• Welcome to National Homebrew Club Ireland. Please login or sign up.
May 21, 2025, 04:46:26 AM

News:

Want to Join up ? Simply follow the instructions here
Not a forum user? Now you can join the discussion on Discord


Small Boils

Started by Donny, December 09, 2016, 11:20:21 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

Donny

I recently scaled down my brews as Ive no space for a large mash tun, kettle etc. Been doing stove top kits and my own 1gal recipes.  When doing a large batch a hop addition at 60min would mean a 60min boil to get the desired hop levels. My question is that when I scale down a recipe can I also scale down the boil time? Beersmith automatically keeps the desired IBU and gravity but does this account for the smaller vol of water being brewed?

irish_goat

Are you doing all grain or extract?

Donny


LordEoin

When you scale down the recipe you scale down the hop quantity, but not the boil time.
But you can just adjust the hop boil times to get to the bitterness you want.

irish_goat

Important to do a 60 minute boil to make sure you boil off any DMS precursors, coagulate proteins and boil off some excess water as well. Can get away with less time with an extract brew though.

Donny

Cheers for the info lads.

Bazza

I have two smallish ones on me neck, one on me right leg and a humongous one on me arse. Beat that!

Oh wait; it's THAT kind of boil. Sorry; I never spoke.

-Barry
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
― Groucho Marx

Leann ull

You can cut back on your mash time, seen experiments down to 30 mins with ok results probably start at 40.
Homebrewing is tough for those with big time constraints

Sorcerers Apprentice

When I was brewing professionally it was a minimum of 45 mins and a minimum of 10% boil off. So depending upon the barometric pressure on any particular day it might take as little as 45 mins or as high as 60 mins to achieve 10% boil off. The boil off rate was measured by automatic gravity meters attached to the kettles. A minimum of 10% evaporation was considered essential for roasted grains, lower than this and the taste panel could detect a harshness caused by some of the volatiles associated with the roasted grains.

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

There's no such thing as bad beer - some just taste better than others

Qs

I heard a pro on a podcast the other day say at least 4% boil off. I've no idea if he's right or wrong. I brewed yesterday and boiled off 7 L from 42 so I tend not to worry about it.

As usual there is an interesting read on Brulosophy about quick mash and boils http://brulosophy.com/2015/11/12/short-shoddy-my-1-hour-all-grain-brew-day/

Sorcerers Apprentice

Brulosophy can make for entertaining reading but his taste panel selection leaves a bit to be desired. It you are comparing something, you should have calibrated the panel, so that you know, thay they can detect a difference before you put your theory to the test. Half of his panel could be blind to whatever he's testing. For example if half of his panel are already blind to DMS then they are not going to detect a difference in a short lager malt boil. All it tells you is that in a random group of people some can detect differences and some can't. However if all the panel can detect DMS then the results take on a different slant altogether.

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

There's no such thing as bad beer - some just taste better than others

molc

Yeah I tend to read the writer impressions over the panel; while subjective the writer at least gives frames of reference for this skill level and inability to detect different flavours.
Fermenting: IPA, Lambic, Mead
Conditioning: Lambic, Cider, RIS, Ole Ale, Saison
On Tap: IPA, Helles, Best Bitter

Qs

You just have to take it for what it is. He doesn't claim his results prove anything. He usually goes out of his way to say it doesn't.

shweeney

I thought DMS was not a major issue with most modern grain.

Sent from my HUAWEI G7-L01 using Tapatalk


Leann ull

Absolutely right but none of us want to risk it