First Beer - First AG

[BrianP]

Well, I finally got around to brewing my first beer. I got quite an education from this site. At first I was interested in extract brewing and was trying to figure out what types of equipment to buy, learning brewing technique, etc. The more I learned about AG, I eventually decided to take the plunge and start with AG.

I made a 10gal MLT (using FlyGuy's design) and also an immersion chiller. I rounded up the fermenters, a turkey fryer and other equipment and was ready to go.


What went well:

I hit my strike temperature within a degree after preheating the MLT and calculating the temp using an online calculator.

MLT worked great - nice clear runnings. Only lost 1 degree over an hour mash. Did two separate sparges. Total runoff was 6.5 gal, just like I wanted.

Boil went well - no boilovers. The turkey fryer was pretty full, so I watched it pretty carefully at the beginning and when I added hops.

The chiller (50' of 3/8" copper) worked great - my cold well water chilled the wort in about 15 minutes. Swirling it in the pot really helped.


What didn't go well:

When bringing gear outside I tripped and twisted my ankle pretty badly, fell down, and nearly spilled my grain bill (luckily I only lost 1/8 cup or so). Now hobbled, I had to recruit the SHMBO to help out. She was a trooper and went above and beyond.

I somehow broke my racking cane in half during my fall, which made siphoning the wort a little difficult. I'm sure I sucked in a fair amount of trub into the fermenter.

During the time I was trying to figure out how best to get the wort out without a siphoning cane, I realized that I had left the cooled wort uncovered for a little while - hopefully it didn't get infected by wild yeast or other nasties.

Efficiency wasn't great - I haven't calculated it out yet, but the gravities were below target. I suspect the problem was the crush. The LHBS said 1x through the mill was good enough, and I didn't really know what to look for. But after seeing BierMuncher's photos of his grind from his BarleyCrusher, my grind looked weak. Until I get myself a BC, or figure out my efficiency issues, I will add extra grains.

I forgot to add the Irish Moss - not a biggie.



All in all it was fun (except for the twisted ankle) and a good learning experience. More things went well than went poorly. And the fermentation seems to be going well. Since I haven't mentioned it yet, the recipe is below.


My English Bitter

Mash 60 minutes at 152F
9 lbs Maris Otter
1 lb Crystal 40
1/2 lb CaraPils

Kent Goldings (6.3AA)
1.5 oz for 60
1/2 oz for 20
1/4 oz for 5

Nottingham dry yeast (not ready to try liquid yeasts yet...)

Preboil: 6.5gal; Postboil: 5.5gal; In carboy: 5.0gal


Thanks again to everyone on this forum for the wealth of information here and for feedback to my questions in past weeks. Now to figure out what to make next, perhaps EdWort's Haus Ale or a wheat beer.

Any comments/feedback welcome.

Regards,
BrianP

 

[bitteral]

Congratulations. That sounds like a pretty good brew day, especially for a first batch!

 

[BrianP]

The next one will go smoother for sure. It was hard doing it while hopping around on one leg.

 

[bigben]

Put some ice on that ankle and have a beer

Congrats on the first brew and for going AG right away!!!

 

[malkore]

put a spigot on your boil pot. then you don't have to siphon (one less thing to sanitize too), and if you do it at the right height you can pretty much avoid the trub layer in the bottom.

 

[Blender]

It sounds like you did just fine. The grain crush is generally the culprit plus you will get better as you do more brews. Consider making 5.5 gallon batches because then you have a solid clear 5 gallons for bottling or kegging.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

Wow, sounds like a great first brew, first AG experience. I also jumped right into AG, but I had someone helping me out the first time. As far as the bad you listed - the only thing I would worry about is the twisted ankle. Looks like a really nice recipe, too. I made one very similar not long ago. I'm down to the very last bottle.

 

[tbulger]

What was your OG?

 

[BrianP]

Thanks for the feedback and comments. Some updates...

What was your OG?

OG (post boil) was 1.042 (corrected for temp - but then again, I'm not a pro reading a hydrometer, and my temperature reading of the sample was mostly a guess - my digital thermometer was wigging out after I had dropped it into the mash).

As far as I can tell, my efficiency was about 60%. But again I'm not that experienced with the calculations - this is based on reading up on it in Palmer's HowToBrew online. I may ask the SHMBO to get me a BarleyCrusher for Christmas....

Regarding the spigot - I will definitely look into that. Or, maybe wait a little and get a better (bigger) stainless kettle with a spigot (or maybe even a keggle). The turkey fryer pot is borderline too small, but workable for now.

Other news...
The bubbling slowed down dramatically at 42 hours after pitching, so I couldn't resist taking a gravity reading - it was at 1.008 (corrected for temperature it is 1.0096). It's still bubbling, but much slower. And I tasted the hyrdrometer sample - very beer-like and it actually tastes pretty good. :rockin:

In a few days I'll rack it to the secondary and let it sit some more. Patience is difficult with the first batch.


Thanks again for the feedback.

BP

 

[AndrewKemendo]

Right on, glad to see there are other people who jumped into AG on their first beer. When I did it, my home brew shop guy told me I was odd - so I told him thanks for the complement.

I don't think I'll ever try the extract either.