OK I know that’s a horrible title for this thread but ever since I first brewed I’ve always wanted to try the Blood Orange Hefeweizen recipe from Sam at DFH. It’s in his Extreme Brewing book. This past weekend we found Blood Oranges and game on! In the book the recipe is extract but I found a all grain version on a forum.
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 5.88 gal
Boil Time: 60 min
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00
5.09 lb Pale Malt (3.0 SRM) Grain 61.46 %
3.19 lb Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 38.54 %
0.50 lb Rice Hulls
0.50 oz Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [4.50 %] (60 min) Hops 10.1 IBU
0.50 oz Saaz [4.30 %] (20 min) Hops 3.2 IBU
0.50 oz Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [4.50 %] (10 min) Hops 2.0 IBU
4.00 items Blood Orange
1 Pkgs White Labs WLP300 Hefeweizen yeast
Once again my trusty false bottom sucked. Don’t buy that piece of shit from Northern Brewer. I have something coming in the mail that hopefully will fix my problem. Thanks for markmier. It seems a truck could drive through my old false bottom. So far my fermenter isn’t bubbling which worries me a bit but we shall see! 10-14 days hopefully I’ll have some lovely summer time beer. Oh and this beer is called Bloody Ale. (pronounced like a Scot. “Bloody ‘ell!”) Thanks to my buddy Aaron for the sweet name =)
So here is All Grain finished product number two. Northern Brewer’s Surly Bitter Brewer Pro Kit. I love big beers but this beer from Surly is one of my favorite sessionable beers ever so I was pretty damn excited to have it on tap in my house, if I did a good job that is. In the end I think I did an OK job but I knew this beer wouldn’t quite be the same right from the start. I made a really big rookie mistake when I didn’t have enough sparge water to get the wort up to 6.5 gallons like I wanted to.
Also once again to much grain got through the false bottom and into the pot even though I thought I recycled enough. Avid homebrewers is the grain in the wort the problem with the dryness in the mouthfeel? I hit my mash temps pretty much right on. Once again I didn’t use a secondary here. I just did everything on the primary and this time I cold crashed which helps out tons. I didn’t write about it but the Furious kit tasted great but I ended up not cold crashing and a ton of the hop matter got into the keg which eventually clogged up the keg. This time around, thanks to the cold crash the beer flows like a madman.
So here it is. My first All Grain finished product. Don’t mind the ton of head there. I need to learn to throttle off the co2 a bit =) As for the beer itself. It’s not Furious. What I mean is, I’m sure I screwed up a few things in the process. I’m sure it’s the recipe for the great beer but with my novice brewing skills it’s just not as good. The aroma is actually pretty damn nice. Some nice citrus, pine, grapefruit hops notes with a nice caramel backbone. The taste though doesn’t match the greatness of the smell. The mouthfeel feels a bit to thin too. But this is definitely something I don’t mind drinking and it’s exciting to know that I brewed this beer.
Something’s I know I messed up on.
- I let to much grain get into my wort. The false bottom on this cooler setup lets through a bit to much grain even though it seems I’m getting clear runnings, it doesn’t end up that way. I need to find a better way to filter these grains out
- For this batch I couldn’t get the fermentation temp to stick to where I wanted it to. For the batch after I fixed the issue. So from here on out I should be ok.
- I took some advice and didn’t use a secondary. I even dry hopped right into the primary. It looks like it ended up pretty good but when I was racking into the keg I got a ton of dry hop residue in the keg with the beer. I didn’t have space in the fridge to do a cold crash but for the future I’ll figure out a way to make room since it really seems like it’s needed in the end.
Overall I’m happy with the beer and I might even buy the kit again to see how much better it is the second time around if I make some changes.
Thanks for everyone’s help!
Ahh everything was going well on my second batch of All Grain beer but of course with my luck it didn’t end up that way. For my second batch I decided to do the Northern Brewer Surly Bitter Brewer Kit. Can you tell I have love for Surly?
Everything was going rather well until my Sparge Arm decided not to work like it did the first time around. The arm just wouldn’t spin, so there I stood, manually spinning the arm the best I could. Trying not to let the grain bed go dry. But more importantly and the biggest messup was the amount of sparge water I had. I only heated up 4 gallons. Same amount for the first batch I did. But I didn’t take in account that the grain bill for this batch was smaller then the first. Needing less water for the lauther. I was way off on how much wort I needed. I’d say in the end I might of only ended up with 4 gallons of wort in the carboy. Oh well live and learn. Believe me, next time there will be more sparge water ready to go. As I checked this morning, she was bubbling. We’ll see how it turns out.
Oh and I tested the Sparge Arm again after all was done, it worked. WTF!
Before I write anything about my first all grain brewing experience I must first thank Aaron over at The Captains Chair. The poor guy had to deal with countless emails and even a phone call. Without Aaron I couldn’t of made it through my first batch.
So there’s nothing to be scared about. For some reason I was somewhat freighted about my first all grain batch. Why I was scared to take the jump from extract brewing to all grain? I guess the chance of failure. Funny thing is, maybe I still failed. I guess I’ll know in a month or so but for now my first all grain batch is sitting there bubbling away. So far so good.
For my first batch I decided to go to a all time favorite. Northern Brewer worked with Surly Brewing to provide a true kit for Surly Furious. One of my favorite beers of all time. It’s not everyday a brewery is willing to allow the public to know all the ingredients of a very successful beer. But Surly did. This is what the recipe looks like
Mash Ingredients
- 7.5 lbs Canada Malting Pale Ale Malt
- 3.25 lbs Simpsons Golden Promise
- 0.88 lbs Simpsons Medium Crystal
- 0.63 lbs Belgian Aromatic Malt
- 0.125 lbs Simpsons Roasted Barley
Yeast
Wyeast #1335 British Ale II
Mash Schedule
Sacch’Rest 153 F for 60 minutes
Mashout: 168 F for 10 minutes
Boil additions and times
- 0.5 oz Amarillo (First wort hop)
- 1.75 oz Warrior (60 min)
- 2 oz Amarillo (0 min)
Furious Dry Hop Blend (dry hop secondary for 7-14 days)
The blend consists of
- 5 oz Simcoe
- 2.5 oz Ahtanum
- 0.5 oz Warrior
- 0.5 oz Amarillo
Everything went pretty smooth from what I could tell other then a few things. On my Strike Water I was two degrees hotter then I should of been. Which I hear is not the biggest deal ever but as I learn my system I’m sure I’ll get it right. Also when I was sparging I thought I recirculated enough of the wort when I saw no huge clumps of grain. Ended up I was wrong and some got through to the wort. This ended up being not such a big deal also as all the grains went to the bottom during the boil and I didn’t pick them up when I transferred from the pot to the carboy. As I was cleaning out the Mash Tun after all was said it done, I did notice a good amount of grain got past the false bottom. I’m going to have to look into a way of fixing that.
This is what I learned about my first all grain batch
Don’t be scared. There’s just a few more steps that need to be done compared to extract brewing. The boil at the end is the same and everything after is the same. You don’t need expensive equipment to get the job done. I’m glad everyone talked me out of saving up for very expensive equipment. Instead two water coolers seem to be doing the job =) All grain brewing takes a long time! Extract brewing took a few hours. You can expect all grain to take double or maybe a little more. From start to finish I think it took me about 5-6 hours. The most important thing is that I felt great after an all grain batch. I felt like I accomplished something. It was fun and rewarding and I can’t wait to try the beer in about a month. Oh and bring lots of towels if you are messy like me.
