Quick Questions on LME / 1st Batch

[djschererjr]

Hi. I am a complete newb taking the plunge into the hobby of home brewing. I have spent a fair amount of time reading and asking others questions regarding the basic process. I read through most of the sticky "Beginner Thread" and checked out a few videos as well, so that is all valuable information. I'll end up studying more prior to pulling the trigger on executing my first batch.

Anyway, the kit I am using for my first brew contains LME and the instructions that come with it call for what apparently amounts to a partial boil (steep specialty grains in 1 gal water, remove grains, add LME and boil for 55 min, add hops near the end, add water to round off to 5 gals before transferring to primary). I think that's the basics. So my questions

1) Would there be anything wrong with simply doing a complete boil (5 gals)? My brew pot is large enough.

2) For full boils, do you guys add water to top off at the end to make up for losses during the boil?

Thanks!

 

[Pie_Man]

Hello and welcome to the forum.

Nothing wrong with a full volume boil, in fact, full volume boils are preferrable.

For full volumes, I start with 6.5 gallons and boil down to about 5.5 gallons, boiling off about a gallon an hour, which is what most brewers do. If you do not have a wort chiller, you will probably want to add top off water to help cool the wort.

 

[IslandLizard]

Welcome to brewing and taking the plunge. Reading this forum is good training.

Don't boil all your LME for an hour, even if you can do a full boil. You'd get more caramelization, darkening, and likely a less fermentable wort. Only boil 1/3 or 1/2 of it for 60 minutes with your bittering hops, adding the rest at flameout.

Speaking of, where are you bittering hops? They're typically added at 60', and they're the only reason we have boil that long when doing extract brews.

If the kit instructions make any hints at fermenting for x number of days then rack to secondary, and bottle after y days, please discard the instructions and read more on how to tell when you're beer is done, and about yeasts' inability to read or acknowledge human schedules. Secondaries are not needed either, generally.

 

[frazier]

I'm concerned about your hop addition - usually, there is a 60 minute addition (at the start of the boil) to provide a suitable bitterness. Depending on the style and recipe, there may or may not be other additions later in the boil (or even after the boil). But it would be strange to not have a 60 minute hop addition.

So - what's the recipe? What hops?

Cheers,

ETA: Yeah, what the lizard said.

 

[flars]

You have never done a full boil before so I would recommend starting with 5 gallons of water. This way you can determine your boil off rate when you add a the measured amount of water to top off to 5 gallons in the fermentor. Boil off rate varies according to the intensity of the boil.

Do you have the means to cool 5 gallons of hot wort? I use an ice bath in the kitchen sink to cool my wort. I can cool a partial boil of three gallons to 70° in 20 minutes at this volume. My top off water then brings the wort down to 56° to 58°.

I add some of the top off water to the carboy before adding the wort. Hot liquid in a glass carboy can stress the glass. Stressed glass can lead to an eventual failure.

 

[djschererjr]

I've attached a link to the instructions. I was looking for something real basic, and I think this one fits the bill. Anyway, there are two hop additions (bittering and finishing, right?) that I did not include in my summary of the instructions.

I do have a wort chiller and plan to use it.

The instructions do mention moving to a secondary fermentor after 7 days. From what I've read here (this thread and others) I don't need to move to a secondary.

Thanks for the replies / help.

Instructions:
http://www.homebrewing.org/assets/images/PDF/AIHrecipes/JonsWickedBrownAle.pdf

 

[KeninMN]

Thank you for providing the instruction. Since you're brewing a brown ale, I'd just add all of your malt extract at the beginning of the boil. Late malt extract additions are more for brews that are lighter colored, although my experience is that it all depends on the malt. I once did a Patersbier extract kit where I added all of the malt extract at the beginning of a partial boil and still yielded a brew that was a very light yellow. I also made the Permafrost India White Ale extract kit from Northern Brewer that turned out amber versus the very light yellow color depicted in the photos on their Web site. And you may or may not adjust the amount of hops you add depending on your taste. Full volume boils increase hop utilization, so adding all of the hops provided with your kit may yield more bitterness than intended. Given the hops used in this kit it may or may not make a difference...