Re-intro to Extract brewing questions (long)

pcollins · Mar 21, 2010

Hi all.

A bit of background so you know these questions aren't completely ignorant. LOL

I was last brewing regularly at home about 8-10 years ago and have come back to it in the last few weeks with a simple IPA recipe that I resurrected from my brew book. I bottled it today and all has gone well throughout the process.

In the last year and half and before returning to homebrewing I was working as a brewer's assistant at our local brewery (Grand River Brewing). All grain brewing on a commercial scale--albeit a very small commercial scale: 25hL/batch. I also took the concise course for brewing from Siebel during that time.

I have been amazed at the changes to the homebrewing world since I left it 8 or so years ago. The rise in popularity of dry yeast, knowledge of techniques, online community and the vast sharing that goes along with that. Just astounding!

That said, there are some things that I'm struggling to figure out and was wondering if you could help me with some answers:

Cold crash: I'm bottling my beer, not kegging. If I spend a week or so in primary, 2 weeks in secondary and cold crash before bottling will there be enough yeast in suspension to condition in bottle? Is cold crashing with bottle conditioning really going to make that much of a difference in the clarity of the final beer without filtering?

Flame out: Never heard this term before. I'm assuming that it's at the end of the boil after the heat/gas is turned off. I'm reading that people are adding hops after flame out, what is the advantage of this? Anything else I should know about flame out?

Late extract addition: Again, what is the point of this? Is this only a late DME addition or can one add LME as well?

Steep small, boil large: Advantages? I was steeping in the boil kettle from cold for about 20-25 minutes and adding LME at the boil. If I'm steeping small and boiling large, am I adding the small amount of steeped liquid to the boil kettle at the same time as the LME?

If you've made it this far in the post, thank you! I appreciate your time and look forward to hearing the varied responses from everybody. Oh yes, despite the nature of the post I am a FIRM believer in RDWHAHB.

JVD · Mar 21, 2010

You could still cold crash and have enough yeast to carb up your bottles.But if you let them carb up then refrigerate for a week you are cold crashing (in the bottle) any way.Cold crashing in the secondary would keep a little more yeast out of your bottles though................Yes flameout hop additions are once the burner is off.They add very little to no IBU's(depending on how fast you cool your wort)but it adds lots of hop flavor and aroma.( mainly aroma).............Late extract additions will make your extract beers a little lighter in color and they will taste better.( No extract twang)........Any method of steeping your specialty grains will likely give good results as long as your at 154 f or so for 30-60 min.........And a full sized boil gets you better hop utilization than a smaller boil.But many people get away with say a 3 gal. boil then add top up water to the fermenter after cooling with good results.But if you can boil the whole batch at once I would recommend it.!.

Tlylebrew · Mar 21, 2010

Lets see if I can help:

1. Cold Crashing will leave enough yeast for you to bottle condition, or so I am told, never tried this myself.

2. Flame out - Is the point at which you turn off the flame, just as it sounds. The advantage of adding hops at flame out is aroma vs bitterness.

3. Late Extract additions: Usually done to prevent further carmelization of the malt, can allow you to acheive a lighter overall appearance to the beer vs 60 minutes of boiling. DME or LME can be a late extract addition.

4. I don't know if there are any advantages to steeping small, but a full five gallon boil definately results in better tasting beer. I steep and boil with 6.5 gallons to start for a five gallon batch. Steeping is done prior to adding LME or DME.

Hope I answered correctly, if not I am sure someone will correct me. Good luck!

JiveTurkey · Mar 22, 2010

Tlylebrew said:
3. Late Extract additions: Usually done to prevent further carmelization of the malt, can allow you to acheive a lighter overall appearance to the beer vs 60 minutes of boiling. DME or LME can be a late extract addition.

Something else late add is for: When partial boiling, if you put all the extract in, then the wort is much denser than it would be with a full boil. In denser wort, it takes more hops to get the same IBUs. So, if you wait to add some of the extract immediately after the boil, you should get similar IBUs as if you'd done a full boil with all the extract using the same amount of hops. (There is, however, a limit to IBUs based on the boil volume, so for high-IBU brews, the bigger the boil, the better.) Beersmith is a good program to calculate IBUs based on boil size and other factors.

goose1873 · Mar 22, 2010

JiveTurkey said:
Something else late add is for: When partial boiling, if you put all the extract in, then the wort is much denser than it would be with a full boil. In denser wort, it takes more hops to get the same IBUs. So, if you wait to add some of the extract immediately after the boil, you should get similar IBUs as if you'd done a full boil with all the extract using the same amount of hops. (There is, however, a limit to IBUs based on the boil volume, so for high-IBU brews, the bigger the boil, the better.) Beersmith is a good program to calculate IBUs based on boil size and other factors.

exactly...also "They" have found that a secondary is completely unnecessary...the yeast cake has no negative effects on the beer! I recommend 3 weeks in a primary fermenter then keg/bottle. even dry-hopping can be done in the last 7-10 days in the primary...

I used to be a wine guy so losing the secondary (and all racking) took a little to get used to

ChrisS68 · Mar 22, 2010

goose1873 said:
exactly...also "They" have found that a secondary is completely unnecessary...the yeast cake has no negative effects on the beer! I recommend 3 weeks in a primary fermenter then keg/bottle. even dry-hopping can be done in the last 7-10 days in the primary...

I used to be a wine guy so losing the secondary (and all racking) took a little to get used to

"They" wouldn't include me.

I'm a firm believer in secondaries, but thats just me...