messing with steeping grain water volume

[baphomite51]

im doin my first partial mash extract brew later. i got a stout kit from the hombrew company. on the instructions it says steep the grains in 2 litres of water then sparge with a further 2 litres of water but iv got a wide 33L pot so 2 litres barely wets the bottom of the pot, if i adjust the volume of steeping water to say 5 litres and sparge with 2 litres will this effect my OG and if so what effect would this have on the final product.

cheers

[irish_goat]

Surely you have a smaller pot?

[baphomite51]

i do but i wanted to do it all in the one pot. is 2 litres not very little to soak a kilo bag of grain in? it seems like feck all to me.

[Shane Phelan]

I don't see why you have to use a small pot. When I was doing extracts I steeped in 18L of water while maintaining the same temperature recommended for the pot, they all turned out excellent!

[irish_goat]

I don't see why you have to use a small pot. When I was doing extracts I steeped in 18L of water while maintaining the same temperature recommended for the pot, they all turned out excellent!

His point is that the pot is wide and if he pours 2 litres of water in it it won't cover all the grain.

If you're planning to boil in the 33L pot you'd save yourself a lot of time using the smaller pot for the grain i.e. fill the big pot with 20l of water and start to bring it up to boil and then steep the grains in a small pot. By the time you've finished steeping your big pot should be getting near boiling. Otherwise you're steeping and then adding tap water to top it up and that'll take ages to boil.

[baphomite51]

I don't see why you have to use a small pot. When I was doing extracts I steeped in 18L of water while maintaining the same temperature recommended for the pot, they all turned out excellent!

His point is that the pot is wide and if he pours 2 litres of water in it it won't cover all the grain.

If you're planning to boil in the 33L pot you'd save yourself a lot of time using the smaller pot for the grain i.e. fill the big pot with 20l of water and start to bring it up to boil and then steep the grains in a small pot. By the time you've finished steeping your big pot should be getting near boiling. Otherwise you're steeping and then adding tap water to top it up and that'll take ages to boil.

ok that does make sense, but if the muslin bag is touching the bottom of the small pot will it burn or compromise it? the pot is pretty low

[irish_goat]

Nah it'll be grand. You shouldn't be applying too much heat to the pot anyway, just get it up to whatever temp you're aiming for, add your grains and then wrap it in a few towels and it should hold a pretty consistent heat.

[baphomite51]

sweet ill give that a go then

cheers

[Danny(00833827)]

Hijack alert!

I also have a HBC extract kit i want to do this weekend - my problem is the opposite - i currently only have a small pot (10 liters or so) - instead of bringing the volume up to the suggested 26L before boil, i was gonna top up to 23l after a smaller scale boil in this pot  - i have seen this in some youtube vids.

Is there an disadvantage/difference to doing this?

thanks

[Donnacha]

Hijack alert!

I also have a HBC extract kit i want to do this weekend - my problem is the opposite - i currently only have a small pot (10 liters or so) - instead of bringing the volume up to the suggested 26L before boil, i was gonna top up to 23l after a smaller scale boil in this pot  - i have seen this in some youtube vids.

Is there an disadvantage/difference to doing this?

thanks

Thats how I do my extracts - boil in a 15 litre stock pot and top up later. Works very well, although I read somewhere that going below 10-11 litres in the stock pot is less than ideal - I'll have to check that again to see why!

[Danny(00833827)]

cheers Dr. D - I would be below that as i only have a ten liter - although was thinking of grabbing this in my local Heatons at the weekend.

http://www.heatonsstores.com/Product/Stanford-Stainless-Steel-Stockpot-30cm/259667/1502020200

When i grow out of it for a keggle, the missus can have it for soup

[BrewBilly]

I believe that its to do with hop efficiency using a smaller pot, not to savvy on the details though.

Good luck, I have done two HBC kits and they have both produced cracking beers

Sent from my BlackBerry 9360 using Tapatalk

[Danny(00833827)]

something like this i bet:

"Early homebrewing books instructed brewers to boil the malt extract for a 5-gallon (19-L) batch in as little as 1.5 gallons (5.7 L) of water. Although this is convenient, this convenience comes at a price. Boiling a thick wort is guaranteed to darken it unacceptably and severely limit the amount of hop bitterness."

taken form http://byo.com/american-amber-pale-ale/item/10-10-steps-to-better-extract-brewing

[Donnacha]

Just looked up the book i was referring to - The Complete Homebrew Beer Book by George Hummel. He states 11litres is the minimum required to dissolve the 'additives'. Not the greatest choice of words, but i take it he's referring to lme/dme in addition to any adjuncts.

[Donnacha]

.... Also, I use that Heatons stockpot too .... Which means my pot is actually 18 litres (i would leave a few litres head space though)!!


Very happy with it!