AG # 1 - Styrian Gold

[Orkney_Rob]

Today was one hellish day, so as a bit of RnR I decided today was a good day to launch into my first all grain brew! Things kicked off at 3:30pm when I chucked 3.5kg of Marris Otter into my mashtun:



Water added to dough in at 75ish degrees, dropped a bit when it hit the grain.



The whole lot was wrapped in a blanket and "some" liters of water were added to the boiler to get up to sparging temperature, whilst I decided to chance it and left the house alone to burn down as there was nothing in for tea... fortunatly I arrived back with the water up to temperature, the house not a smoldering ruin and about the right time to start the sparge - result (about the first one today to be honest!)



Alas I had cut my copper pipe too long to use my nifty watering can sparging device, so I just wiggled the hose end around a bit to get a decent coverage... this may be where my efficiency died a death!

The whole lot then went on to boil for 60 minutes along with the first addition of Styrians (3.8%aa and 30g thereof).




I figured it would do no harm to leave the imersion chiller in for the duration....

At 15 minutes to go I added another 30g of Styrians and a whirlfloc, then at flame off I added another 5gish so that half the pack was used up... no other reason!

The cooler was connected and the wort was down to 24 degreesish within about 20 minutes. The water was a little chilly!

A yeast starter was sitting ready, made with Girven English Ale yeast - 250ml sitting ready to go in....



But before then I decided I best break for tea cos Nat was wanting fed... and was about to crack into the Red on an empty stomach which could get messy....



Following feeding the wort was beaten to within an inch of its life - so I could avoid watching East Enders - and the yeast added.



Alas I lost interweb access all day as I was going to ask for some tips as I went along... or even just work out what I was supposed to be doing... but as I was disconnected for the day due to Talk Talk cocking up I had to guess what the whole proceedure was!

SG wound up at 1.033 over 20l so I undershot on both strength and quantity from the expected 24l at 1.036 or higher... but not too bad for a first attempt! The wort tastes good though!

The recipe was as follows:

3.5kg Marris Otter
30g Styrian 3.8% AA @ 60min
30g Styrian 3.8% AA @ 15min
5g Styrian 3.8% AA @ 0min
11g Gervin English Ale Yeast

Can't wait to see how it comes out now - the wort certainly had a more interesting flavour than the kits, and I was shooting for a pale session beer so hopefully that is what I have got!

[AT]

Well done any congrats on your first brew, only thing you should add the grains to the water and not the water to the grains when doughing in

Edit: must learn to spell

[Vossy1]

Well done OR and great pics

It'll taste great no matter what, as it's your first AG

[mixbrewery]

Cracking job there mate
Hope you're not to battle weiry from your first AG.

[delboy]

Nice one, its a steep learning curve at first, you'll be amazed at how much quicker and simpler you'll find it next time.

As AT said its probably easier to add the grains to the water, just be sure and mix it well so as not to get dough balls.
Also putting the water in first allows it to pre-heat the cool box (this will probably rob you off a few degrees).

If you stick 'strike temp calculator' into google you will come across any number of online calcs that let you punch in how much water at a certain temp you are adding to a certain weight of grains at any temp and it'll tell you what sort of temp you'll end up with, invaluable when you are still finding your feet.

Onwards and upwards

[spearmint-wino]

Seems like I'm always the first to say it (maybe i AM that sad)... Welcome to the dark side

Good work on the day's proceedings

[iowalad]

Nice work OR! Now its the waiting game. . .

[Wez]

No looking back

[Burner]

Looks a good process. Ditto on the grain into water thang - If you put the grain in a plastic bag then cut it open with a knife it makes the doughing in easier and very "House of Flying Daggers".

[prolix]

Well done mate. In five weeks time you'll be suppin' this beer and reminising on the good ol' days of your first brew.

[Orkney_Rob]

Cheers - the order of water and grain was one of the things I was going to look up... until my interweb died! Figured that the first batch, with no real fall back on instructions, would be a good learning process though

It's going to be quite a light one so I should be ready to take some first samples fairly early on, and with a second keg due to come free in the next week or two I shall be cracking on with my second brew shortly! Hmmm... need to clean everything from today first!!!!

My sparging device is a work of genius though - hopefully that will be in place for next time around

[Jimberbob]

Nice one, well worth the wait for your setup. Can't wait to see your sparging device.

[prodigal2]

Nice one Rob, and welcome to the fun side of homebrewing.
And seeing as you have a low OG ale you can be supping in, in 3 weeks or so.

[delboy]

Looks a good process. Ditto on the grain into water thang - If you put the grain in a plastic bag then cut it open with a knife it makes the doughing in easier and very "House of Flying Daggers".

cracking tip, its things like this that make this forum priceless, so simple and effective, 15 brews in and i hadn't thought of that, cheers burner , i'll bre incorporating that in the next dough in.

[delboy]

Looks a good process. Ditto on the grain into water thang - If you put the grain in a plastic bag then cut it open with a knife it makes the doughing in easier and very "House of Flying Daggers".

cracking tip, its things like this that make this forum priceless, so simple and effective, 15 brews in and i hadn't thought of that, cheers burner , i'll be incorporating that in the next dough in.