Brewday No.2 - Putting on the big boy pants

[Madhouse]

Hi all,

So my first ever brewday went fine, bottled it on Saturday and all seems and tasted ok - but it was a kit.

So yesterday I put my big boy pants on and did my first AG brew. I learnt a lot!!

I’m very much small batch and aim for about 4L in my FV so you might have to adjust to my measurements.

Firstly, 1.6kg of malt is a lot of volume. I need a new pan! But I did find that the mash went ok and while I hadn’t planned to sparge that’s what I ended up doing to ensure my wort didn’t end up all over the kitchen.

I need more volume in my strike water. I used 5L but could have done with 6 or more, I had to use my emergency boiled and cooled water to top up - as such I missed my OG target.

I need to create myself a brewday checklist as I forgot to add half a protafloc tablet at 15 mins. But as that was all I forgot I can live with that.

Having transferred the wort to the FV it looked like I had a massive amount of trub and I must admit I was a tad concerned, but I remembered a thread on here that said it’ll settle down - it has halved already. Phew.

Overall I think things went ok and my Maple Stout seems to be happy and is fermenting already.

OG is 1.066 (target 1.071), just a month or so until I find out for sure how yesterday went.

 

[keat64]

Nice one.
Although, I'm not sure I could through the AG process for such a small batch.
I'd drink that in one sitting.

 

[Madhouse]

Haha, I’m going for the ‘little & often’ approach with a dash of experimentation for good measure. I’m getting another FV with a wider neck to make FV additions & dry-hopping easier. Bonus to that is the ability to do a weekly (ish) brew and stagger the two.

Needless to say I’m brewing to a higher ABV as there’s no point doing a small batch of sessionable ale.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Looks great!


I've just got mine in the FV, missed my OG by a country mile, not sure why.... Tastes great though but i've added a little bit of sugar to raise the abv a little...

 

[Madhouse]

Quick look at it this morning and the yeast are having a field day - foam’s getting close to the air-lock. Will have another look later as it might need an extra bit of hose.

Is there a proper name for that foam/bubbles?

 

[MmmBeer]

Quick look at it this morning and the yeast are having a field day - foam’s getting close to the air-lock. Will have another look later as it might need an extra bit of hose.

Is there a proper name for that foam/bubbles?

It's called the krausen (pronounced kroyzen). Not surprising that you got a lot of it with a high OG brew in a demijohn, with not much headspace.

I did a couple of one gallon AG brews, but found that for the amount of time it took, it made sense to upgrade to 2.5 gallon batches with a Wliko stockpot and a 15l fermenting bucket.

 

[Madhouse]

Thanks.

Last brew was a kit and it was nowhere near as lively. Forgot to take OG readings with that one but I expect it was much lower. Headspace adjustment is definitely another thing I’ve learnt from this brew.

A bigger stock pot is already on order, could certainly do a bigger brew in it.

While I like the experimentation factor of smaller brews at the moment I can totally see how a bigger batch would be useful when brewing for family events - same time outlay and twice the beer!