Thinking of starting Extract Brewing.

[potatoes]

Firstly, congrats on putting down a brew!!

One thought that comes to mind is that beer looks darker in the fermenter than it does in the bottle. Secondly, If your recipe was based on a 23 litre brew length and you ended up with 15 litres, then you might have ended up with wort which is more concentrated than expected. Two questions:
Did you take a gravity reading?
How much LME did you use (in kgs)?

Potatoes,

[Nobby Novice]

I used 2 tins which would have been 3.6 kilos in total. I took a reading in the fv before pitching the yeast. It was approx 1055. not allowing for the temperature which is 23 degrees.
An electrician at work tells me I need a simmerstat fitted, to control the boil temperature.
I may have to write this brew off to experience, but it has not stopped my enthusiasm.
Thanks for your reply Potatoes.

[potatoes]

Hi Nobby,

Dont write the brew off until its been bottled for at least 4 weeks and you have tasted it at least 5 times. I think you will end up with a good brew because vigourous boiling isnt a problem. 1055 OG is not excessive but your beer will probably be a bit stronger than you expected. Maybe about 5.5 -6%. It comes out at 5.69% with a FG of 1012 on this calculator. http://www.brewersfriend.com/abv-calculator/

Sounds like a great santa's winter warmer where he will be very warm!

Are you going to bottle or Keg? Remember to adjust the amount of sugar you prime with as priming for 23 litres when you have 15 litre could end with bottle explosions.

Potatoes

[Graham]

An electrician at work tells me I need a simmerstat fitted, to control the boil temperature.

A typical electro-mechanical simmerstat is not a lot of cop because it cycles the power on and off over something like a thirty-second period. This means that a continuous rolling boil is not achieved. At best this would mean that the boil will take a lot longer to perform. Likewise a thermostat does not work at boiling point because water boils at 100°C no matter how much energy is pumped into the boil. There is nothing for a thermostat to measure, the excess energy boils off more liquor as steam, but the temperature stays the same.

Most people just have the element connected directly to the mains.

It would be nice to have to have some sort of control, to control the steam to minimum levels. An electronic pulsed energy regulator would do the job nicely, but that considerably adds to the expense, so most people do without.

[Kev888]

+1. My old burco has/had a simmerstat but I didn't use it in the boil for that reason, though it was okay as a crude controll for a HLT. You'll find that you can control things with the lid too though, just like with saucepans, if it bubbles up too much then sliding the lid off a bit helps it die away, and generally after it has boiled for a while theres less tendancy for it to do that. I think you can also spray some sort of anti-foam stuff on but I've never used it myself.

This is one area where gas is an advantage as its easy and cheap to adjust the power output rather than have the full power cutting in and out, but personally I can't be bothered with the gas cylinders and so on and its not so good for indoor use.

Cheers
Kev

[InsideEdge]

Hi

You should allow for boil off when you decide how much water to boil. For instance if im doing a recipe for 15 litres I actually boil about 20 because thats how much I end up with about 15.

Also you dont really need to boil for 90 mins. Boiling for 60 means you'll get less boil off. Just pick a recipe which states a 60min boil otherwise your hop bitterness will be off.

Oh and Im another one for no thermostat. In my 30 litre boiler I boil no more than 20-25 litres so I can just let her rip and not worry about boilovers.

[Nobby Novice]

Thanks for all the replies . The brew that I have now fermenting will be put into a barrel with about 50gms of brewing sugar to condition. I am now looking forward to my next brew which I will now boil in the same way, topping up after to make 25 litres
Nobby.

[Nobby Novice]

Just thought I would let you know about my brew yesterday. I tried a clone of Old speckled hen from GW`s book. I put the crystal malt and the black malt into a laundry bag and put into the boiler on top of the disolved pale spray malt. Next the challenger hops at 40 degrees. I decided I had better peg the laundry bag to the top of the boiler as I would need to fish it before it came to the boil. The bag was fished out and the boil continued for the next 90 minutes. I did not notice a hoppy smell this time as I had done in my first brew. The last 15 minutes of boil I added the irish moss and Golding hops.

I then let the brew rest for about 30 minutes. I stood the fv in a large plant tub with ice around the side to bring the temperature down. I then drained the brew into the fv. It was then that I noticed the bag of challenger hops had welded itself to the element. This may explain why I could not notice the hoppy smell during the boil.
I have now pitched the yeast into the fv, o.g. 1046. It looks clear and the colour of Speckled hen, but I did take a taste from the trial jar. It just tastes malty.
I think my next brew will have the other malts steeped in a pan and then the liquor added to the boiler.
I am not sure if this brew will be okay or just have a malty taste. hence I have called it old speckled bantam. The learning curve continues.

[Fuggled Mind]

I think my next brew will have the other malts steeped in a pan and then the liquor added to the boiler.

This is exactly what I do. I use a 15L stock pot and when I steep the grains, I use an old pasta pan. I don't even use a grain bag. I just fill the pasta pan pretty close to the top with cold water, throw the grain in and turn the hob up pretty high.

While I wait, I usually throw a couple of litres or so of water into my stock pot, dissolve my malt extracts and busy while waiting for my grain to finish steeping.

Once the surface of the grains starts to break up in the pasta pan, and foam emerge, you can be pretty sure the water below is close to boiling.

I then transfer to the main stock pot using a sieve. Yes, people will say it's too much faffing around and it's probably true but it suits me well. I often pour some hot water in (but not boiling) to get some more liquid from the grains.

I then put the sieve on the pasta pan. What remaining liquids filter through normally get added to the stock pot. Once it's all good and boiling, I then add copper hops. The sieve usually gets cleaned and sterilised to wait for the end of the boil to filter out the hops.

Don't give up. Learning is half the fun. The more you try, the better your results will get. I am pretty satisfied with my results though I too continue to learn over time. Fortunately, the more you do it, the easier it gets

Cheers

Jason

[potatoes]

It looks clear and the colour of Speckled hen, but I did take a taste from the trial jar. It just tastes malty.

Hi Nobby,

Congrats on another brew. Your hops melting to element sounds a bit nasty. Did you get them off ok? I think, but maybe wrong, that all beer tastes malty when it has been boiled. When the old yeasty gets busy in your the wort, the malt will be eaten up and then your beer will taste superb.

How did you last brew end up tasting?

Potatoes

[Nobby Novice]

Thanks for the replies guys. the last brew (Summer Lightning clone), is in the barrel conditioning, so I have not tasted it yet. About another week and a half to wait.
Part of the bag weleded to one side of the element, so although the hops were in there, they didnt get to flow in the brew and infuse. However you guys sound optomistic, which helps encourage me. The speckled hen clone is fermenting nicely with a nice foamy head.
Before my next brew day, I hope to fit an extractor fan in the shed. I will let you know the progress.
Thanks again guys.