Friday, October 15, 2010

First all-grain - brew in a bag

First all-grain brew in a bag style:



That Sunday's brew session was... interesting :) I knew my drill would lose power half way through the grain bill. I didn't know that my fellow brewer/brother in law's backup drill chuck would be too small... or that my antique hand drill (getting desperate) wouldn't clamp on tight enough... or that my air tool set didn't have an actual drill. At least my father in law, Bill, doesn't live far and he had a super drill!

Drilling and filing the hole for the brewpot valve took longer than I thought as well... of course. At any rate, other than taking awhile, it worked fine - no leaks!

The brew in a bag experience was interesting. My mother-in-law, Terri, did a super job constructing the bag, but I think I had her get the wrong bag material. It didn't want to release any wort. We had to lift out 20 pounds of grain and probably 8 gallons of wort. We let it drain into a separate bucket, but it took a long time and we had to massage the bag a bit (probably extracting too much tannins, especially since it's a dark beer). But... we did end up with about the right amount of wort... and I think we got over 80% efficiency! It tasted good going into the fermenters too. We shall see. I wish it would have been ready by this week's brew club meeting... but it will have to wait for the next meeting, I guess.

Thanks again to Erich for his help and spare parts!



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