How do you brew?

In 2016, I've pretty much done biab as I've been playing with an electric system. For the previous 10 years I used a cooler all grain system. I'm not sold on the electric system, but I did buy it, so am trying to spend time with it. I could see myself going back to the cooler,

 

I've been an AG brewer for about 5 years but I'm about to move to BIAB on my next batch. I have a 10 gal round mash tun & have wanted to move to 10 gallon batches but my mash tun won't quite handle my brews. So, I will start with a 5 gallon batch or two to get my process' down & then will move to 10 gallon batches. For me, this will eliminate 2 vessels & reduce clean-up.

 

I stepped up to BIAB from extract a while back and I'm very happy with the technique. I need to get something to insulate my kettle with (I've seen people make jackets of reflective bubble paper and that seems like a good way to go) but in the meantime I just apply a bit of heat to re-up the mash temp once it has fallen 2-3F. I put a metal colander on the bottom of my kettle to prevent the bag from scorching when I do this, although it might not be strictly necessary. I've given up on brewing inside because the hop oils were condensing on the walls and leaving streaks, which the girlfriend was not a fan of. So now I have a burner that I put on my back porch, and it's served me well even on days when it was -10C outside. Mind you, when it's cold I typically mash indoors, since my gas stove is powerful enough to get the water up to mash temps (but not powerful enough to get 7 gallons of water boiling). I also have a 5-year-old, and between parenting and work it can be hard to find the time to brew sometimes. But I'll be brewing twice in October - it just doesn't feel right when I don't have beer on tap!

For the record, I make batches up to about 5.5 gallons in size, although sometimes I scale it down and do 3G or so. It's easier on the back, plus I have a hard time drinking 5 gallons of IPA before it starts to get stale anyway.

 

All grain since the start. Never had interest in doing the extract or BIAB brewing methods, personally. Was already tweaking water, temp control fermentation and lagering just a few batches in. Spent months pre-studying before ever brewing, so most of the learning was done prior to diving in.

 

All grain since the start as well. Many problems in the beginning until I found this forum.

 

Just did my first all-grain with a keggle and mash tun that I made and I'll say after brewing numerous extract, partial boils, steeping, late additions etc. previously I'll not look back.
Do I need to relearn? A bit but holy crap it's so worth it
Going to need a bigger fridge

 

Like a boss...

 

Which electric system do you have? Pros? Cons? Cheers!

 

I started in 1992 with no boil, prehopped extract/corn sugar kits. Did 2 batches like that, figured there should be more to it, started with partial mash/extract, and within a few months I was doing all grain. A few years later 10-15 gallon batches, all grain and never looked back.

 

http://www.highgravitybrew.com/store/pc/BIAB-Electric-Brewing-System-120V-269p4647.htm

If the flexibility of a 120v system is important, this one gets the job done. It gets wort to a sufficient boil, if not rolling, for 5-6 gallon batch. More power would be better, but I'd need an electrician to rewire my brew spaces.

I like the idea of a temp controlled mash so I could do proper step mashes, and to some degree I have played around with this. Mine has the temp probe mounted down next to the heating element. It seems a little too close. With the boilcoil and the basket insert, there really is not much space for the probe. But I don't know that this is a problem. If you follow Basic Brewing, you'll have seen/heard how James used it to control fermentation temps of a sour wort beer. I have done the same. On the whole, I'd say that having temp control for my mashes hasn't hurt my beer any, but maybe it isn't a huge improvement over the cooler. either.

I wondered about the recirculation set up. Continuous recirc of the hot wort through a showerhead sprayer seems like a sure way to incorporate hot side aeration into the beer. But my beers haven't sucked, so maybe this isn't a real thing.

My biggest cons is that I miss the simplicity of the cooler. I never had a pump before. More stuff to think about, more things that can go wrong. The bigger kettle, with heating element and temp control ports, plus insert is awkward for me to wash in my kitchen.

 

3 vessel all-grain…surprising to me that I am definitely in the minority in my brew club as most are BIAB folks

 

3 vessel AG since almost the beginning...2 batches with extract to start, then about 20 partial mashes with a 3 gal mash tun with bazooka...then AG with 10 gal FB round cooler (still using for 5 gal batches)...then 10 gal batches with single tier pump and keggle setup...now...back to 5 gal batches with an occasional 10 gal batch when the pipeline narrows. Only time I've ventured into BIAB (unplanned) was a couple times I got cocky with rye
I've brewed in my kitchen almost exclusively until I bought the wife a new stove and put the old one in the garage.

 

Started with a Brewers Best extract kit, after three of those I went all grain. Electric Breweasy.

 

Still a beginner (~18 batches so far),especially compared to some contributing to this string. But 100% all grain. I enjoy getting all of the steps to produce desired results, and being able to relate my process to how things were done long ago. Plus, the deer really like the spent grain from the mash (except for the peated stout).

 

All grain BIAB. Still experimenting with sparge methods. I live in an apartment so I can do BIAB with one kettle and a few other household pots indoors.

 

I do All Grain. Gravity fed system with a HLT, a Mash Tun (made of a water cooler), and a brew kettle.

I am going to ask for a pump for Christmas from my wife so I can start whirlpooling and change to a plate chiller to get my brew day down to 3.5 hours.

 

Without going in to how I came by it, I have a cooling coil made from 1/2" stainless tubing. Cooling time dropped to ~25 minutes for a 5 gallon batch. It was like going to heaven.

 

We brew all grain and BIAB depending on time and size of batch....We started to use a Brew bag in the mash tun....Excellent experience totally removes the need to vourlauf....and has increased our efficiency.

 

To those of you doing BIAB... did you buy the bag pre made (if so, where?) or did you buy a mesh sheet and sew it into the exact size to fit your kettle?

I've done 4 extract batches with about 80% fermentables coming from extract and 20% from specialty steeping grains. Im looking to take an easy/cheap step into AG before I invest time/space/money into the traditional AG setup

Thanks

 

^ I should add to above that I see some online for sale. So to specify: any that I should stay away from or gravitate to?