sd_brewbie
Well-Known Member
TL;DR Enjoyable brew day with back to back batches as my wife demanded I brew her favorite but had something else I wanted to brew. Found batch sparging with equal batch volumes and a thinner mash helps my efficiency. Oh and a Hot Toddy made with Altbier wort is amazeballs.
Brewed two 5 gallon batches back to back with my brother filling in as assistant brewer (actually drinker of beer). Everything clicked today, no valves left opened and tweaked my process for the better. I wanted to share.
First up was an altbier, first time for me brewing the style. Did a single decoction and had an awesome sweet caramel flavored mash. My brother brought over the remnants of a bottle of Jameson caskmates and we enjoyed some hot toddy made with 2:1 wort to whiskey. It was like drinking candy.
Next up was an APA I have brewed a number of time prior and making this beer is almost muscle memory now... though I did forget to take a ph reading of my mash. Started the mash as the previous boil was coming to an end and ended up finishing my 60min mash right as I finished draining my cooled wort to my carboy... perfect.
The APA is a favorite of my wife and she insisted I could only brew if I made this beer for her, as we have been out of it for a couple weeks now. Hence my motivation for doing two batches back to back. I am also excited as I have been doing 10 gallon batches lately, but now I will get some variety out of my brew day (even if it was a bit longer).
We also tried a Hot Toddy with the APA wort... not as good as the Alt... the caramel flavors went so nice with the whiskey.
What I learned today: In the past I have been using mash thickness of 1.25 - 1.5 qt/lb. I started fly sparging, but moved to batch sparring earlier this year and stuck with that. In BeerSmith I was always confused why the default batch sparge profile did not have the "Drain mash tun before sparging" option selected by default. On top of that my mash efficiency has been pretty bad, my last batch was 62%. I did some googling and found that the recommendation is two have two equal batches to get both the best conversion and still have enough sparge water left to wash as much sugar from the grain as possible. The beer smith profile by default was encouraging me to do this by asking me to add enough water to my mash two have two equal batches. So today, finally, I did not check that option in the mash profile and instead modified my mash thickness to require no extra water to have two equal batches. My mash thickness ended up at almost 2qt/lb, but that should net me better conversion. All and all I ended up with a mash efficiency of ~73% for both of my batches, that I can live with. My next step will probably to get a mill and crush my own grains (LHBS, the homebrewer, told me they set to a coarser grind, but they also run a nano brewery in the same building and use the same mill).
sorry for the long post.
Brewed two 5 gallon batches back to back with my brother filling in as assistant brewer (actually drinker of beer). Everything clicked today, no valves left opened and tweaked my process for the better. I wanted to share.
First up was an altbier, first time for me brewing the style. Did a single decoction and had an awesome sweet caramel flavored mash. My brother brought over the remnants of a bottle of Jameson caskmates and we enjoyed some hot toddy made with 2:1 wort to whiskey. It was like drinking candy.
Next up was an APA I have brewed a number of time prior and making this beer is almost muscle memory now... though I did forget to take a ph reading of my mash. Started the mash as the previous boil was coming to an end and ended up finishing my 60min mash right as I finished draining my cooled wort to my carboy... perfect.
The APA is a favorite of my wife and she insisted I could only brew if I made this beer for her, as we have been out of it for a couple weeks now. Hence my motivation for doing two batches back to back. I am also excited as I have been doing 10 gallon batches lately, but now I will get some variety out of my brew day (even if it was a bit longer).
We also tried a Hot Toddy with the APA wort... not as good as the Alt... the caramel flavors went so nice with the whiskey.
What I learned today: In the past I have been using mash thickness of 1.25 - 1.5 qt/lb. I started fly sparging, but moved to batch sparring earlier this year and stuck with that. In BeerSmith I was always confused why the default batch sparge profile did not have the "Drain mash tun before sparging" option selected by default. On top of that my mash efficiency has been pretty bad, my last batch was 62%. I did some googling and found that the recommendation is two have two equal batches to get both the best conversion and still have enough sparge water left to wash as much sugar from the grain as possible. The beer smith profile by default was encouraging me to do this by asking me to add enough water to my mash two have two equal batches. So today, finally, I did not check that option in the mash profile and instead modified my mash thickness to require no extra water to have two equal batches. My mash thickness ended up at almost 2qt/lb, but that should net me better conversion. All and all I ended up with a mash efficiency of ~73% for both of my batches, that I can live with. My next step will probably to get a mill and crush my own grains (LHBS, the homebrewer, told me they set to a coarser grind, but they also run a nano brewery in the same building and use the same mill).
sorry for the long post.
