Sick of Sugar and moving to AG and BIAB

Clickeral

So I have only a few more sugar washes left to finish off and them I'm moving to AG, had enough of sugar and want to get a better product.

Currently have the first BIAB AG beer I have made in Australia fermenting away 25L of it

Going to be buying 3 25kg bags of grain over the next month or two and start experimenting

I've got an idea for a single malt whisky and plan on doing a malted red wheat vodka

Also want to do some more AG beers, thinking maybe a Pilsner and an Ale

Still need to get another plate and a packed section :s

The girl I'm semi seeing likes Gin so need to look into Gin as well

Been super busy with MMA and BJJ so have been neglecting my brewing lately :(

punkin

Sounds good mate. I like hoppy ales like Hop Hog and some of the APA styled ales like Pinptail Pale Ale and Burleigh Heads Brewing 28. That style of beer really opened my eyes to what beer should taste like and what i'd been missing for 30 years.

Dr Smurtos Golden Ale ids the first one i ever brewed and a real crowd pleaser. I had 15 blokes over for a Gone Away Party when our boss left and only one guy stuck to the Tooheys. The rest were very pleased with the beer on tap.

Smurto's Golden Ale

55% JW trad ale

20% Weyermann Munich I

20% Weyermann Wheat

5% Caramalt

Amarillo @ 60 to 31 IBU

1g/L @ 20 and 0

US05

Mash at 66C

Clickeral

@punkin whats the total grain bill in KG for the above??

I just brought 40kg of grain for $116 (4 bags of 10kg) in a bulk buy going on atm

Briess Rye Malt Briess Midnight Wheat Weyermann Caramunich Simpsons Crystal Light

Not 100% sure what I am brewing with it yet, also need to buy a mill as I currently don't have one

Anyone got any suggestions on what and where to buy from?

punkin

It depends on how many litres you want to make and how strong you want it mate. Download Brewmate for free and start with your abv and your litres then add the grain bill in % (use switch grain mode button) the software will convert it to kg.

You can substitute the wheat in that recipe for Rye malt, that is the authors current preference (and mine usually but i'm out of rye).

As far as mill goes i have just upgraded mine and i would heartily recommend buying from mashmaster.

As far as i know this is the only fully adjustable geared roller available for home brewers. Usually it's one or the other. It's a great bit of gear but takes a bit of driving.

I bought one of these and used a spider coupling.

Home Brewer Special! Worm Drive Motor + DC Speed Controller!

Clickeral

Trying to use up some sugar stocks I have so have made a ginger beer

180g ginger root 1kg brown sugar 780g raw sugar 1.22kg white sugar 4 lemons juiced and meat 2 limes juice and meat

25L water and 1/4 cup bread yeast

Also popped down to pet stock and got 5kg of stock molasses and put my first rum on

3kg white sugar (as I didn't have raw at the time)

Have now got 6kg of raw sugar for the next two rum batches :)

Pet stock sell it for $12.5 for 5kg or about $23 for 20kg (liters?) so will get more next time :D

Going to buy a 3roller crankenstain from the states on payday and 20kg of JW Amber Ale male

CothermanDistilling

I will post a good ginger ale recipe in a different thread!

punkin

The Crankenstein 2 roller was the one i had before switching after it broke two shafts.

grim

There was some Aussie I came across that was building 2" by 8" roller mills, can't seem to find the link, but they looked quite nice. We'll see how my Crankandstein does with a full 1hp motor tugging at it.

Clickeral

@CothermanDistilling said: I will post a good ginger ale recipe in a different thread!

Yeah will be keen to give it a go next the one I threw together was just with Ingredients I had on hand :)

Clickeral

@punkin Just brought some more Alcometers off you as I brought the one I can find :s hoping you'll be amazing and post tomorrow morning for me :p

Lloyd

Alcometers are damn strange. You go for months, even years, without breaking one and then you kill 3 in a row in short order.
Me? As long as I have a spare it lasts forever. Lose the spare and it self-destructs.

SpontaneousAlcometerDestruction

Clickeral

@Lloyd said: Alcometers are damn strange. You go for months, even years, without breaking one and then you kill 3 in a row in short order.
Me? As long as I have a spare it lasts forever. Lose the spare and it self-destructs.

SpontaneousAlcometerDestruction

My mate just found my spare so all is not lost but I will be treating it carefully until the new ones arrive :)

I have rum to run on friday (first time with this still) so want to track my outputs :D

Lloyd

You are at great risk. The alco KNOWS you are vulnerable.
It truly can last for many years if it thinks you have a backup.

Quick, print a picture of it, perhaps a few copies that it can see, then it will be less likely to self destruct.
If it knows that it is your only alco you are lost I tell you!

punkin

@Clickeral said: punkin Just brought some more Alcometers off you as I brought the one I can find :s hoping you'll be amazing and post tomorrow morning for me :p

They'll go express this morning mate, packed in a tube.

jonno

Hey @punkin with your mill are you able to crush corn right down to flour easily enough?

punkin

Haven't tried Jonno. I have a bag of cracked corn that is pretty big a mate dropped off so i will put some through on the weekend to test it for you. Being geared to drive both rollers and adjustable both ends i reckon it will be fine. May be a different story starting from whole corn though.

Clickeral

So some pictures of my last all grain beer brew

Spent grain to make a sugar head whisky

Todays supply run

Corn was 19.99 for a 20kg bag and the Molasses was about 23 for 25kg :)

radiatorboy

Shit i wish i could get molasses that cheap. . Im paying $18 for 10l.

Chalmer

I can get 40 liters of Blackstrap for $52.50 us

Lloyd

@Chalmer said: I can get 40 liters of Blackstrap for $52.50 us

How much finished rum does that make?

Chalmer

I used 6 gallons to make a 24 gallon wash and didnt get to run it yet. Waiting for it to clear a bit before I strip it. Hope I get a couple gallons. This is the first time making rum for me so it should be interesting. White sugar is .43 cents a pound and Cracked corn is $8 per 50lb. Dont think thats too high price.

MickyMoonshine

Cracked corn $8 for 50lb maybe I should show this where I buy mine from. $20 for 5kg

Chalmer

It goes from $8 to $12 for 50 lb depending on where u get it here.

punkin

@MickyMoonshine said: Cracked corn $8 for 50lb maybe I should show this where I buy mine from. $20 for 5kg

You need to find a proper feed store mate. Somewhere the horse people buy their feed, not the pet owners. And definitely not the HBS or Woolworths.

Cracked corn should be under $20 (15-18) for a 25kg bag in Australia.

This is my local, i can by from their store now or still from the farm gate where they do the grading. They don't list prices, but give them a call to get some idea?

Wallamore Grain and Produce Horse Feed

MickyMoonshine

That is a horse feed joint maybe if I bought it in bulk might be different. I bought whole corn once and it was $45 for 25kg. Just have to sort the corona mill out

punkin

Seems strange for a feed store to be showing those sort of prices it's about double what is normal round here.

fadge

Seems high, my last purchase was 40kg cracked corn, 20kg each of wheat and barely. 80kg for about $50, direct from feed store, at standard prices. I was doing some IT work for them at the time, fresh cracked for me and all.

The feed store is 1 hr from me, in a small country town, the local guys appear to be all resellers and did not stock everything or seem interested in what l wanted.

This is in the mallee river region north vic.

Fadge.

Clickeral

@fadge is the barley malted or did you malt it yourself? The cracked maize I got was 19.99 for 20kg which I was happy with

Clickeral

Picked up the below on Sunday Currently have part of it sitting at my mates in Brunswick till they can bring it out to my place

1x 19L pot/kettle
3x 20l cubes
1x 30l fermenter
1x stc1000 temp controller (new in box)
2x goldings rhizomes
600g ish of medium crystal malt
600g ish of dark crystal malt
1kg ish amber malt
4kg ish munich malt
4kg ish wheat malt
250g ish brambling cross
250g ish challenger hops
250g ish first gold hops
250g ish northdown hops
100g - 150g ish magnum hops

Total $100 which I thought was pretty good :)

Ordering a 3D crankenstein next week I think (still reading reviews atm) Picking up the grain I mentioned above from a bulk buy on the 1/11 so no rush

Might get some JW ale malt as well (20kg)

Clickeral

Thinking Bourbon recipe of

5kg stock feed cracked maize (corn) 1.5kg Munich 800g wheat malt

Ferment it out at about 26-30C with some bread yeast or US05

Should be enough for 30L at 1.052 SG and if I get it down to FG 0.990 I'll get 8%

Then hard cuts and age on Med toasted oak for as long as I can :)

The corn will be interesting to process however :s

Also picked up a 76L chilly bin (also sitting in Brunswick)

I should really work out how yeast effects flavor considering I make beer as well haha

punkin

Hopefully your wheat will have the diastic power, but i would research it before i brewed. Consensus seems to be about 30 degrees lintner is a minimum for self conversion but say 50 degrees or more to be on the safe side for pound for pound (50% unmalted) conversion.

That means you need a base malt (assuming no powdered enzymes) of 165 degrees lintner for that grain bill above (3.3 times the adjunct) assuming it's a straight graph (i don't know). Most Munich malts are between 20 and 70.

Mashing - Diastatic power @ Wikipedia