Question on brewing with limited stove heat

[brianpablo]

I've been brewing for almost a year now and am starting to see some great results, but find I'm getting a bit tripped up by the limited heating capacity of my stove. I can boil five gallons without too much trouble, but much above that the wort won't heat up enough for a rolling boil that can really bring down the volume and raise the gravity.

I've developed a few work-arounds for this situation, most of which involving producing smaller batches and wasting considerable amounts of fermentable sugars

I don't have an option to get a propane stove or a new stove, so this is basically what I've got. This gets to be a real problem for higher gravity beers because I end up with more wort that I can boil down.

My question is - Can I begin by boiling a couple gallons from the last sparge for an hour or so to get the gravity down, and then combining that with the wort from the first runnings so I don't overload the stove with 7 gallons of wort? This will basically mean that some of the wort will boil for longer than the rest of it and for longer than what the recipe says. As long as I do this before adding hops I don't see why it would be a problem as such, but I'd appreciate any feedback on whether this is going to cause problems.

Thanks,

Brian

 

[joshuatu]

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I had a similar issue and solved it with a heavy lid on the pot in order to get that nice rolling boil.

 

[kh54s10]

This gets to be a real problem for higher gravity beers because I end up with more wort that I can boil down.

My question is why you end up with more wort when brewing higher gravity beers? Your preboil volume should be the same no matter what the gravity is.

Though 7 gallons is about right to get a 5 - 5.5 gallon batch depending on your boil off rate.

You could boil some then boil more though I don't know the change in hop utilization.

You could get recipes or kits that boil smaller amounts then top up.

 

[kh54s10]

I had a similar issue and solved it with a heavy lid on the pot in order to get that nice rolling boil.

If you are brewing all grain you do not want to boil with the lid on. It will trap DMS in the wort.

You can get the boil started then take the lid off.

 

[brianpablo]

My question is why you end up with more wort when brewing higher gravity beers? Your preboil volume should be the same no matter what the gravity is.

I probably didn't phrase that quite right. I was looking into doing my first step mash and noticed that the wort volumes appeared to be going up toward 8 or 9 gallons when I did the calculations (I'm only now starting to look into protein rests), but you're right that the gravity should remain independent of the wort.

I'm guessing the best way to deal with it is to simply divide the recipe in half, which would give me a maximum of about 4 gallons of wort, and then simply boil it down to make sure I hit the gravity numbers. That would mean boiling it for some time before I begin putting the hops in - I don't see anything per se wrong with that, unless I'm missing something.

 

[GilSwillBasementBrews]

You could just split the full volume into two pots Boil both pots and split hop additions then blend the two back together in the fermenter. Kinda be a PITA but I think it would give more consistent results. But keep in mind if you do you are basically doubling the amount of boil off since you now have 2 separate pots and surface areas to boil off from.

 

[Wynne-R]

Using two pots is way faster on a marginal electric stovetop. I could barely boil 16 qts on an apartment (cheap) stove. Now I can do two 12's standing on my head. I’ve been doing it for years.

Doing two half batches concurrently is just barely harder than one big one. As for boil-off, that’s no big deal either. I suppose the big pots are a little taller, but it comes down to the heat. I boil off about 10%.

 

[Indian_villager]

Have you considered a heat stick?

 

[beergolf]

You could just split the full volume into two pots Boil both pots and split hop additions then blend the two back together in the fermenter. Kinda be a PITA but I think it would give more consistent results. But keep in mind if you do you are basically doubling the amount of boil off since you now have 2 separate pots and surface areas to boil off from.

I do this when the weather is bad and I don't want to go outside. works great. Just drain half into one pot and the other half into another pot. Split the hop additions between the pots and you are good to go.

 

[retheisen]

I could barely boil 16 qts on an apartment (cheap) stove. Now I can do two 12's standing on my head. I’ve been doing it for years.

While I do not engage in or advocate operator inverted multi vessel liquid to gas phase change, I can certainly imagine the entertainment value.

 

[djt17]

Have you considered a heat stick?

I use a heat stick when cold weather forces me indoors; works great with the stove. 1500W + stove = boils 6.5 gal easy.

 

[junior]

You could just split the full volume into two pots Boil both pots and split hop additions then blend the two back together in the fermenter. Kinda be a PITA but I think it would give more consistent results. But keep in mind if you do you are basically doubling the amount of boil off since you now have 2 separate pots and surface areas to boil off from.

+1, this is what I do and get good results.