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rage-saq posted:20k BTUs is probably on the low end of "just barely able to bring it to a boil" and it will likely take you an hour or more to get there. So...buy something like Prefect Six mentioned a few posts back? From that product's Amazon description, "This powerful, high-pressure outdoor propane stove features a 10-inch cast-iron burner that emits a minimum 210,000 BTUs" - my math skills suck but should that equate to around a 6-minute time to boil? The book I've been reading to ramp myself up on brewing seems to have neglected a lot of hardware-related issues which I would welcome being educated on by anyone looking to expound on the subject of outdoor/dedicated burners.
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Feb 6, 2012 21:54
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wattershed posted:So...buy something like Prefect Six mentioned a few posts back? From that product's Amazon description, "This powerful, high-pressure outdoor propane stove features a 10-inch cast-iron burner that emits a minimum 210,000 BTUs" - my math skills suck but should that equate to around a 6-minute time to boil? Basically anything sold for turkey frying or seafood boils will work. I have a basic Bayou Classic turkey fryer for ~$60 (Also came with a 7 gallon pot, so probably cheaper for just the burner) that gets my 9 gallons of water to mash temp in no more then 15 minutes and to a boil in about 5-10 more minutes.
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Feb 6, 2012 22:47
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Finished 1 extract batch, and getting ready to do a second and I'm already thinking about going all-grain. My wife isn't helping either - she says it's like making Betty Crocker cake mix to not brew all-grain.  What kind of outlay am I looking at to upgrade too All-Grain? Seems like there's a lot of stuff beyond just the mash-tun etc. that you have to get.
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Feb 6, 2012 23:22
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If you have a boil kettle with a run off valve (whatever this is called) you can use that for your mash as well as your boil kettle. That's what we did for my first brew and everything worked out fine. We used coiled copper with cold sink water running through it too cool the wort and it did so quickly with no problems. I think the only thing you'd need is a grain mill.
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Feb 6, 2012 23:25
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Angry Grimace posted:Finished 1 extract batch, and getting ready to do a second and I'm already thinking about going all-grain. Nothing really. That is, if you're willing to brew in a bag. http://vimeo.com/35571624 I did my first all-grain batch this way last weekend and it only cost me a few dollars for a big grain bag. Extra bonus: small batch size means you get to brew more often!
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Feb 6, 2012 23:45
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I did something stupid with my 1 gallon batch of a dry Irish stout, and racked it to secondary after three days. However, I did pitch a whole packet of Lallemand/Danstar Nottingham ale yeast. My OG was 1.036, and after two weeks (11 days after I racked it to secondary) my FG is 1.016, which makes it a very weak beer (2.7%). The recipe I followed didn't list a target OG or FG, but brewtarget says my FG should be around 1.007. Is it worth waiting a bit more to see if the FG comes down at all? I don't want to take too many readings because I only brewed 1 gallon. If the answer is add another packet of yeast I probably wouldn't even bother, as it's another $5 to make 8 or 9 beers.
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Feb 6, 2012 23:47
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wattershed posted:So...buy something like Prefect Six mentioned a few posts back? From that product's Amazon description, "This powerful, high-pressure outdoor propane stove features a 10-inch cast-iron burner that emits a minimum 210,000 BTUs" - my math skills suck but should that equate to around a 6-minute time to boil? Yes buy a KAB6 if you have the budget. The SP10 is also a good lower budget item. I used one of those for a long time but wish I had some KAB6 heads on my brewstand. 6 minute time to boil might be a little fast but you are probably looking at 10 minutes or so and then turning it down a lot to maintain a healthy boil.
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Feb 6, 2012 23:57
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MomJeans420 posted:I did something stupid with my 1 gallon batch of a dry Irish stout, and racked it to secondary after three days. However, I did pitch a whole packet of Lallemand/Danstar Nottingham ale yeast. My OG was 1.036, and after two weeks (11 days after I racked it to secondary) my FG is 1.016, which makes it a very weak beer (2.7%). The recipe I followed didn't list a target OG or FG, but brewtarget says my FG should be around 1.007. The FG seems pretty reasonable for a stout, they don't tend to finish in the single digits. If in doubt give it more time (or take more samples) though, nobody wants bottle bombs. The OG sounds really low but I guess if they were going for a real light session beer it's not out of the question.
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Feb 7, 2012 00:09
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Docjowles posted:The FG seems pretty reasonable for a stout, they don't tend to finish in the single digits. If in doubt give it more time (or take more samples) though, nobody wants bottle bombs. The OG sounds really low but I guess if they were going for a real light session beer it's not out of the question. I'm still trying to get my all grain methods down, which is why I'm doing 1 gallon batches, and probably why the OG was low. Sounds like I'll just have some weak beer to drink.
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Feb 7, 2012 00:59
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rage-saq posted:Yes buy a KAB6 if you have the budget. The SP10 is also a good lower budget item. I used one of those for a long time but wish I had some KAB6 heads on my brewstand. I believe the KAB6 has the same burner as the KAB4, just a bigger stand. Both are 30 PSI jet burners that have the same diameter, but the KAB4 lists it's BTU output whereas the KAB6 doesn't. Pretty sure they're the same burner, which is why I went with the KAB4 since it's cheaper and by the time I can't fit my pot onto the stand that comes with it I hope to have a stand built.
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Feb 7, 2012 00:59
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I just realized I forgot to aerate my most recent wort, most likely due to waiting till the following morning to pitch the starter 
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Feb 7, 2012 01:21
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I had two questions: 1. Is there a particular method of using canned pumpkin for an extract batch that works well? I was trying to put together a recipe that would have pumpkin, cinnamon, brown sugar, etc. From recipes I've seen online, it looks like people do anything from adding the pumpkin right at the beginning of the boil, to adding the pumpkin to the primary. Also, is pumpkin fermentable like fruit? I can't find anything that will tell me how much it would raise the alcohol content. Any recommended recipes that use canned pumpkin? 2. I was reading "How to Brew Beer" and I noticed that half of the recipes involve adding the second half of the malt extract after flameout. I've always just boiled all the extract. It looks like adding less extract at the beginning increases hop utilization, but is there a limit? Is there a downside to adding less malt at the beginning and more during flameout?
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Feb 7, 2012 01:44
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Scottw330 posted:
Hop utilization goes up and SRM goes down when you add extract later in the boil. I vaguely remember reading something about wanting SOME malt extract in there before adding the hops (something about proteins) but it could have been BS, and it probably is to the extent that even if there is some legitimate interaction between hops and malt-water, its effects have been exaggerated like DMS or hot-side aeration. Frankly I've just started to wonder right now if it's even necessary to boil LME/DME at all. Pasteurization is usually cited as the main concern, but like honey - shouldn't it be impossible for either to become "contaminated" (I understand there could be pockets of bacteria around the packaging etc) due to the water ratio? Isn't it realistically impossible for a homebrewer to completely avoid all contamination and good sanitation combined with today's ultra competitive yeast are why these contaminations are usually not perceivable?
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Feb 7, 2012 02:12
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Super Rad posted:Hop utilization goes up and SRM goes down when you add extract later in the boil. Hot break is pretty well agreed upon as needing to go. If you're skeptical about the hops, just try some hop tea and start wondering how anything good ever comes out of hops.
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Feb 7, 2012 02:28
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internet celebrity posted:Nothing really. That is, if you're willing to brew in a bag. http://vimeo.com/35571624 Dang, a bag is all I need to go all-grain? And the downside is only that I gotta keep it to 3gal batches? Sign me up! (Thanks for the link, this video is really interesting and informative even though some of their terminology is going right over my head.)
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Feb 7, 2012 02:34
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Sirotan posted:Dang, a bag is all I need to go all-grain? And the downside is only that I gotta keep it to 3gal batches? Sign me up! Yeah, that video (and the subsequent ~20 Brewing TV videos I watched after) gave me the confidence to make the jump after 2 extract kits. It's a really great primer for anyone who is on the fence about moving to all grain brewing since they walk you through the process from start to finish. The only other downside is you're probably going to get low efficiency but you can pad it out by beefing up the grain bill a bit or using a bit of extract to bump it up.
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Feb 7, 2012 02:41
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internet celebrity posted:The only other downside is you're probably going to get low efficiency but you can pad it out by beefing up the grain bill a bit or using a bit of extract to bump it up. I guess this is the part I didn't understand completely. How would I know how much more to use, is it a fixed percentage and/or would recipes tell me that?
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Feb 7, 2012 02:49
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Brew in a bag is an amazingly cool method. Despite my giant brewstand and pumps and eRIMS and all that ridiculousness, I love doing quick, easy batches. BIAB 5 gallon on just a turkey burner in a 10g pot is ridiculously easy and simple, and it gets even easier and more ridiculously simple when you do no-chill with a Winpak for a fermenter. I did two BIAB no chill batches this winter because it's been horribly rainy weather for a full brewday. It's awesome being done in ~3 hours, and truly 1 pot to clean, no chiller to clean, the entire brewday's worth of water goes into the kettle at the beginning. It rocks. I finish the batch, it goes into the winpak hot and then I go make my yeast starter and pitch the next morning.
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Feb 7, 2012 02:53
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Sirotan posted:I guess this is the part I didn't understand completely. How would I know how much more to use, is it a fixed percentage and/or would recipes tell me that? It's something you'll have to play with a bit and experiment with. For instance, in my brew I came up about 15 points short and I think it's because I had a coarse grind, didn't stir the mash enough (had some ~1" dough balls when I pulled the grain out), and didn't mash long enough. Next time I'll get a fine grind, stir really well, and mash for 75-80 minutes. I might boil a little longer as well because I had about 3.2 gallons instead of 3 when I transferred to the fermenter. But hey, it's all a learning process.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:01
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I could use a little advise - So, we racked our cider to a secondary (it's been in the primary since Oct). We had a bunch of issues with seals on our siphon and a fair amount of air bubbles ended up traveling into the cider. Is there anything we can do to save it? Could we add some fermentables to encourage yeast growth (and therefor O2 use) or is my logic off here? I feel like a bit of an rear end asking the question but I don't want to lose it to oxidization.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:13
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Scottw330 posted:1. Is there a particular method of using canned pumpkin for an extract batch that works well? I had wonderful luck with using canned pumpkin in an extract batch. I put two cans of organic pumpkin in a baking pan covered in aluminum foil and let it bake at 350* for around 40 minutes. I then put it in a fine nylon bag and added it with my grains and did a mini-mash at 151* for one hour. Despite what most people say about using pumpkin, I definitely tasted and smelled it in my beer.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:22
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I learned the hard way last night that some part of the equation of small boil + lots of malt and sugars + heat stick results in scorched flakes of something stuck to the heat stick and a nasty burnt odor. I have two ideas on what happened. The first is that this was a pretty thick boil. It was the Brewer's Best Belgian Tripel kit which had 6.6 lbs of LME, 3 lbs of DME, and a pound of massive sugar crystals in only 2.5 gallons of water, so one possibility is that there was just so much stuff floating around in there that some was bound to settle on the heating coil. The second is that we did not turn off the heat stick while adding hops, so it could just be that. Any thoughts? The heat stick is a 1500 watt water heater element which we've used successfully in addition to the stovetop on two previous brews. Either way, the wort smells normal so we'll see how it goes. It's a lively fermentation, that's for sure. I just got done swapping out the airlock after taking a look and finding it clogged. wolrah fucked around with this message at 03:31 on Feb 7, 2012 |
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Feb 7, 2012 03:28
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Dukket posted:I could use a little advise - So, we racked our cider to a secondary (it's been in the primary since Oct). We had a bunch of issues with seals on our siphon and a fair amount of air bubbles ended up traveling into the cider. Is there anything we can do to save it? Could we add some fermentables to encourage yeast growth (and therefor O2 use) or is my logic off here? I feel like a bit of an rear end asking the question but I don't want to lose it to oxidization. When you say cider do you mean some version of apfelwein or another? I don't see why you don't already have this awesome poo poo in your stomach. But the second half of the question I've been wondering about too so there you go.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:43
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Hypnolobster posted:Brew in a bag is an amazingly cool method. Despite my giant brewstand and pumps and eRIMS and all that ridiculousness, I love doing quick, easy batches. BIAB might just convert me to all-grain with everything I've been hearing about it. What is the largest batch you could brew with BIAB on the stovetop in a 4 gallon pot? (I.e. what I'm using for extract brewing) I know where to find 3 gallon fermenters for maybe 2.5 gallon batches, and I feel like that is a good amount of beer to get in exchange for several hours of work.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:44
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wattershed posted:Indoor cooking question - a 20,000 BTU rangetop burner should be sufficient to reach & maintain a boil of 6 gallons, yes? I've been brewing for a few years on an indoor natural gas stove without any problems until I switched away from my IC. My stove has the full width cast iron grates which makes supporting big pots easy. I started out doing full boil 5 gallon batches on a 13,500BTU burner and it did take a long time to get to boil. I eventually got a 15 gallon megapot which spans a 13,500btu burner, a 5,000 btu burner and a 8,000btu burner on the same stove and have no trouble with 5 gallon batches fairly quickly. I've done a couple of 10 gallon batches too but it takes quite a long time to reach the boil. Once it's boiling there are no problems keeping 13+ gallons at a solid boil. Recirculation is where I've been having problems. I've been accumulating parts for a single tier stand and have my recirculation/chilling/pump setup complete. Even with a 5 gallon batch the stove doesn't have enough power to keep the boil going with the pump on and the wort going through the chiller and whirlpooling. If I start recirculation with 20 minutes to go in the boil it barely gets back to boiling by the scheduled knockout time. This has been really screwing up my hop and boiloff calculations since I've had to add time to make sure the chiller/pump/hoses are boiled sufficiently. Motivation to get the stand completed I suppose...
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Feb 7, 2012 03:47
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Sirotan posted:I guess this is the part I didn't understand completely. How would I know how much more to use, is it a fixed percentage and/or would recipes tell me that? I've only done three batches so far so anyone can correct me if I'm getting something wrong. I skipped any extract batches and went straight to all-grain with biab. I did a lot of reading first and from what I can tell the efficiencies you get with biab are perfectly reasonable and even just as good as other methods. Each method has plenty of reasons to get poor efficiency, and figuring out what efficiency YOU can get is the key to planning your recipes. And if you feel you need/want to get better efficiency, then you can troubleshoot. Technically it doesn't really matter what efficiencyies you get, the trick is to get a consistent system so you can accurately predict what you need for a recipe. So initially you might have to estimate based on what other people get. Then you do a few batches and take careful measurements, and you will figure out how your setup works. Then you can adjust the values in your spreadsheet, Brewsmith, Brewtarget or whatever software you might be using to calculate recipes. After my first two batches I found the grain was absorbing quite a bit more than I expected, adjusted it for my third batch and all my volumes and gravities were right on. The Biabrewer forum is where I did most of my reading, they have a spreadsheet for calculating batches.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:48
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All grain sounds intimidating and it is more involved, but it is definitely the right move to make. I'm on AG batch number 8 at the moment (bottled tonight) and although the learning curve is high, you can make good beer. I missed my target FG bc I mashed too high by about 3*, but the beer is still delicious and I learned from my mistakes. The leap in equipment isn't huge if you can get your hands on a cooler. Early Papazian books advocated making a mash tun by stacking two buckets, with the upper having holes drilled in the bottom. You can improvise and make decent beer.
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Feb 7, 2012 03:54
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internet celebrity posted:It's something you'll have to play with a bit and experiment with. For instance, in my brew I came up about 15 points short and I think it's because I had a coarse grind, didn't stir the mash enough (had some ~1" dough balls when I pulled the grain out), and didn't mash long enough. Next time I'll get a fine grind, stir really well, and mash for 75-80 minutes. I might boil a little longer as well because I had about 3.2 gallons instead of 3 when I transferred to the fermenter. But hey, it's all a learning process. Guess I'm gonna need a bigger brew pot.... drat there are way too many options out there. And if I get a giant pot I am probably gonna need to finally get a wort chiller. And and and..... Scope creep. quantegy posted:The Biabrewer forum is where I did most of my reading, they have a spreadsheet for calculating batches. Thanks, will be checking this out. Sirotan fucked around with this message at 04:04 on Feb 7, 2012 |
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Feb 7, 2012 03:59
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Darth Goku Jr posted:When you say cider do you mean some version of apfelwein or another? I don't see why you don't already have this awesome poo poo in your stomach. But the second half of the question I've been wondering about too so there you go. I mean five gallons of cold pasteurized apple cider (from Grand Rapids, MI) poured into a carboy with a bunch of brown sugar and some Champagne yeast. We tasted some when we racked it and it was not great, but I'm willing to wait it out. I figure I'm not going a specific flavor (yet), just a dry cider, so what's there to lose.
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Feb 7, 2012 04:03
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Scottw330 posted:BIAB might just convert me to all-grain with everything I've been hearing about it. What is the largest batch you could brew with BIAB on the stovetop in a 4 gallon pot? (I.e. what I'm using for extract brewing) I know where to find 3 gallon fermenters for maybe 2.5 gallon batches, and I feel like that is a good amount of beer to get in exchange for several hours of work. You could make it a 5 gallon batch pretty easily by adding extract near the end and then diluting into the fermenter, too. Dukket posted:I mean five gallons of cold pasteurized apple cider (from Grand Rapids, MI) poured into a carboy with a bunch of brown sugar and some Champagne yeast. We tasted some when we racked it and it was not great, but I'm willing to wait it out. Cider generally takes a very long time to condition and develop some acceptable flavor, doubly so if you didn't use any yeast nutrient (yeast sort of hate cider, nutrient sort of helps). It also will more than likely not taste quite like what most people think cider tastes like if you're used to drinking easily available commercial ciders. It will probably end up very very tart and dry. Hypnolobster fucked around with this message at 04:10 on Feb 7, 2012 |
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Feb 7, 2012 04:06
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^^^ Gonna keep this in mind when I first try my New-brew. Jacobey000 posted:I found that buying Trader Joe's 6 packs is a cheap and easy way of getting bottles. The beer is 'decent.' And for clarification, I'm looking to make sure my cider is flat before bottling, so if all goes well I won't have to worry about bottle bursts. But I'm new at this, so all the bottles are going in a rubbermaid tote once sealed. Gonna try some more simple-type stuff before I try anything as complex as decent beer.
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Feb 7, 2012 04:20
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LeeMajors posted:All grain sounds intimidating and it is more involved, but it is definitely the right move to make. Definitely agree with this if you're at the point where you think you love the hobby. All grain sounds intimidating but it really isn't at all, it's just your steeping grains step on a much bigger scale. I'm a learn by doing guy; I read the all-grain sections of How To Brew 20 times and didn't know what the gently caress. Watched someone brew all-grain in person once and I got it. Most people make all-grain out to be harder than it is. wolrah posted:Any thoughts? The heat stick is a 1500 watt water heater element which we've used successfully in addition to the stovetop on two previous brews. Yeah you probably just burned the poo poo out of your wort. But don't worry, you will still produce booze! Sugar and yeast really, really wants to become beer. It might taste too dark or downright burnt but it will work out fine.
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Feb 7, 2012 05:43
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Midorka posted:I think the only thing you'd need is a grain mill. And you don't even need that if your shop has a mill.
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Feb 7, 2012 06:49
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LeeMajors posted:All grain sounds intimidating and it is more involved, but it is definitely the right move to make. It's amazing how quickly I'm accumulating *stuff* after only 2 batches. Luckily nothing too expensive and I'm letting a friend brew using my stuff too so it's less of a money sink on stuff I don't use. I suppose I need a bigger pot than the one I have - how big of a pot do I need for 5 gallon batches?
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Feb 7, 2012 07:00
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Angry Grimace posted:how big of a pot do I need for 5 gallon batches? 1.5 to 2x your batch size. 1.5x will limit you on bigger beers, but is workable for most things up to 1.075 or so. For Imperial Stouts, barleywines, and other very strong beers, you'll either have to upgrade to 2x your batch size or add other fermentables. I brew ten-gallon batches in 15-gallon vessels, and about once a year I think that I should upgrade to a 20-gallon boiler and mashtun. The rest of the year I feel satisfied with the size of my equipment, though.
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Feb 7, 2012 07:14
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Jo3sh posted:1.5 to 2x your batch size. 1.5x will limit you on bigger beers, but is workable for most things up to 1.075 or so. For Imperial Stouts, barleywines, and other very strong beers, you'll either have to upgrade to 2x your batch size or add other fermentables. Possibly dumb question - what's with the ball valves on some of these kettles I'm seeing? Do you just like hook up some vinyl tubing to it to get the wort to the fermenter or are they for some other purpose? Angry Grimace fucked around with this message at 07:29 on Feb 7, 2012 |
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Feb 7, 2012 07:24
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Picking up and pouring 50-100 pounds of boiling liquid is a bad idea. Ball valves make it much easier and safer to move wort around. Inside the pot, they will have various fittings (false bottoms, dip tubes, screens) to manage what you are picking up vs. leaving behind. On the outside, they will have hose barbs or other attachment points for hoses.
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Feb 7, 2012 07:30
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If you don't want to spend the money on a ball valve on a kettle, you can also just rack into the fermenter with an autosiphon after you've chilled.
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Feb 7, 2012 07:31
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Hypnolobster posted:Cider generally takes a very long time to condition and develop some acceptable flavor, doubly so if you didn't use any yeast nutrient (yeast sort of hate cider, nutrient sort of helps). I'm ready to let it go for eight plus months (its been since Oct so far), it was pretty tart when we tried it. I'm not trying to replicate Woodchuck or anything like that, I'm hoping for a dry cider that isn't quite as tart as what I have. Also, I don't like how many ciders taste like apple juice - many, though not all of the Crispens have this problem. I did not use nutrient, I'll keep that in mind for next time. But at this point my real question is: Dukket posted:
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Feb 7, 2012 14:42
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Jo3sh posted:The rest of the year I feel satisfied with the size of my equipment, though. 
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Feb 7, 2012 15:36
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