My first post of going all-grain outlined the process of building your newest piece of brewing equipment, the mash-tun. For the second part of this series I will outline the basics of how I setup to mash, calculate strike water temps and combining it all together to start mashing.

For this process we’ll need to start with a basic recipe. Lets look at the grist (grain bill) for my ESB:

14.5 lbs English 2-row Pale
1.0 lbs Crystal Malt 40°L
1.0 lbs Victory® Malt
3.0 oz Chocolate Malt

In this recipe, there is 16.8 pounds of grain to be mashed. I crush them all with my corona mill and store it in a large bin until I am ready. Typically, I crush my grain no earlier than the night before. Too much earlier and that may promote staling of the grains once the husk has been broken open during the crush. Now that we have a recipe and a bin full of crushed grain we need to think about amounts of water and the balance between mash temp and strike temp.

Mash Temperatures:

Mash temp is the final temperature you want the final mash to be at once all your water and grains are combined. An average middle of the road mash temp is 154F. When first getting accustomed to the mashing process and how your individual equipment works I strongly recommend dong all your mashes at this temp. Once you get comfortable with being able to hit that mash temp each time you brew, then it becomes easier to adjust it to suit your needs, depending on style and tastes. If you brew a Stout then a pilsner then a brown ale then a Tripel, and try to adjust your mash temp every time I think that leads to a lot of missed mash temps, and a lot of discouraging results. So trust me on this one. Plan your first three all-grain brews to either be the same beer or styles that will let you get away with the same 154F mash temp (i.e. ESB, IPA, Browns, APA, bitters etc).

I like to mash with a thickness of 1qt/lb. I have seen a lot of recipes, sites and books that use 1.25qt/lb as the average thickness. I find that for my cooler set up, 1:1 ratio give me a loose oatmeal like mash, which is what you want. Also, if I miss my mash temp I can always add some more water that brings the mash to 1.25:1, and keeps me from thinning the mash too much.

There are many calculators on line to calculate the temp of your strike water. Strike water refers to the temperature that you need to heat up the water above the mash temp in order to achieve the desired mash temp. I use this site from the Green Bay Rackers. You need to know what the temperature of your grain is (generally the ambient temp of your storage location). Just fill in the weight of the grain, the thickness and temp of the grain; the calculator does the rest.

In my example recipe at 1:1 ratio, 16.8 lbs of grain would call for 16.8 quarts of water or 4.2 gallons. In my process, I would measure out 4.5 gallons and start heating it up on my burner. I keep a thermometer in the water and check it regularly. I stir the water I get close to strike temp to be sure its consistent throughout the water.

Combining water and grain:

After the water is at strike temp, I use a one-gallon pitcher to start transferring the hot water into the empty mash tun (with the SS hose-braid already installed). After the first couple gallons are in, I then lift up the pot heating the water and dump the rest in. Once all the water is in I quickly start adding grain. I add about a third of it at a time, and stir well to prevent little dough balls of grain from developing. I try to move quickly so I don’t loose too much of the heat from the water. As I am stirring in that last third of grain, I will put one of my thermometers in the mash. After closing the lid, I wait 5 minutes or so to let the temperature equilibrate, then I open the tun and check the status.

If my mash temp is within 1-2 degrees of what I wanted I don’t try to change it. It seems like too much effort. I do however usually put one gallon of water on the burner to start boiling. That way I have 1 gallon of super hot water that I can add if my mash temp was 5 degrees or so less than I wanted. A quick small infusion will usually get me back to where I want it. As small infusion of cold water works too, as long as the water is fairly cold, so as to not need to overly thin the mash.

I then close the lid, and cover it with a few towels. The lack of insulation in the lid can allow a lot of heat to escape out the top even with the lid closed. I find that two old towels folded in half do a great job insulating the lid.

Then the mash sits for 60 minutes until it time to sparge.

To get the sweet wort out of the tun I use a batch sparging approach. I find this is relatively quick and I get pretty good efficiency (generally >70%).

In part three of this series, I’ll cover clarifying the wort with recirculation, draining the tun and adding sparge water. Also, I’ll show how I monitor the progress of extraction by using a refractometer to get quick and easy readings while I sparge.

If you follow the posts here you know that John and I won a couple awards with our beers at the NERHC.  While winning ribbons is nice, my motivation for competition is to get unbiased opinions about my beers from experienced judges.  I wanted to review one of my scoresheets and discuss some changes to make according to how the judges commented on a beer.

 For this post I want to review my scoresheets from the Oatmeal Stout I submitted.  I posted my current “in progress” recipe on the site a while back.  Now I want to make some notes to change a few things.

First off this beer scored a 36 out of 50.  This beer scored the highest out of the five beers that I sumitted. A score of 36 is falls in the Very Good designation (30-37) according to BJCP.  There were three judges scoring in this category.  The main points from the judges comments that I want to focus on for recipe changes are:

• Low Roast character
• Ester like profile in the aroma and flavor, possibly too sweet for style or unbalanced
• Low hop bitterness and flavor

Roast issues:  I was a little gun shy when putting the recipe together originally with the black malt and the roasted barley.  I felt that the chocolate malt was a bit too strong.  So to change this I would back off the chocolate a bit and change it to 0.5lbs from the 0.75lbs. Subsequently, I would raise the roasted barley and the black patent too 0.75lbs each.  This should also darken the beer a bit more too as one judge had listed the color as dark brown, where I really would prefer an opaque black color.

Ester and sweetness issues:  This was the first time I used WY1084 Irish ale yeast. It was an experiment and I would prefer to use my standard WLP002 English Ale yeast.  While the english ale yeast does produce esters I am personally much more comfortable with how that yeast performs.  Using too high a fermentation temp can lead to excess ester production, but I fermented that beer at a solid 68F so I don’t think fermentation temps led to the estery nature in this case.  I’ll switch the yeast back to WLP002 and ferment at 68F again.  I also used a 0.25lb of Crystal 120L.  I would consider lowering this as it can give you that raisiny sweet like flavor.  But if I am going to up the black malt I think that keeping the crystal 120L where it as a measure against the black malt bitterness becoming too strong.

Bitterness:  Personally I don’t like hop flavor in my Stouts, at least not in this style which is more of an English style.  However for bitterness I would agree with the judges here that with this much malt complexity and a bigger body more bitterness may help with the balance.  Knowing that the black malt and roasted barley are going to be higher that may compensate for some of the lacking bitterness, so I think I’ll either have to find some 5%AA EKG hops or just up the amount of my 4%AA EKG to 3oz from 2.5oz.

So the new recipe would look like this:
(For 7 gallons)
12lb Marris Otter malt
1lb wheat malt
1.5lbs flaked oats (quaker whole oats)
0.5lb rice hulls
0.75lb Crystal 40L
0.25lb Crystal 120L
0.5lb Chocolate Malt
0.75lb Black Patent
0.75lb Roast Barely

3.0oz EKG (4% AA, pellets) -60 minute boil
1.0oz EKG (4%AA, pellets) -30 minute boil

Mash at 156F (up from 154F to increase the body a bit more too).

Hopefully I can brew this one up soon while its fresh in my head and I still have some of the last batch in the keg for comparison.
Next time, I review the silver medal winner 60/- Scottish Ale.

I have a copy of the Zymurgy “Best Articles” book. It’s sort of like a greatest hits album of all the articles from Zymurgy. (For those who are unfamiliar with this publication, it’s the magazine that accompanies your membership to the AHA) It’s a little dated (published in 1998) but there are a few good reads in there, including the one on hot side aeration

I read an article last night written by the late George Fix about hot side aeration (HSA). HSA is the introduction of oxygen (in the form of air) into your hot wort. The presence of excess O2 in your hot wort leads to the oxidation of melanoidins in your wort. These oxidized molecules contribute to staling in your beer post packaging. The more of these there are the sooner your beer will become stale.

I have never worried too much about HSA because: 1. I don’t stir my wort much post boil. 2. I chill with an immersion wort chiller prior to racking the wort to my fermentor.

I always thought the biggest chance of HSA was during these later stages of wort handling, and when the wort is super hot still, i.e. above mash temps. However, Fix states that he believes that HSA happens at temperatures starting at around 86F!

86F!!!!!

His article warns about over-stirring your mash, splashing the runoff too much, and over- stirring the wort during boiling (at least I already knew that was bad). I know there is a lot of debate about HSA and whether it really happens with much ease or if you really need to work to get it to be a problem. Personal experience tells me that my process is not harmed much by HSA because I don’t really have much staling in my beers. At least I don’t think I do…

On the other hand, I will tell you something about my process that has me concerned now that I have read this HSA article. I am a batch sparger as I have said in previous posts. I collect my wort in white buckets as I run off from the mash tun. I have my kettle sitting up on my propane burner when I start. I transfer the wort from the bucket to the kettle by simply pouring it into the kettle…. It splashes a lot when I pour it, and this wort is at 168F. Then I start heating that wort while I collect my next running of wort from the tun. I dump that wort right into the kettle (wort from the bucket is at 168F, the wort in the kettle by now is near 200F) and I have more splashing.

Now like I said, I don’t think I have much in the way of stale flavors in my beers, but Fix was a smart guy and well respected. I do sometimes have a flavor component in my beer that I can’t identify, maybe it is a mild oxidation leading to HSA products in the wort prior to boiling.

What to do…

Well, Fix recommends making the same wort twice. He recommends that you really abuse the first one (stir the mash excessively, pour in the sparge water aggressively, perform a messy vourlaf, stir the wort several times during the boil, splash the wort around prior to cooling). He then recommends taking as much care as you can with the second wort to not introduce any HSA (this may just be doing your regular process), but with a little more care. I like this approach. Using two test batches one that is as close to your normal process as possible, the second… work hard at making the system fail.

Fix says that after you ferment those beers out and bottle them you may then realize how HSA effects your final product. This seems like a strange thing to do, and who wants to potentially ruin 5 gallons of brew?  But this is something to consider. I certainly will have to rethink my transfer method. Next time I may actually collect my running in my bottling bucket and use a hose from the spigot to the base of the kettle to transfer the wort.

Spiced Bourboned Oaked Holiday Amber
For 6.5 gallons final volume.
8 gallon run off, 90min boil.
Anticipated OG is 1060-1065
Mash efficiency is 75%

12lb American 2-row (or 7.5lb DME)
2lb crystal 40L
1lb crystal 60L
0.125lb crystal 120L
0.125lb chocolate malt

1.0oz Nugget (12%AA, pellets) 60-min
0.5oz Nugget (12%AA, pellets) 15-min

4.0oz American Oak Chips
8.0oz Bourbon/Whiskey (see comments below)
1/4 tsp cinnamon-ground fresh
1/8 tsp nutmeg-ground fresh

Mash in at 154F, 90 minute mash.
Boil for 30min, then start with 1st hop addition.
Irish Moss at 20-min mark.

Yeast WLP002 (or WY1028)
Use two vials of yeast or pitch a hearty dose of yeast cake from a previous batch.

Primary ferment at 68F for two weeks.
During primary:
Steam Oak chips in water steamer on high heat, 5 minutes. Steam chips, do not submerge.
Place oak chips and bourbon in a clean mason jar, cap immediately. Let sit in cool place during primary fermentation. Right before transfer to secondary strain the oak out, add spices to the bourbon, and shake well (This will sterilize the spices).
Rack beer to secondary, dump in oak bourbon spice mix. Secondary for two months at 68-70F.

Notes on secondary and Bourbon:
OK, so I don’t actually use bourbon, I have found that Johnny Walker Red Label is sort of smokey and hot, but when mixed with the beer it ages out to a smooth bourbon like quality. But this is where the extended secondary comes in, it really helps move that HOT nasty Red Label taste to the back of the beer, but it keeps a just noticeable supporting role. You can leave the oak chips in during secondary if you want a stronger oak flavor, it’s an experiment I haven’t done. When adding the bourbon mix, you can prime and bottle right away. Then bottle condition for two months and get the same effect. But there is something about bulk aging the entire 6 gallons together that just works for me.

Check out our Christmas Ale Recipe.

It’s important to take good notes, kids!

Here is my log sheet that I use to keep important information straight. It’s still a work in progress, but it works for me so far! Feel free to print it out and use it. I usually print a formulated recipe from the beer recipator along with one of these logs. Then both the recipe sheet and the log sheet go into a binder with plastic sheet protectors.

Protectors keep me from getting “Sheet” on my sheet in the brew-house!

Brewing logsheet

I wanted to put up a post about starting down the path of all-grain brewing.  All-grain brewing gives you ultimate control over the wort.  You can control the exact proportion of base malt to specialty malts and you can control the body of the beer through mash temp.  These two factors are things that are out of your control as an extract brewer.  You can certainly “shop around” and make 3-4 pale ale recipes using base extract from different suppliers.  Maybe you’ll find one that’s just right.  What happens though if you don’t fine one that’s just right?  Well, that’s where all-grain comes in.

Before I continue…
Extract brewing is great in its own right.  You can make awesome beer with extract.  You can win awards with extract.  There are microbreweries out there based upon extract brewing!!!  There is absolutely nothing wrong with using extracts.  However, eventually you may want to see if you can “brew like the pros” or you may hit a wall in recipe tweaking that forces you to investigate the all-grain process.

In this first part of “Going All-Grain” I want to introduced the most important piece of the puzzle for getting there; the mash tun.  Now there are several ways to mash and lauter (rinse) your grains.  The method I employ is referred to as batch-sparging.  I’ll discuss the how and why in a subsequent post.  I want to focus this post on how I built my mash tun to start to give you some ideas.

First off I used a 50qt “cube” cooler that I got on sale one winter at Target.  It had a spot for a valve, but it wasn’t drilled out.  So I was free to do what I wanted.  I chose to keep it real simple and I purchased a second valve that you normally see on your bottling bucket.  I also purchase a rubber stopper that would fit into the port of the valve once inside the cooler.  I jammed a stainless steel T-fitting into the stopper.  To serve as a sieve to strain the wort from the grain I used the ever popular stainless steel hose braid.

Working with the braid can be tricky.  I simply hacked the end fitting off with a saw.  Then I cut it to my approximate length.  Wearing gloves, I carefully worked the rubber hose out of the interior of the braid so I was just left with the braid.

This picture is a close up of the valve on the cooler.

This picture is a close up of the braid clamped to the T-fitting and jammed into the stopper.

Here is what the whole thing looks like assembled inside the cooler.

Now you’ll notice that I doubled over the braid into two loops.  This isn’t really necessary.  In fact most other people you’ll just see one straight 5 inch piece of braid.  I went with the doubled over loop to increase my overall lautering profile with respect to the dimensions of the cooler.  This was to decrease the probability of channeling if I had decided that batch sparging wasn’t for me, or that I wanted to give fly sparging a try. (I will describe the differences in a future post).

Here is a picture of beautiful wort running out of the tun.  This was wort for the Belgian Tripel!

So that’s the basics of what my mash tun look like.  I’ll discuss how I set up my mash in part 2!!

In the mean time here… have a beer on me.

I tasted the 60/- the other night. It’s fully carbed in the keg. Unfortunately, I think it’s pretty thin and lifeless. I didn’t achieve a good enough carmalization with the drawn off portion. I’ll still submit it to the NE regional comp, just to see if my assessment jives with other judges.

Next time I brew it I think I will substitute some of the roasted barely with chocolate malt and black patent and some crystal 80L. I think that will hedge my bet of getting some more dynamic flavors. I’ll also not rush the caramelization step. I know I rushed it this time.

On the last run I drew off 1 gallon of wort and reduced it to half a gallon. I know now that I will likely need to reduce it to a 1/3rd or even a 1/4 gallon to get good caramelization. I’ll have to extend the total boil time to 120 minutes too I think.

Just some thoughts to improve the brew for next time.

Comment if you have had similar experiences or have advice to lend.

Brew on!