Recipe scaling

[MaddBaggins]

This probably sounds a bit dumb, but I've always brewed 5g batches. If I want to scale down a recipe to a 1g batch, is it simply divide everything by 5 or is there more to it?
Ive been tasked with doing a solar powered homebrew demonstration next month. The solar rig can boil a gallon in 1 hour. I figure I could scale down a recipe and do it as an extract version.

 

[chickypad]

Yes it really is that simple, although there could be some minor adjustments related to scale such as efficiency, water volumes, etc. I always use software set with my personal settings for batch size, and that helps when scaling, but just dividing is a good starting point.

 

[JordanKnudson]

Yes it really is that simple, although there could be some minor adjustments related to scale such as efficiency, water volumes, etc. I always use software set with my personal settings for batch size, and that helps when scaling, but just dividing is a good starting point.

Yep! As mentioned, there are minor adjustments to get it perfect, but you won't get a noticeably different end result if you let those slide. Particularly with extract, efficiency won't be a problem. Water volumes change based on equipment, and hop quantities vary a bit between different size batches, but if you use a calculator (or the Scale Recipe function on BeerSmith, if you have the program) you can easily account for these minor adjustments. Good luck with the demonstration!

 

[Brewmex41]

You might have slightly different boil off if you're using a different boil kettle and a different heat source like your stove vs a propane burner. But I always scale recipes by building them as 5.5g batches then scaling them to either 3g or 1g depending on what I'm brewing. BrewR for android is what I use and it has a scale function. I usually round off to the nearest whole oz for grain and nearest half gram for hops when I do 1g batches.

 

[MaddBaggins]

Thanks for the info! Sounds like, for the purpose of this demonstration, just dividing by 5 should work fine.
I'll need to get a scale for the hops. I'm sure guys at the LHBS will let me divvy it up at the shop.

This is the recipe I'm going to use. It's my hefeweizen all grain recipe. Very tasty brew. Should be pretty simple as an extract brew. To save time at the demo, I could arrive early to steep the grains or even steep them at home I suppose. It's going to be a small amount of grain once scaled down.

9# Domestic wheat
1.5# Belgian Pale
.5# Belgian Biscuit
1oz German Hallertau Leaf 60min
1oz German Hallertau Leaf 15min
1oz Sorachi Ace Leaf 10min
Safbrew WB-06
mashed at 156 for 60min

 

[chickypad]

Looks like you'd be steeping less than 2 oz of biscuit, I think you can get away with using wheat extract alone. Unless you want to show the steeping process.

 

[JordanKnudson]

I agree with chickypad. You won't be steeping too much grain. However, I would include it in your demonstration anyway. It's easy and it's definitely a good thing for extract brewers to have in their toolkit.

What do you like about the Sorachi Ace in a hefeweizen? I've never actually played with this hop, but the consensus is that it has a lemony character, which would go great with a wheat beer, I would think. How does it interact with the yeast character in a hefe? (I assume that since you like the recipe, it must be in a positive way).

 

[MaddBaggins]

At 10min of boil, the Sorachi leaves a nice lemony smell and a touch of lemon on the finish of the beer. Hefeweizen was the first thing I thought of when I read the description for Sorachi. It works well.
I haven't tried that yeast with any other recipe, but I like how it works in this one. I plan to try some other recipes with it soon.

 

[MaddBaggins]

Looks like you'd be steeping less than 2 oz of biscuit, I think you can get away with using wheat extract alone. Unless you want to show the steeping process.

I'm going to discuss that with the Chair of this event. I need to see what kind of time constraints I might be under. If there is time, I will be steeping some of the Belgian Pale with the Biscuit as part of my specialty grains.

It's for this event. The Chair and I belong to a local Facebook group for Fine Ales. He asked if I would be interested.
http://www.solarguild.org/2014-solar-potluck.html

 

[chickypad]

If you're including the pale malt are you going to get into mashing vs. straight steeping with your audience then? Or maybe is this just for showing the process even though it's a base grain.

Sorachi is very nice in American wheat/rye too, no competing yeast character to hide it.

 

[MaddBaggins]

If you're including the pale malt are you going to get into mashing vs. straight steeping with your audience then? Or maybe is this just for showing the process even though it's a base grain.

Sorachi is very nice in American wheat/rye too, no competing yeast character to hide it.

I will include mashing as a part of the discussion but his demo will be straight steeping. The Pale probably doesn't do much to the overall character of the beer, but I like to have it in there. :cross: