Thought I'd post my first experience here since I am a beginner. I've only done one other extract before, but i'd rather do all grain. It took a lot longer than I thought, but i also made some mistakes
It was definitely a learning experience and i'm glad that I did it.
Well im on a tight budget(and im just a cheap ass) so i figured id just use my 7.5 gal bottling bucket with a make shift filter on it for my mash tun(first mistake).
So I heated up 5gal water to 163 and mashed 15lbs grain. Had the bucket wrapped in a blanket and it kept the temp good for an hr. So I go to drain off my first runnings and when I turn the spigot absolutely nothing comes out So we had to dump everything through spaghetti strainers.
So by now im sweating my ass off and had a few beers, I figure since I got 3 gal of wort off my initial 5 gal of water I need to sparge with another 5 gal to get a total of 6 gal to boil.(second mistake)So again we strained everything through the spaghetti strainers into my boil kettle. Ended up with a total of just over 7 gal
My pre boil 7 gal gravity was 1.054 corrected for temp
After an hr of boiling I was 1.064 corrected(The recipe called for 1.079)
After I boiled for another hr while adding my hops it was time to cool. I have a large tupperware tub I was going to use to put the boil kettle into an ice bath. What i didnt know was there was small cracks in the bottom of the plastic and my ice water was slowly running out. So i had the hose in the tub constantly running and after 40min it got down to 78 and i couldnt get it any lower. So I transferred to fermenter and pitched yeast starter. Its been at a steady 72 since
Its been almost two weeks and I checked today and gravity is 1.011, it taste pretty good. Has a lot of sediment and is a little darker due to my awesome spaghetti strainer techniques. Going to wait a few days and transfer to secondary and dry hop. Then kegging.
All in all I think it is going to turn out pretty good. I learned a lot and I am currently building a cooler mash tun the proper way Sorry for the long post but I just thought I'd share.
It was definitely a learning experience and i'm glad that I did it.Well im on a tight budget(and im just a cheap ass) so i figured id just use my 7.5 gal bottling bucket with a make shift filter on it for my mash tun(first mistake).
So I heated up 5gal water to 163 and mashed 15lbs grain. Had the bucket wrapped in a blanket and it kept the temp good for an hr. So I go to drain off my first runnings and when I turn the spigot absolutely nothing comes out
So we had to dump everything through spaghetti strainers.So by now im sweating my ass off and had a few beers, I figure since I got 3 gal of wort off my initial 5 gal of water I need to sparge with another 5 gal to get a total of 6 gal to boil.(second mistake)So again we strained everything through the spaghetti strainers into my boil kettle. Ended up with a total of just over 7 gal
My pre boil 7 gal gravity was 1.054 corrected for temp
After an hr of boiling I was 1.064 corrected(The recipe called for 1.079)
After I boiled for another hr while adding my hops it was time to cool. I have a large tupperware tub I was going to use to put the boil kettle into an ice bath. What i didnt know was there was small cracks in the bottom of the plastic and my ice water was slowly running out. So i had the hose in the tub constantly running and after 40min it got down to 78 and i couldnt get it any lower. So I transferred to fermenter and pitched yeast starter. Its been at a steady 72 since
Its been almost two weeks and I checked today and gravity is 1.011, it taste pretty good. Has a lot of sediment and is a little darker due to my awesome spaghetti strainer techniques. Going to wait a few days and transfer to secondary and dry hop. Then kegging.
All in all I think it is going to turn out pretty good. I learned a lot and I am currently building a cooler mash tun the proper way
Sorry for the long post but I just thought I'd share.
