TheRedDarren
Landlord.
- Joined
- May 14, 2015
- Messages
- 1,192
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Hey guys,
I recently bought an http://www.the-home-brew-shop.co.uk/acatalog/Deluxe-All-Grain-Mashing-Setup.html#.VVpFm5Oul1Qall grain brewing kit from The Homebrew shop, and fair play to them it arrived less than twenty four hours later, all nice and shiney!
So, I've never brewed anything before, but I recently picked up a homebrew book quite randomly and read that you can brew from grains, this is right up my street so I thought I'd give it a go. Half a million youtube videos later and a joint 40th birthday pressie from my family and ba da bing!
Using Brewmate to calculate a few details like total liquor volume and strike water temp and we're off!
Transferring liquor to the mash tun.
http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=1624&stc=1&d=1431981862
I think I got a bit of the info I typed into Brewmate wrong as it told me to heat water to 71c for a mash temp of 66c but it ended up with an initial mash temp of 62c which was far too cool so I added 1l of boiling from the kettle and checked again - 64c so one more litre of boiling got me to 66c. No problem.
Then leave it for 90 minutes to mash.
I might get myself some iodine so I can check saccharification progress, just out of interest really...
Once 90 mins was up I made sure I had enough sparge water heated up to 82 ish and started my first runnings, a lot of info I had already gathered had said to run off few 100mls until it runs clear, return the unclear wort to the tun and run clear stuff off into a collection vessel, well, I had to run off about 2l before it was nice and clear. I had to batch sparge as I don't yet have a sparge arm, but I think it worked out ok, I recharged the mash tun with another 10l and stirred gently and let it sit for about 10 mins before starting the second runnings.
Again, I had to draw off two litres before I was happy and returned it to the tun.
I did three batches in all.
Lovely clear wort, Tastes nice too!
Back into the boiler and start the 90 minute boil.
The kit only came with bittering hops so they went in at the point where it came to a full rolling boil.
The wort chiller that came with the kit worked brilliantly and brought the temp down from 100c to 25c in about 25/30 minutes.
Time to run off into the FV and pitch the yeast. I took a gravity reading of 1042 (target was 1038) so I was a bit off there, then once I'd run it off into the FV I found I only had 19l instead of 23l so I guess thats why the OG was a bit high, I should have topped up with another 4l to hit the marks but didn't think of it until later, but I'm sure it'll be ok, just a bit stronger right?
Only about 6 hours later I heard the first bubble through the airlock and its away! It's currently bubbling like crazy and has a massive yeast head on it1
So thats its so far, I think its been a success... time will tell for sure.
But I found it all very straight forward and very do-able. If you're thinking about trying the all grain route just go for it! I have never brewed anything before and it was fine for me, so surely anyone can do it!
I recently bought an http://www.the-home-brew-shop.co.uk/acatalog/Deluxe-All-Grain-Mashing-Setup.html#.VVpFm5Oul1Qall grain brewing kit from The Homebrew shop, and fair play to them it arrived less than twenty four hours later, all nice and shiney!
So, I've never brewed anything before, but I recently picked up a homebrew book quite randomly and read that you can brew from grains, this is right up my street so I thought I'd give it a go. Half a million youtube videos later and a joint 40th birthday pressie from my family and ba da bing!
Using Brewmate to calculate a few details like total liquor volume and strike water temp and we're off!
Transferring liquor to the mash tun.
http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/attachment.php?attachmentid=1624&stc=1&d=1431981862
I think I got a bit of the info I typed into Brewmate wrong as it told me to heat water to 71c for a mash temp of 66c but it ended up with an initial mash temp of 62c which was far too cool so I added 1l of boiling from the kettle and checked again - 64c so one more litre of boiling got me to 66c. No problem.
Then leave it for 90 minutes to mash.
I might get myself some iodine so I can check saccharification progress, just out of interest really...
Once 90 mins was up I made sure I had enough sparge water heated up to 82 ish and started my first runnings, a lot of info I had already gathered had said to run off few 100mls until it runs clear, return the unclear wort to the tun and run clear stuff off into a collection vessel, well, I had to run off about 2l before it was nice and clear. I had to batch sparge as I don't yet have a sparge arm, but I think it worked out ok, I recharged the mash tun with another 10l and stirred gently and let it sit for about 10 mins before starting the second runnings.
Again, I had to draw off two litres before I was happy and returned it to the tun.
I did three batches in all.
Lovely clear wort, Tastes nice too!
Back into the boiler and start the 90 minute boil.
The kit only came with bittering hops so they went in at the point where it came to a full rolling boil.
The wort chiller that came with the kit worked brilliantly and brought the temp down from 100c to 25c in about 25/30 minutes.
Time to run off into the FV and pitch the yeast. I took a gravity reading of 1042 (target was 1038) so I was a bit off there, then once I'd run it off into the FV I found I only had 19l instead of 23l so I guess thats why the OG was a bit high, I should have topped up with another 4l to hit the marks but didn't think of it until later, but I'm sure it'll be ok, just a bit stronger right?
Only about 6 hours later I heard the first bubble through the airlock and its away! It's currently bubbling like crazy and has a massive yeast head on it1
So thats its so far, I think its been a success... time will tell for sure.
But I found it all very straight forward and very do-able. If you're thinking about trying the all grain route just go for it! I have never brewed anything before and it was fine for me, so surely anyone can do it!
