LovesIPA
Well-Known Member
Right now I do 5 gallon batches. I only purchased an 8 gallon kettle (oops) so getting much more than 5.5 gallons in the fermenter is tough. I keg so 5 gallon batches are perfect.
I owe a buddy a case of beer and he likes high ABV, hoppy beers. For an upcoming batch I want to brew this beer. I would like to bottle a case for my buddy and then keg the rest but I don't want to keg half a batch. I'd like to get the keg as full as possible. I have two fermenters that will hold close to 9 gallons so I'm going to use one of them to ferment.
What I am thinking of doing is scaling the recipe up to 8 gallons, but only collect about 7.5 gallons of wort (my kettle would be full) so I'd end up with about 5.5 gallons in the fermenter. Then I'd top it off with purified water to bring it up to 8 gallons (blowoff tube for sure).
Two questions:
1. How is this going to affect the quality of the beer? I'm particularly concerned about hop utilization, especially with an aggressive hop schedule like this one.
2. With a grain bill this large (~24 lbs) how much will my efficiency be impacted by only sparging enough to collect 7.5 gallons of wort? I typically get low/mid 80's.
I don't mind boiling for longer than necessary and adding more wort to the kettle before the first hop addition to up the gravity points if that's necessary.
I use a 10 gallon igloo cooler for a mash tun. I know it's supposed to do 24 lbs of grain. I guess I'll find out for sure. The grain bill would be:
-20 lbs of 2-row
-2 lbs of C80
-1 lb each of Carafa III and chocolate
-1.25 lbs dark candi sugar
I owe a buddy a case of beer and he likes high ABV, hoppy beers. For an upcoming batch I want to brew this beer. I would like to bottle a case for my buddy and then keg the rest but I don't want to keg half a batch. I'd like to get the keg as full as possible. I have two fermenters that will hold close to 9 gallons so I'm going to use one of them to ferment.
What I am thinking of doing is scaling the recipe up to 8 gallons, but only collect about 7.5 gallons of wort (my kettle would be full) so I'd end up with about 5.5 gallons in the fermenter. Then I'd top it off with purified water to bring it up to 8 gallons (blowoff tube for sure).
Two questions:
1. How is this going to affect the quality of the beer? I'm particularly concerned about hop utilization, especially with an aggressive hop schedule like this one.
2. With a grain bill this large (~24 lbs) how much will my efficiency be impacted by only sparging enough to collect 7.5 gallons of wort? I typically get low/mid 80's.
I don't mind boiling for longer than necessary and adding more wort to the kettle before the first hop addition to up the gravity points if that's necessary.
I use a 10 gallon igloo cooler for a mash tun. I know it's supposed to do 24 lbs of grain. I guess I'll find out for sure. The grain bill would be:
-20 lbs of 2-row
-2 lbs of C80
-1 lb each of Carafa III and chocolate
-1.25 lbs dark candi sugar