GrowleyMonster
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2019
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No solid plans here, just sort of thinking out loud. I have too many variables in flux right now as it is, to make such a huge change in my brewing, I think. Maybe NEXT winter. I brew outside, under the carport, in a corner between two brick walls so usually out of the wind, for the most part, but I can always move my wort out away from the sheltering walls and radiant heat from them. We don't have much of what most of you would think of as a winter season, but it does get sort of cold. Average nightly low temps for selected months are November 53, December 50, January 44, February 48. We might get 4 to 6 nights a year when it touches freezing at night. It makes no-chill brewing seem a lot more do-able with fewer cons in what passes for winter in New Orleans.
My beers are very lightly hopped. I just don't like hoppy beers. For a 5gal batch I typically use an ounce of Cascade boiled 60 minutes and that's it, and I use a spider rather than just dumping hops in the kettle, so I can remove them easily enough right before flameout. I suppose I could also use the hop tea approach and add sterile hoppy water right into the fermenter.
Anyway I am pretty sure I would have pitching temp in the wort in about 6 hours after flame out on a reasonably cold winter night. Maybe less. That kind of makes "no-chill" brewing a lot less unattractive. I could boil late at night and then transfer to fermenter early in the morning. Lots of guys seem to be using a 12 hour or longer natural cooldown with no significant DMS or other issues, mostly just with excess hop conversion, which can be adjusted in the hopping schedule. I don't know if I am just trying to sell myself this idea or not. It is a PITA using the immersion coil chiller. I use a lot of water and can't be bothered to rig a pump and use a closed loop coolant system. The chiller prevents proper covering with the lid. I can't justify a fancy pants stainless all in one brewing system with built in heating and cooling. I don't have time to build a custom solution though I do see a lot of possibilities in hacking a small window AC unit. There's just no free lunch, and no perfect solution that checks all the boxes. But overnight outdoor ambient temperature natural cooling of the hot boiled wort seems like it could be a thing, in the winter. I just bought a Tilt and according to the website, The temperature range of the Tilt is 0°F to 185°F so I could maybe write a python app to alert me when the wort is down to say 76°F and then I could transfer to a fermenter, and pitch.
Thinking about just letting it cool in the covered kettle, and also considering the various bags and PTFE containers that guys are using. This looks intriguing:
https://www.morebeer.com/products/hot-fill-bags-pack-10.html
Your thoughs, O Wise Ones?
My beers are very lightly hopped. I just don't like hoppy beers. For a 5gal batch I typically use an ounce of Cascade boiled 60 minutes and that's it, and I use a spider rather than just dumping hops in the kettle, so I can remove them easily enough right before flameout. I suppose I could also use the hop tea approach and add sterile hoppy water right into the fermenter.
Anyway I am pretty sure I would have pitching temp in the wort in about 6 hours after flame out on a reasonably cold winter night. Maybe less. That kind of makes "no-chill" brewing a lot less unattractive. I could boil late at night and then transfer to fermenter early in the morning. Lots of guys seem to be using a 12 hour or longer natural cooldown with no significant DMS or other issues, mostly just with excess hop conversion, which can be adjusted in the hopping schedule. I don't know if I am just trying to sell myself this idea or not. It is a PITA using the immersion coil chiller. I use a lot of water and can't be bothered to rig a pump and use a closed loop coolant system. The chiller prevents proper covering with the lid. I can't justify a fancy pants stainless all in one brewing system with built in heating and cooling. I don't have time to build a custom solution though I do see a lot of possibilities in hacking a small window AC unit. There's just no free lunch, and no perfect solution that checks all the boxes. But overnight outdoor ambient temperature natural cooling of the hot boiled wort seems like it could be a thing, in the winter. I just bought a Tilt and according to the website, The temperature range of the Tilt is 0°F to 185°F so I could maybe write a python app to alert me when the wort is down to say 76°F and then I could transfer to a fermenter, and pitch.
Thinking about just letting it cool in the covered kettle, and also considering the various bags and PTFE containers that guys are using. This looks intriguing:
https://www.morebeer.com/products/hot-fill-bags-pack-10.html
Your thoughs, O Wise Ones?