Anybody ever go back to extract from all grain?
#41
Posted 20 July 2010 - 07:40 AM
#42
Posted 20 July 2010 - 07:45 AM
I would not add any gypsum to a weizen. I would get all of my calcium from CaCl2. Also, there is no reason to add CaCO3 at all to a pale beer.I think my thermometer is close enough. It's a digital NSF thermometer that has the ability to calibrate. I calibrated it the day I brewed the hefeweizen in a cup full of ice water. Here are the salt additions from my last batch... it was a hefeweizen with an SRM of 3.4Starting Water (ppm): Ca: 0 Mg: 0 Na: 0 Cl: 0 SO4: 0 CaCO3: 0 Mash / Sparge Vol (gal): 4 / 5.2 Dilution Rate: 0% Adjustments (grams) Mash / Boil Kettle: CaCO3: 0.5 / 0.65 CaSO4: 1 / 1.3 CaCl2: 2.5 / 3.25 MgSO4: 1.6 / 2.08 NaHCO3: 0 / 0 NaCl: 0 / 0 HCL Acid: 0 / 0 Lactic Acid: 0 / 0 Mash Water / Total water (ppm): Ca: 73 / 73 Mg: 10 / 10 Na: 0 / 0 Cl: 80 / 80 SO4: 78 / 78 CaCO3: 16 / 16 RA (mash only): -42 (2 to 7 SRM) Cl to SO4 (total water): 1.02 (Balanced)
#43
Posted 20 July 2010 - 09:47 AM
This!I have switched completely to purified spring water and my beer quality has been WAY better. I just go to Raleys, get the cheapest purified water that they have (they sell it in 2.5 gallon jugs).Now, if I just want to make some beer and not go through the extra work that it does take to make an AG batch, then I will certainly do an extract batch. I'm a beer snob, but I'm a lazy one sometimes.Why not just do all-grain with spring water, and stop worrying about water chemistry? In a lot of cases, messing with water chemistry just makes the beer worse, it's hard to improve a beer through water chemistry.
#44
Posted 22 July 2010 - 01:27 PM
I'm glad you brought this up. I like my beers fairly dry and I was also having problems with getting my FG as low as I wanted with extract. With AG (or MG - "mostly grain") I am able to consistently get a much lower FG by mashing below 150. For instance, my last pale ale finished at 1.006. I used to think I was having yeast issues but with lots of healthy yeast and ferm temps under control, I still don't get good enough attenuation when I brew with LME, even with adding more than half of the extract at the end of the boil.After 6 years of brewing I was forced to sell my setup when I moved. While I was building my brewery back up, I did extract batches for a while. I was doing full boils, extra light dry extract with some steeping of specialty grains. While I made pretty decent beer, it just wasn't up to my standards. I know and have heard all the arguments for extract, both positive and negative, and brewed my batches with absolutely no bias. Some batches like big malty super hoppy IPA's came out great, but milder beers didn't fare so well. For me the issue was attenuation. I like my beers dry. I just couldn't ferment anything down past 1.018 when working with extract. I'll never knock anyone for brewing extract and would gladly drink their beer... but I've made my choice and it's all-grain, all day.
#45
Posted 22 July 2010 - 01:51 PM
I usually did late addition and also used about 10% table sugar to help with the same problem of high FG. I think getting real fresh extract is part of the problem there.I'm glad you brought this up. I like my beers fairly dry and I was also having problems with getting my FG as low as I wanted with extract. With AG (or MG - "mostly grain") I am able to consistently get a much lower FG by mashing below 150. For instance, my last pale ale finished at 1.006. I used to think I was having yeast issues but with lots of healthy yeast and ferm temps under control, I still don't get good enough attenuation when I brew with LME, even with adding more than half of the extract at the end of the boil.
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