I've done four BIAB brews now and I'm looking for any hints or tips to improve.
I use Beersmith to create my recipes. I use the water calculations on there. I start with half a campden tablet. Then I do alkalinity and calcium tests. I use as much gypsum, table salt, and calcium chloride to match the closest water style for the beer on Beersmith. Finally I adjust the alkalinity using lactic acid.
Onto the mash. I heat up to the temperature suggested on Beersmith usually using a medium body BIAB mash. Whilst water heats up I give all my grain another grind through my corona mill.
Bag goes in and then I wait until I reach 69-79C (depending on the mash temp).
Grain goes in and then I use a big whisk and my plastic spoon to attack the clump of grain to really break it up. Then I wrap the kettle in a foil camping matt and leave it for the mash, between 60-90 mins. I'll only give the mash a stir once in that time, halfway through.
I'm curious about the use of a pump here to recirculate the wort whilst keeping the heating element on to get a more stable temperature, any thoughts?
Once the mash is done I start mashing out and raise the temperature to 75-80C, this usually takes about 20 minutes. Once I reach that temperature I lift the bag up, let it mostly drain, and then dump it in another bucket. I then squeeze the bag in the bucket and leave it to drain a bit.
What other techniques are available for this stage? A big colander to allow the bag to drain back into the kettle? What about brew in a basket? I'm also considering the use of a 'sparge' stage here to get an extra 4L into the boil, any tips for that?
After 5-10 minutes I'll pour the wort from that bucket into the kettle. Gravity reading taken and mash efficiency calculated, I usually hit at least 70%. My last brew was 75% efficiency.
How can I improve my efficiency? Hitting 80% would be nice.
Time to start the boil. Not much to say here, I usually boil for 60 minutes. Haven't tried a longer or shorter boil yet.
Once the boil is done my immersion cooler goes it. I'll cool down to about 80C for the whirlpool hops. My whirlpool technique involves spinning the wort with my spoon and then throwing the hops in. I then wait 20 minutes occasionally giving it another spin every so often.
Curious about the use of a pump and a hop spider here. Recirculating the wort for 20 minutes while the hops site in a spider or similar filter vessel thing.
After the whirlpool I cool down to pitching temp, transfer to the FV, and pitch my rehydrated yeast. It then goes into a fridge with an Ink Bird controlling a heat tube to warm up and the fridge to cool down. After the krausen has subsided I throw in my dry hops. I don't use a secondary FV as this seems to have gone out of fashion.
Is this the best way to dry hop?
Once fermentation is done I'll cold crash for a day or two and then bottle up using a bottling bucket.
Sorry for the wall of text, if you can be bothered to read it though some advice would be great! Thanks.
A typical BIAB brew day for me, any advice?
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Jocky
- Even further under the Table
- Posts: 2738
- Joined: Sat Nov 12, 2011 6:50 pm
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Re: A typical BIAB brew day for me, any advice?
Honestly it sounds like you've got it all in hand. My biggest hint to improve would be to join a homebrew club. They can try your beer and tell you where it's falling short and work with you to help improve your techniques.
Regarding your actual questions:
1. Using a pump with BIAB is pretty unnecessary. Turning a heating element on in the mash is a quick way to burn grain, or your bag. Get the mash nicely mixed in and then leave it. A bit of a temperature drop is quite normal.
2. Some people use a hoist or pulley to hold the bag above the pot and let it drain. You can also buy mashing baskets on ebay that have legs on the side so you can lift the grain out and stand it on the rim of the pot to drain.
3. If you want to sparge, then go ahead and sparge. It'll give you a bit more efficiency. People that do it with BIAB will either 'dunk' sparge where they drop the grain bag into the sparge water and slosh it about, or they simply pour the water through the grain bag above the pot. In terms of ease of use though I'd only do this if I can't fit more water into the pot that I'm mashing in.
4. You're not going to gain anything from recirculating post boil. Normally whirlpooling is done to gather all the hops and break in the middle of the vessel so you can drain it without having to filter. Having a hop spider negates the need for a whirlpool.
5. Dry hopping that way sounds fine to me. Just do everything you can to keep oxygen out as the krausen starts to subside - put a lid on the fermenter with an airlock and don't keep opening it!
Regarding your actual questions:
1. Using a pump with BIAB is pretty unnecessary. Turning a heating element on in the mash is a quick way to burn grain, or your bag. Get the mash nicely mixed in and then leave it. A bit of a temperature drop is quite normal.
2. Some people use a hoist or pulley to hold the bag above the pot and let it drain. You can also buy mashing baskets on ebay that have legs on the side so you can lift the grain out and stand it on the rim of the pot to drain.
3. If you want to sparge, then go ahead and sparge. It'll give you a bit more efficiency. People that do it with BIAB will either 'dunk' sparge where they drop the grain bag into the sparge water and slosh it about, or they simply pour the water through the grain bag above the pot. In terms of ease of use though I'd only do this if I can't fit more water into the pot that I'm mashing in.
4. You're not going to gain anything from recirculating post boil. Normally whirlpooling is done to gather all the hops and break in the middle of the vessel so you can drain it without having to filter. Having a hop spider negates the need for a whirlpool.
5. Dry hopping that way sounds fine to me. Just do everything you can to keep oxygen out as the krausen starts to subside - put a lid on the fermenter with an airlock and don't keep opening it!
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.
Re: A typical BIAB brew day for me, any advice?
How's your beer? I see you don't mention any issues with your final product. If that is the case, great, I'd be going in the opposite direction i.e trying to simplify my process (I've being doing BIAB since 2008!).
Taking some of your process:
Taking some of your process:
- Campden tablet - does your water company use chloramine? Most don't so by the time your water has heated, the chlorine has vented off, a tablet is not needed unless chloramine has been added.
- I've never used lactic acid, have you blind-tested beer you've made with & without it?
- Some HB suppliers will happily mill you a finer crush for BIAB, I've never bothered specifying
- My mashing is the same (hot water cyclinder jacket, check temp once)
- My lifting/draining is the same
- I compensate for less efficiency compared to my (now sold) batch sparge system by adding more grain to the recipe as this costs 50p and takes no time or extra process
- I add some protafloc near the end of the boil - I never cold crash after fermenting
- Pump? I can't see that working better than dunking the hop spider a few times when we work at such small volumes. Again, any blind-test difference from dunking vs leaving the hop spider?
- I sold my IC with my other shiny gear and now use a no-chill cube
- I don't rehydrate yeast as the manufacturer's data sheet says it is not necessary
I brew therefore I ... I .... forget
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Meatymc
- Drunk as a Skunk
- Posts: 840
- Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
- Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire
Re: A typical BIAB brew day for me, any advice?
Mostly covered above although everyone will do the same process slightly differently.
I've only recently gone from a single 31L pan (and plasterers bucket to dunk sparge) to 2 x 50L - 2 only because it was a 2nd hand package deal that also included 2 x chiller coils and a 100L pan that I don's use - all for £60!
Few comments:
I mainly do 90 minute mashes so check temp at 30 and 60 minutes
I use the 2nd pan to dunk sparge - you'll find a large sieve from IKEA comes in very handy to rest the rather heavy bag on
3g Irish moss with 15 minutes to go in the boil to help clear the wort
Hop spider worth getting to keep all the gunk out of the wort
Dry hopping - I always transfer to secondary before dry hopping. Advice nowadays seems to be drop to 8C before adding and don't bother leaving the hops in for any longer than 3 days - various experiments over the water show extraction no better after 3 days
And perhaps most of all, keep clear notes of your process and the result everytime so you can refer back and tweak to hopefully get to the end result you're after.
Emjoy
I've only recently gone from a single 31L pan (and plasterers bucket to dunk sparge) to 2 x 50L - 2 only because it was a 2nd hand package deal that also included 2 x chiller coils and a 100L pan that I don's use - all for £60!
Few comments:
I mainly do 90 minute mashes so check temp at 30 and 60 minutes
I use the 2nd pan to dunk sparge - you'll find a large sieve from IKEA comes in very handy to rest the rather heavy bag on
3g Irish moss with 15 minutes to go in the boil to help clear the wort
Hop spider worth getting to keep all the gunk out of the wort
Dry hopping - I always transfer to secondary before dry hopping. Advice nowadays seems to be drop to 8C before adding and don't bother leaving the hops in for any longer than 3 days - various experiments over the water show extraction no better after 3 days
And perhaps most of all, keep clear notes of your process and the result everytime so you can refer back and tweak to hopefully get to the end result you're after.
Emjoy