Unusual Brewing Circumstances

[Ilan34]

I was thinking the other day about how much my process has changed in the last year of brewing and it occurred to me that most might consider how I brew to be fairly unusual. .. or not. I'd love to hear under what unusual circumstances you guys brew, whether it be the norm for you or just a one time crazy thing.

Here's the highlights of how I probably differ from the typical homebrewer:

I started out on all grain.

I brew 2.5 gallon batches.

I do BIAB.

I hit my mash temp and then put the kettle in an oven that's been preheated to 170.

I do an overnight mash. I started doing this six batches ago so that I can keep brewing regularly (every two weeks) and keep SWMBO from feeling like an entire day gets eaten up. I start heating the water at nine pm. After I squeeze the bag, I'll heat the wort to 190, denaturing the enzymes, and put it in the oven (again preheated to 170) usually around 12:30. At 6:30 the next morning, I'm out there ready to go. I'll be done by ten am. The day is saved!

I do a split boil because I brew on an electric stove. I use fermcap and am armed with a spoon and spray bottle so I can fill both two gallon pots to 95% capacity. I pre-divide all ingredients.

Finally, I do all this within an apartment that is in a dormitory of a private high school for girls. SWMBO works as residential faculty, and they give us housing. None of the girls know I brew, although all the telltale signs are there. Sometimes, the girls can even see into our kitchen while I'm mashing in. I keep all my equipment in a hall closet that's located immediately adjacent to several dorm rooms, so I'm always surreptitiously hauling equipment to and fro. My ferm chamber is covered with a tapestry and picture frames.

One big advantage is we live right above the dining hall, so I'll take the elevator down to the kitchen to grab two buckets of ice for wort chilling.

Whatchoo guys got?

 

[Ilan34]

Monday morning bump!

 

[mtnagel]

You are weird!

I do BIAB and I also have done 2.5 gal batches (but still using 10 gal pot and propane burner outdoor), but that is where our similarities end. If your method works, keep being weird!

 

[Hello]

Sounds more like a total pain in the rear to me but then again, I don't brew all grain yet. You gotta do whatever works for you though. It doesn't sound like you're miserable or anything so I say keep doing you!

 

[Mattyc88]

I was thinking the other day about how much my process has changed in the last year of brewing and it occurred to me that most might consider how I brew to be fairly unusual. .. or not. I'd love to hear under what unusual circumstances you guys brew, whether it be the norm for you or just a one time crazy thing.

Here's the highlights of how I probably differ from the typical homebrewer:

I started out on all grain.

I brew 2.5 gallon batches.

I do BIAB.

I hit my mash temp and then put the kettle in an oven that's been preheated to 170.

I do an overnight mash. I started doing this six batches ago so that I can keep brewing regularly (every two weeks) and keep SWMBO from feeling like an entire day gets eaten up. I start heating the water at nine pm. After I squeeze the bag, I'll heat the wort to 190, denaturing the enzymes, and put it in the oven (again preheated to 170) usually around 12:30. At 6:30 the next morning, I'm out there ready to go. I'll be done by ten am. The day is saved!

I do a split boil because I brew on an electric stove. I use fermcap and am armed with a spoon and spray bottle so I can fill both two gallon pots to 95% capacity. I pre-divide all ingredients.

Finally, I do all this within an apartment that is in a dormitory of a private high school for girls. SWMBO works as residential faculty, and they give us housing. None of the girls know I brew, although all the telltale signs are there. Sometimes, the girls can even see into our kitchen while I'm mashing in. I keep all my equipment in a hall closet that's located immediately adjacent to several dorm rooms, so I'm always surreptitiously hauling equipment to and fro. My ferm chamber is covered with a tapestry and picture frames.

One big advantage is we live right above the dining hall, so I'll take the elevator down to the kitchen to grab two buckets of ice for wort chilling.

Whatchoo guys got?

This is crazy ! If it works, it works though. It sounds like it is more time consuming, if you're only doing 2.5 gallon batches it shouldn't take all day. I can 5 gallon BIAB batches and from start to finish clean up is 3-4 hours total. If I got up and started when you do, 6:30 i'd be done by 10:30 with clean up etc and beer in fermentation chamber ready to go.

 

[brewguyver]

The first half isn't so weird - many of my friends in your situation do 1-3 gallon biab bathes. The rest is odd, but if it's consistent, good for you!

How much active time do you spend all together on the process?

 

[Ilan34]

Ha! It's funny because aside from brewing in a high school, almost everything about my process is completely different from when I started. It was such a slow evolution, though, that it felt like a natural logical progression. I've done 27 batches since March, and every brew has been different in some way from the last brew, be it a big or small change.

 

[brewguyver]

Ha! It's funny because aside from brewing in a high school, almost everything about my process is completely different from when I started. It was such a slow evolution, though, that it felt like a natural logical progression. I've done 27 batches since March, and every brew has been different in some way from the last brew, be it a big or small change.

Lol - I'm that way too. Need to get mine dialed in. Those small changes cause me a lot of unnecessary pain an suffering.

 

[Ilan34]

I should probably mention that we have a very active 20 month old daughter. That's a big part of why I've split up the brew day. I've found it to be more relaxing, actually. No rush to clean and get ingredients ready - I can have a few beers and not worry about messing up the rest of the batch. In the morning, I make a pot of coffee. SWMBO hardly feels the impact of a brew day now.

It does take me longer, technically, to do it this way because I have to heat up to 190 after the mash. But it feels like less time. Before I began overnight mashing, my brew day was about six hours. A large part of that is the fault of my electric stove. It's not very powerful so getting up to temp takes a while. It also takes me about 35 minutes to chill down to 60 degrees.

I guess it is a pretty unusual process after all, but I did a ton of research on all of it and it works! Someone's got to be able to top it, though.

 

[brewguyver]

Most of my brew day is if the "I pick things up, I put zem down" variety. That and yelling "hey honey, where did I put the <critical small brewing part>, and trying to explain why I had another 16 hour brew day. I also tend to mash in, realize i have a bunch of errands, and come back to finish 4 hours later. Last time I tried to not hold my mash manifold together with copper wire and it completely separated.

All this has gotten me approval to go full electric...assuming we can move to a new house first.

So while many people do crazy things, I think you're one of the few that does it well! Very cool.

 

[Transamguy77]

Kudos to you man, that is pretty impressive. I keep all my brewing stuff on the second floor of my house and have to lug it all up and down before and after and it gets heavy by the end of the day. I would say 2hrs of my brew day are just setting up and taking down.