Sunday SMaSH

[Klemay83]

After reading Clibits simple all grain thread (a 100 times) I finally decided to give it a go. Got my Marris Otter mashing at 67.5 deg just now (15 mins in). Gonna use cascade on this beer.

I haven't been blown away by the extract beer I've recently just bottled so I though I would give AG a go!

 

[Johnf]

Welcome to the Darkside.. There is no known cure for whats about to bite...

 

[JapanBrew]

Enjoy. Make some cool beers!!!

 

[Klemay83]

Ok, so all done and in the FV. For the most part it went smoothly. The major Whoopsie was that I didn't have a big enough pot for the boil...luckily I had two 7 litre pots , so I just split the wort between them and did a dual boil. Worked out fine. OG was 1054, I had to top up about a litre and a half after doing my boil to get to 5L. Just used an Ale yeast that was left over from a kit.

I found this brew much more fun to do than the extract/kit style brew I did as my first ever brew a couple of weeks back.

 

[JapanBrew]

AG is they way to go. You get to tweak the flavors and profile that fits your tastes. It's still a good idea to keep a few kg of DME and even LME on hand for backup. I use DME for yeast gathering and starters.
Keep us posted on your brews and recipe ideas.

 

[Klemay83]

It was certainly much cheaper than the kit/extract first brew I did. I also chucked in 1/2 a teaspoon of yeast nutrient to see if it has an effect on the fermentation, but nothing seems to have happened much. Just tried it as an experiment.

 

[Klemay83]

So due to the fact that I'm trying to ferment 5l of wort in a 23l FV, I'm almost 100% sure my batch has gotten infected....

It smells awful and seems to be kind of slimy when I poured a bit into a glass. There has been no krausen at all in nearly a week. So I think it's time to start again!

Lesson learned.... * heads off to buy some more 5L water bottles*

 

[HisDudeness]

Are you sure it's only been 4 days?!

 

[Klemay83]

I was considering leaving it, just incase I'm wrong. I told the guy at my LHBS about it and he said it may well be infected as there is too much headspace above the wort. It definitely smells very sulphur/vinegar like....

 

[MickDundee]

I was considering leaving it, just incase I'm wrong. I told the guy at my LHBS about it and he said it may well be infected as there is too much headspace above the wort. It definitely smells very sulphur/vinegar like....

Are you sure it's not just the smell of the hops, from stray pellets etc making their way into your fermenter?

I did an almost identical SMaSH to yours the day before you did and yesterday (day 4 as well) I was paranoid it was infected - I posted a photo on here and was told it looked like a combination of yeast islands and hop oil so was completely normal. My thread is here: http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=61331

I've got 16L in my fermenter though so less headspace.