My First BIAB - Fullers London Pride

[emdiesse]

Hi All, I'm currently carrying out my first AG, first BIAB, first time away from a kit.

I have Graham Wheelers book and I am having a go at the Fullers London Pride recipe.

I am actually only doing a 1 gallon batch though in a 12 litre stockpot as it takes me ages to get through a 25L brew so with 1/5th the amount I should get to have more brew days and get to experiment more this way.

So, I am doing a stovetop BIAB, I've checked my recipe into the BIABacus and I am currently in the process of mashing - 46 minutes to go then I'm ready to boil

I realised one thing however, I have no idea how much yeast to add to a small 1 gallon batch.

I have a 11g GV12 Ale Yeast packet, and judging that its for up to 25 litres of wort I figure 1/5th of that should be fine 2.2g - but I have no idea if it's as simple as that (this calc also comes out at 2g http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html).

I've been taking photos as I go, so I'll post an update when it's all in the fermenter

Cheers,
Matt

[Raize]

Small volume BIAB is actually more difficult to manage than full volume! The mash loses heat quicker and you have to boil it gently or you end up with syrup. My first BIAB was in a 15L pot and a bit of a disaster. My 30L pot is much better.
I agree with your reasoning though. So many styles to try, so little time. I'm in that place myself but my solution is just to do 20L batches and drink a lot...

I'd pitch 1/5th of a pack if I trusted the yeast to be good. I trust S-04 and US-05 but I've never used GV12 so I don't know.

[Manngold]

Hi Matt, I would try for a teaspoon leveled.

Got any pics of the day?

Gold

[emdiesse]

Cheers, all is done and dusted now. I pitched 1/5th of the yeast - we'll see how it turns out .

Your solution is also a good one, I'm not sure I'd cope though

Anyhow, so the brew day I believe was a success - it took me way longer than I'd expected but some of that was frantically finding out things I had forgotten about - I am so glad I took the time to fill out the BIABacus at the last minute before I started because there was so many things I would have overlooked otherwise.

I get the feeling I could squeeze in a brew mid-week after work as 5 litres of wort boiled quickly and cooled quickly too.

Here is my brew day in pictures

Here are all the ingredients, all ready to go.


Heating up to strike temp of 66.4C (according to BIABacus)


Grains slowly added whilst stirring


Then plonked the pot in the oven


I chucked a thermometer on the top - it's not the same temperature as the mash but I figured it'd give me a visual on a relative temperature drop.


Mash completed, I drained of the rest of the mash liquor from the bag


Boiled with the first hops


Adding the late hops


Just Chilling - to under 27C


Poured through the sieve into a fermenter bucket


and then back into the pot - a few times to aerate


Siphoned the lot off into my demijohn - Perhaps siphoned off a little too much since it's quite warm so I expect the fermentation might be a bit violent


Siphoned a bit into my hydrometer too for a reading - It's under what I was aiming for (1.034 instead of 1.040 - hey ho)


Pitched the yeast and here we have it, my first ever AG brew day, first ever BIAB brew day.

[Raize]

Looking good.

Hydrometers read lower when the temperature is higher than the calibration temperature (normally 20C), so your corrected OG might actually be 1.036 if the sample was still at 27C.

[emdiesse]

Hi, thanks, my last reading was at about 24C so with the chart of temperature calibrations in Wheeler's book it's OG is nearer 1.035-ish

Once fully fermented I guess it'll be a 3.2%ish beer... I'll work with 'ishes' for this one

I was surprised how simple it turned out to be, when looking at the recipes I saw the london pride recipe has a lot of ingredients... but when you consider that it's just all the grains mashing at once, then a bunch of hops boiling all the time and then a single hop variety boiling for the last 10 minutes it really wasn't that hard.

Can't wait for it to finish, My london-ish pride...ish

[alexlark]

Cracking brew day!! I done a London Pride last year as my first BIAB and it turned out great. Im now hooked and upgraded to a 30L pot, making 20L batches. Compared to kits its miles better. Much more rewarding too.

[emdiesse]

Are you using Maxi-BIAB to get a 20L brew length out of a 30L pot?

[Raize]

Are you using Maxi-BIAB to get a 20L brew length out of a 30L pot?

Maxi-BIAB isn't really needed with a 30L pot unless you want to make a large quantity of very strong beer.
I did some calculations once and I can do 20L batches as follows (assuming efficiency and attenuation are both 75%):

5.5% ABV witthout any need to top up.
8.5% ABV if I do a pre-boil top-up and without mashing thicker than 1.25qt/lb.

I don't really need 20L of any beer stronger than 8.5% anyway, I'd kill myself.

[emdiesse]

Cheers, I agree with you on the amount of strong beer - I'd like to have a go at a barley wine (mainly just to say I have) but I'm 100% certain I wouldn't need 5 gallons of the stuff .

I have a 50L pot as I had initially planned 5 gallon brew lengths. However there are so many styles to try and I can't justify having a party every month just so I can do more brew days so I thought I'd get a smaller pot for 1 gallon brews so I can squeeze in more brew days to learn the art of brewing without killing myself trying to drink 5 gallons each time! (Plus my girlfriend was keen on a bigger pot for when she makes her elderflower champagne and cordial) - Also I look forward to experimenting with ingredients in time, and I'd rather ruin a smaller batch!

I do look forward to a 5 gallon brew, once I have a great beer I enjoyed in a 1 gallon batch + a big brew ready for the next BBQ/party

Sounds like I'll generally have no trouble with a 50L pot then!

Cheers,
Matt

[alexlark]

With my 30l pot I've done 2 maxi BIAB brews, they were both around 6% and I end up with approx 22l in the FV. So with the trub I then end up with 20l in the keg.

After using a 19l pot and filling it quite close to the top it's just nice to use a pot with a bit of head room so the brew day is more relaxing. I was torn between the 30l and 50l because so many people were saying to go big but as I use a wok burner on my hob the 30l is really the max that I can get a boil going. As I also use the 20l crusader sankey kegs the 30l pot is perfect.

Getting to do a few brews and knowing your equipment is a big help. I mash about 3cm from the top of the pot and dunk sparge with 3l, which is 2 kettle fulls. This gets me 20l of a big beer. I really recommend BeerSmith, it's very technical but very very accurate.