; the wording of the above post was a little bit unclear so I read it as saying that you didn't know how gravity relates to efficiency.
 
Sorry yes that's what I was trying to say, yes I was unsure how a simple gravity reading could give someone the ability to calculate efficiency. So I appreciate you informing me when to take my gravity reading. Now just sit and wait and see if this awful straight grain taste dissipates haha
 
If you haven't read it yet, check out this article.

link


I'd been hitting low on my OG the last few batches and I'm hoping this will help me out on future brew days.


And if it makes you fell better, my second attempt at an AG brew, my bottled beer looked like the pic of your hydrometer jar. I accidentally pulled a bunch of trub when I bottled it, and it looked all nasty looking after bottling. I'd keep a few bottles in the fridge and whenever I would grab one, I would just decant into my pint glass and the beer still was fairly clear looking.

That was, to this day, one of the worst brew days but in the end it turned out to be one of my best tasting beers.
 
Yesfan said:
If you haven't read it yet, check out this article.

link


I'd been hitting low on my OG the last few batches and I'm hoping this will help me out on future brew days.


And if it makes you fell better, my second attempt at an AG brew, my bottled beer looked like the pic of your hydrometer jar. I accidentally pulled a bunch of trub when I bottled it, and it looked all nasty looking after bottling. I'd keep a few bottles in the fridge and whenever I would grab one, I would just decant into my pint glass and the beer still was fairly clear looking.

That was, to this day, one of the worst brew days but in the end it turned out to be one of my best tasting beers.
Click to expand...


Thanks for the awesome read, I will use this in the future.
Although I hit my expected gravity almost dead on (1.050) and I ended up with (1.052) the thing thats got me concerned is the wort tasting like straight grain. This is my first all grain batch and I would assume it might take a while for the true beer flavor to show but when I took a sip of my gravity reading it was like water with my grain in it :cross: and was awful tasting. All my other beers wort resembled the final product at least a little bit. This just tasted like straight grain.
 
Your original post is one of the "so called" negatives of BIAB, a dirty wort.

All of my BIAB brews have a bigger than usual trub left behind in the fermenter. I believe it is just grain debri. It drops out, especially if you cold crash and get the cake nice and tight. My pale ales are crystal clear though. I do use whirfloc tabs in the boil.

Sometimes I do adjust my recipe to account for the loss of 'product'. I want to make sure I get a full 5gal batch for the time spent.




Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
kable said:
Your original post is one of the "so called" negatives of BIAB, a dirty wort.

All of my BIAB brews have a bigger than usual trub left behind in the fermenter. I believe it is just grain debri. It drops out, especially if you cold crash and get the cake nice and tight. My pale ales are crystal clear though. I do use whirfloc tabs in the boil.

Sometimes I do adjust my recipe to account for the loss of 'product'. I want to make sure I get a full 5gal batch for the time spent.




Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
Click to expand...

I'm actually giving this a go myself with the double batch I'm fermenting - in my short BIAB history, about six months, most batches have been whirlflocced and trub was left in the kettle, but now that I'm bagging my hops when possible, I'm trying to see how well it'll work to let all or most of the trub get into the fermenter and eventually into the yeast cake. I'm expecting to get an extra half-gallon minimum into bottles, since I often erred on the side of caution in leaving break material in the kettle, while much of that liquid would have separated from the trub in the fermenter.

Combine that with overshooting my water both days, I'm expecting to bottle about 13 gallons of 4.4% wheat ale in a few weeks, instead of the intended 11 gallons of 5%. All the better, as the ratio of bottles to wedding guests was looking lower than I hoped, and 4.4% is still about 1.4% stronger than the local stuff the guests are used to.
 
Mx750ktm said:
when I took a sip of my gravity reading it was like water with my grain in it :cross: and was awful tasting.
Click to expand...

Wort should taste very sweet, and generally you'll taste your hop additions. If not, something went wrong with your mash, but given the gravity reading it appears that you got conversion. I'd stick with the plan, see what happens. You're kind of committed at this point. Have you calibrated/checked your thermometer and hydrometer? What water are you using for your brew?
 
Don't worry it is just extra protein. I have gotten the same with all grain and extract. As to the taste you have a very large amount of two row. As your beer carbs and conditions that flavor will change a lot as the hops come to the front. I am sure it will taste fine. :rockin:
 
As far as the "sedimentation vessel" or other means of removing cold break go, it isn't going to make any difference in your final product. This sediment is not about to go back into solution. If it ends up in the fermenter, it will fall to the bottom. It will then get covered by a layer of flocculated yeast once fermentation is complete. It will not change your final product.
 
kable said:
Do you increase your hop amounts when using a bag? I have always wondered about that, potentially less contact etc.
Click to expand...

I've only done relatively small hop additions this way so far. I'm thinking a hop spider of a very DIY nature is in my future the next time I do an IPA. I haven't actually tasted any of the beers that used bagged hops yet - but the hop trub does clump in the bag so I do wonder how much that will impact the final product.

The biggest question is the four quarters IIRA - bulk-boiled with 1 oz FWH Chinook in a muslin steeping sock and 1 oz 90 min bittering Zeus in a hop bag about 5x6 inches (though come to think of it the majority of the Zeus found its way out of the bag and into the rest of the kettle anyway), then the same size hop bags with different one ounce hop combos as a whirlpool/steep in the 5L PP plastic fermenters (wort scooped with a 1L Pyrex cup and poured into the fermenters as the kettle was still boiling). There was little hop trub to deal with, which was a major plus, but the amount of clumping in the steeping bags made me wish I agitated them a bit during the steep. Either way, a round of dry-hopping should hopefully suffice.

So the short answer is, no I don't adjust my hops, but I might need to in the future.
 
BeerGrylls said:
Wort should taste very sweet, and generally you'll taste your hop additions. If not, something went wrong with your mash, but given the gravity reading it appears that you got conversion. I'd stick with the plan, see what happens. You're kind of committed at this point. Have you calibrated/checked your thermometer and hydrometer? What water are you using for your brew?
Click to expand...

I agree. Just see it through. It may look and taste awful now, but you might wind up with a really good tasting beer. That's what happened to me on my second all-grain attempt.


Stay the course............
 
BeerGrylls said:
Wort should taste very sweet, and generally you'll taste your hop additions. If not, something went wrong with your mash, but given the gravity reading it appears that you got conversion. I'd stick with the plan, see what happens. You're kind of committed at this point. Have you calibrated/checked your thermometer and hydrometer? What water are you using for your brew?
Click to expand...

The wort was very sweet then straight grain taste. It overpowered the hops but the recipe had an odd hop schedule from what I've done in previous batches so that could be why? 0.78 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (60 min) (First Wort Hop) Hops 40.2 IBU
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -
1.00 oz Willamette [5.50 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -

My thermometer I use is digital but I always use two just in case to make sure they are both reading the same. The whole brew day they were always reading the same. I also have two hydrometers and checked the wort with both of them and got the same 1.052.
There must be some sugar in there because it's been bubbling away pretty good for the past 24 hours!!!!
But your right I'm committed at this point we shall wait and see. Thanks for all the info guys
 
Mx750ktm said:
The wort was very sweet then straight grain taste. It overpowered the hops but the recipe had an odd hop schedule from what I've done in previous batches so that could be why? 0.78 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (60 min) (First Wort Hop) Hops 40.2 IBU
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -
1.00 oz Willamette [5.50 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -

My thermometer I use is digital but I always use two just in case to make sure they are both reading the same. The whole brew day they were always reading the same. I also have two hydrometers and checked the wort with both of them and got the same 1.052.
There must be some sugar in there because it's been bubbling away pretty good for the past 24 hours!!!!
But your right I'm committed at this point we shall wait and see. Thanks for all the info guys
Click to expand...

Sounds like your equipment and process are good, although if you want to keep the cold break out, you can improve your process getting the wort into your fermentor. If you cooled your wort in 12 minutes, I'm assuming you're using an immersion chiller. This is a short time and will make a fantastic cold break as you see (this is mostly coagulated protiens). This can be aided with irish moss or whirlfloc. Afterwards, you can whirlpool or "fake whirlpool" by stirring the pot in a circular motion, then leave it alone and let the break material settle in the bottom center of the pot. Then, drain it out from the edge of the kettle without disturbing the break. However, like others have said, this matters little because most of it will drop out with the yeasties at the end of fermentation. It's mostly useful if you're interested in better clearing, or if you'll be harvesting your yeast for the next batch.

How familiar are you with Chinook? It's got a pretty unique flavor as far as hops go, plus the candy syrup, two-row, and C80L. So I wonder if what you tasted coupled with a less-than experienced palate makes you think something might be wrong. I doubt it, it sounds to me like everything went perfectly. Only judge the final product! Cheers.
 
Thanks for the reply again, You know this is the first time that I have ever added Irish Moss to one of my batches. I did it with about 15 mins left in the boil. And I did do a whirlpool or what I think may be a whirlpool. After cooling the wort I set the kettle up on my counter and used my spoon to make a whirlpool effect and once it had a few minutes to settle proceeded on. Now my keggle has a spout so thats what I use to transfer so I would almost assume it has a decent amount of vacum and pulls some of the stuff from the center out but who knows. But what everyone is saying makes since about it falling. I mean just in the hydrometer vial it dropped quickly to the bottom and continued to kind of compact. So I would assume the yeast cake will cover this up.

Im not to familar with any hops so to speak, This is my 5th batch and first all grain attempt and although I have used chinook before it was in my first batch which I over carbbed tremendously and the beer wasnt very good.

On a side note my beer is fermenting away in a room with an ambient temp of 64-65. I wanted to check the temp of the actual beer today and it was right about 71 I know this is a tad higher than I would like but I dont think it will hurt it too bad. What I'm getting at though is once I took my temperature I just let the thermometer drip its little drip into my mouth as i pulled it out and it tasted like caramel to me :) !!!!!
I'm thinking this is all going to work out and be a decent beer thanks to all who helped me feel a little better about all this.
Nothing worse than watching a beer progress you have doubts in haha
 
I am actually do some experiments on this right now. I have been doing BIAB for a couple years now, and the wort is super cloudy. I have a few beers turn out with a flavor that's hard to describe other than being very grainy. I went to a courser crush on my grain mill and switched to a mash tun for my last couple of brews. we shall see if there are any flavor differences between methods. you would think that boiling all that stuff would have to have some sort of effect on the flavor, even if it does settle out in the fermenter, but who knows.
 
Yes be sure to check back with what you conclude with your tests as it would be helpful info. This was my first biab and I liked the process and if it makes good beer I would like to continue down the biab route!!! I can tell you I went to a local brewery and bought my grain and they milled it for me and it was super fine some parts of it like dust. But from what I had read everyone said for the biab people typically double crush?
 
Mx750ktm said:
Yes be sure to check back with what you conclude with your tests as it would be helpful info. This was my first biab and I liked the process and if it makes good beer I would like to continue down the biab route!!! I can tell you I went to a local brewery and bought my grain and they milled it for me and it was super fine some parts of it like dust. But from what I had read everyone said for the biab people typically double crush?
Click to expand...

I will be sure to post my findings. I should be tapping my first mash tun batch over the next few days. it seems a lot of people do not have problems with biab trub, so maybe it is a non issue. just seems illogical to me that all that extra stuff can go into the boil and not have an effect on flavor. I don't have a lot of brewers around me to compare notes, so I have to figure it out myself. I have cranked out a lot of great biab brews, but some have the grain thing more than others.

heres a thread where I described some of the flavors. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/what-does-tannin-extraction-taste-smell-like-336213/
 
If you're getting off flavors from grain material, then maybe you should look at the type of bag you're using. How fine is the mesh? The grain bags that they sell at home brew shops is generally very course and will allow a lot of grain material through. Voile works much better. Still drains quickly, but does a good job filtering out most of the crap. Increased trub is ok. Excessive grain making it to the boil is a very different issue.
 
seabass07 said:
If you're getting off flavors from grain material, then maybe you should look at the type of bag you're using. How fine is the mesh? The grain bags that they sell at home brew shops is generally very course and will allow a lot of grain material through. Voile works much better. Still drains quickly, but does a good job filtering out most of the crap. Increased trub is ok. Excessive grain making it to the boil is a very different issue.
Click to expand...

I am using voile. Never any visible husks or anything like that slipping through. Just the ultra fines.
 
Then I'd be very surprised if that was the cause of off flavors. I didn't notice any difference flavor-wise when I switched from BIAB with voile to a cooler mash tun. But I'm curious about other's experiences.
 
seabass07 said:
Then I'd be very surprised if that was the cause of off flavors. I didn't notice any difference flavor-wise when I switched from BIAB with voile to a cooler mash tun. But I'm curious about other's experiences.
Click to expand...

You are probably right, but its one of those things I'll have to find out myself. My extract batches don't have this flavor, and I pay attention to water chemistry, mash pH, fermentation temp, yeast pitching, etc etc.
 
I've tried some of veedo's beers, and only in one- a kolsch- did I pick up on that flavor described. I didn't even know the beers were biab vs traditional mashing. Just thought I'd throw that out there because I thought they were all very good to excellent by bjcp scoring!



Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 

Similar threads

Zippy123
Feedback on recipe to split mash for two different beers
Replies
2
Views
422
Zippy123
Zippy123
PashMaddle
Brew day #2 is done.
Replies
22
Views
1K
lumpher
lumpher
Clint Yeastwood
Failure Beer
Replies
9
Views
826
Zambezi Special
Zambezi Special
S
Autumn Wheat Ale
Replies
5
Views
1K
kwilson16
kwilson16
Rob2010SS
West Coast IPA recipe check
2
Replies
51
Views
6K
HM-2
HM-2

Latest posts

Back
Top