My first AG will be on Sunday!

[kicknbrew]

I'm on batch 8 now, and it'll be my first all grain. I concocted a recipe on hopville.com for a very basic dry stout:

8# canadian 2 row
2# roasted barley
3oz fuggles
6.0 gallon batch @ 1.25qt/gal

That's it. I wanted the most basic recipe to start.

My brew day schedule is below. If any of you seasoned vets can let me know if I'm way off on something, I would certainly appreciate it!

Down the rabbit hole I go...

1pm: Set up, start heating mash water
1:30: pour 3.5 gal 175 degree water into mash cooler, seal and let cooler come to temp
1:45 or when water is at 165: dough in
2:00 or when water is at 153: seal cooler for 60 min
2:40: start heating 1 gallon mashout and 3.5 gallons sparge water
3:00: mashout and drain
3:15: batch sparge with 3.5 gal of 170 degree water, drain
3:30: begin boil, add 3.0 oz fuggles (4.0%AA)
4:20: add whirlfloc and drop in chiller to sanitize
4:30: flameout and begin chill
4:45 or when temp is at 65 degrees, cover and let trub fall for 60 min
5:45: siphon wort off trub into fermenter, pitch, lock, and wait

 

[flabyboy]

I would do 2 equal batch sparges with 180 degree water. If I am reading this right you are using a total 8 gallons of water. Depending on your boil off rate this may be a little on the light side. you may need 1 more gallon to even get to 5 gallons in the fermenter and you say 6 gallon batch on the top

 

[kicknbrew]

Well, it's in the carboy and just did a blazing fast 2 day ferment. A few mistakes, but none tragic.

1. my mash temp was only 150. I added a few quarts of near boiling water, but i couldn't get it anywhere over 152, which then quickly stabilized back at 150.
2. because of that, my mash was a little over 1.25qt/#
3. my flame (because of that infernal timer on my turkey fryer!) went out for about five mins on a chilly Buffalo afternoon, so the boil was a bit off.
4. probably because of all of the above, my gravity was only 1.036. :\

I'm sure there'll be more epiphanies and realizations about what I did wrong, but for a first AG batch, I had fun.

 

[kingmatt]

Well, it's in the carboy and just did a blazing fast 2 day ferment. A few mistakes, but none tragic.

1. my mash temp was only 150. I added a few quarts of near boiling water, but i couldn't get it anywhere over 152, which then quickly stabilized back at 150.
2. because of that, my mash was a little over 1.25qt/#
3. my flame (because of that infernal timer on my turkey fryer!) went out for about five mins on a chilly Buffalo afternoon, so the boil was a bit off.
4. probably because of all of the above, my gravity was only 1.036. :\

I'm sure there'll be more epiphanies and realizations about what I did wrong, but for a first AG batch, I had fun.

What was your anticipated OG?

 

[kicknbrew]

As per hopville.com, I was supposed to be around 1.045. At 1.036 I was at 60% efficiency. For a first batch, I'll take it, and happily drink beer. For my next batch, I am definitely going to tighten up on the process.

 

[kicknbrew]

UPDATE:

I racked to secondary this morning, and am at almost exactly 1.010. Awesome!

It's black as black can be, and I got about a 3.5% abv on it. Oh, and it tastes phenomenal!

So on my first AG batch, here's the breakdown, highs and lows (some repetition from above):

• Biggest Error: too much water left after the boil. I overestimated boiloff and got 6 gal rather than 5.5, which dropped my OG by .003.
• Second Biggest Error: Mash temps were 3 degrees lower than I wanted. Better control next time might get me more than 60% efficiency.
• Fermentation was intense! Three days and out, all the way down to 1.010. Thumbs up on that one!
• I had fun. Ergo: I win!

I'm going to let it clear up a bit more, maybe a week or two, before I bottle.

Off topic: Today is Hefe Day! Yippee summer beers!