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BigJerk

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I've been brewing for a while, but this is my first all grain, so I decided to post it here. I'm doing BIAB with my new brew pot (9 gallons) and using my old 5 gallon as a mash tun. My only worries right now are hitting my mash temp, then maintaining it for 90 minutes. After that I'll worry about getting all 6 gallons to boil on my crappy stove!
 
Mash Temp ~150, so far so good, I think this will be an ok temp. I would have rather have been about 154, but this is something I can tweak later. 10.25 lbs of grain and 13 qt water pretty much max out my 20 qt pot, so if i ever want to go bigger I'll have to get a bigger pot (oh darn)
 
BigJerk said:
Mash Temp ~150, so far so good, I think this will be an ok temp. I would have rather have been about 154, but this is something I can tweak later. 10.25 lbs of grain and 13 qt water pretty much max out my 20 qt pot, so if i ever want to go bigger I'll have to get a bigger pot (oh darn)

I just did my first all grain batch last week and hit the same temp. Not a problem as long as the starches convert. It may take a little longer but it shouldn't be a problem. Do an iodine test to see if the starches convert before sparging. Good luck!
 
I've never heard of an iodine test, I'm planning on mashing for 90 minutes, do you think that's enough? It's holding temp pretty well, I'm keeping it on a warm (I can touch the burner, so not to hot) burner. After about 50 minutes it's at about 148.
 
it's 143 at 90 minutes, I think I'll let it go another 30 minutes just in case. then I'll dip it in the sparge water and begin my boil.
 
Ok, two hours into mash and temp is 140. I'm gonna pull the bag and dip into 180 "sparge" water to rinse. Then I'll pour the mash liquid into the sparge ( brew kettle) top off water if needed and proceed with the boil. Hopefully this will turn out good, everything I've brewed lately has been awesome, so i'm steeling myself for a "learning moment" just in case. I'm excited for this new step into brewing, and I'm looking forward to honing this new skill.
 
Anticipated (according to beer alchemy) pre boil gravity 1.039. Actual pre boil gravity 1.036. Wort tastes sweet. Hopefully a success everything else now should go like normal for me (except for the full boil as opposed to partial) so I'll post again when I pitch the yeast.
 
done and done! OG is 1.040, planned for a 1.043, so not too bad. I've learned a few things, so next time it should go a bit smoother.
 
What are you using as a mash tun? How are you sparging???


Check this out. This is what I do to make sure my starches convert....

 
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When you are using Brew in a Bag, you can use a very thin crush or you can grind your grain to about the consistency of corn meal without it going through the bag. With these smaller grain particles, your conversion from starch to sugar may be done in as little as 15 minutes so you don't really need to hold the temperature for 2 hours. Try an iodine test at 15 and 30 minutes to verify conversion. If the starch is gone, you can pull the bag out and either sparge or if you used the full volume of water, just squeeze the wort out of the bag and you are ready to start the boil.
 
She's a bubblin' away and looks just like all my other beers so far, Hooray! it was a lot of fun, I'm already thinking of the next one, and both my fermentors are full!
 
Sounds like your brewing was a pretty good time!

To hold your temps, set your "mash tun" on a folded towel on a counter top, wrap the tun with another towel, and place one more on top. That will insulate it quite well, and you shouldn't lose any temps.
 
Well, it looks like the major part of fermentation is done (which for a 1.040 beer is not surprising) krasen has collapsed, but it's still good and cloudy. I accidentally got the london ale wyeast (that'll teach me to not check when I get the packet outta the bin) which I've never used before, but thats kinda like a little side quest in my all grain adventure. good thing my kegs are full, or I'd be tempted to keg in two weeks and not give the beer the patience and time it deserves. I've got a beer in the kegging queue before this one too, so it should have a good 4 weeks before I get to keg it. I'm just excited, this new process is like getting started all over again, and I've got the noob antsiness going on, it's just so hard to resist messing with it, and just letting it be...
 
I've been brewing for a while, but this is my first all grain, so I decided to post it here. I'm doing BIAB with my new brew pot (9 gallons) and using my old 5 gallon as a mash tun. My only worries right now are hitting my mash temp, then maintaining it for 90 minutes. After that I'll worry about getting all 6 gallons to boil on my crappy stove!

I'm interested in trying BIAB too. But I'm a bit confused by what you said about using your 5 gal pot as mash tun. I thought the idea with BIAB was just a single pot for mashing and boiling? And if you were using a separate pot for mashing, wouldn't you want to use the bigger one, isn't that what requires the large volume?
 
Since my new brew kettle has the thermometer in it I was afraid the stem would catch on the bag and tear it. so I used my old 5 gallon that was unaltered for the mash, and then heated water in the new one for the "sparge" (really I just dipped the bag in to rinse the grains) it was a messy process, but now that I've done it once I think I can replicate the process with less mess. If I can figure out a way to ensure I won't snag the bag I can reverse the kettles and do a bigger mash in the big pot and use the smaller pot to rinse the grains. after reading some responses in other threads on this site from the more experienced brewers, I'm going to get some silicone grilling gloves so I can squeeze the bag to get all the goodness out. really, I'm the worst for reading good advice and then deciding to do it my own way only to realize that I should have followed the good advice to begin with, so there you go. The best part of this hobby, to me anyway, to to find your own way to create beer. Only time will tell if I made something good, and if I didn't I'm confident enough now that I'll only see that as a challenge to do it again to make it better. Sorry for the ramble, today was my actual birthday, and I've had a few, and with this new kettle I feel that there are a lot of new possibilities open to me, and I'm really excited for my next brew.
 
Since my new brew kettle has the thermometer in it I was afraid the stem would catch on the bag and tear it. so I used my old 5 gallon that was unaltered for the mash, and then heated water in the new one for the "sparge" (really I just dipped the bag in to rinse the grains) it was a messy process, but now that I've done it once I think I can replicate the process with less mess. If I can figure out a way to ensure I won't snag the bag I can reverse the kettles and do a bigger mash in the big pot and use the smaller pot to rinse the grains. after reading some responses in other threads on this site from the more experienced brewers, I'm going to get some silicone grilling gloves so I can squeeze the bag to get all the goodness out. really, I'm the worst for reading good advice and then deciding to do it my own way only to realize that I should have followed the good advice to begin with, so there you go. The best part of this hobby, to me anyway, to to find your own way to create beer. Only time will tell if I made something good, and if I didn't I'm confident enough now that I'll only see that as a challenge to do it again to make it better. Sorry for the ramble, today was my actual birthday, and I've had a few, and with this new kettle I feel that there are a lot of new possibilities open to me, and I'm really excited for my next brew.
Ah, makes sense now. But was your 5 gal kettle big enough for the mash? I watched some videos of the process and I don't remember a sparge - I thought the usual BIAB process was to just let the bag hang over the kettle or a bucket to drip out while bring kettle up to the boil. Or is a sparge part of the process?
 
Technically the 5 gallon pot was only big enough for about 10 lbs of grain, so for bigger beers I'll have to do a partial mash. As far a the " sparge" I did, it was more of a dip in hot water to rinse the last of the goodness out of the grains, a bit of something I went rogue with, not part of the official process, but something I wanted to try out. Since it was my first BIAB experience there's already a few things I want to change for next time (mainly cause I made a giant mess!)
 
_MG_3659.jpg


This is how I mash my BIAB. Old skiing jacket works much better to hold heat than towels. After couple batches I realized I don't even need to apply heat during mash to hold temp steady. Usually within 1-2F during 90 min mash
 
Heh, heh. A jacket; I like it!

Actually, the towels work very well. I don't lose any temps. I wouldn't have suggested it if it didn't work. :)
 
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