Source
r/Homebrewing•
DerekCase

I want to learn to brew from only grains, hops, yeast and water. Where do I start?

I've brewed a few boxed beers with the cans of malt extract and the step by step instructions. The beer comes out the best I've ever had which doesn't say much as I've only ever had the very popular beers like Budweiser and Guiness. My only complaint is the price. I've invested a good 300 into this project already with a mini-fridge being my next buy because my beer is fermenting at too high of a temperature. I got into this because I thought home brewing would be cheaper and more satisfying like baking your own bread or changing your own oil. While it is definitely more satisfying, it's about the same price as buying commercially with the additional cost of time and equipment. The boxed beers are expensive, and I want to learn to brew from grains as some people on here say they do. What extra equipment and steps are required to brew from grain? I can grow grain, grow hops and propagate yeast, and I really want to get to that point where my beer comes only from my work.

Posted Oct 13, 2013, 4:35 PM UTC

119
DrBubbles•

It's true that unless you brew a lot and continually refine your procedure, you probably won't be saving much money by brewing your own. Most brewers brew because we love the process, the science, the experience, and yes, the result.

My best advice is to pick up a copy of either John Palmer's How to Brew or Charlie Papazian's The Joy of Homebrewing. Both books give a very good introduction to all-grain brewing and are pretty much required reading for anyone that hopes to get good at this particular hobby.

In short, for all grain brewing you will need to invest in a mash tun (either store-bought or built by you) that will contain your grain, a larger pot that can contain all your wort with some headspace (≥8gallons), and most likely a burner that can bring that much liquid to a boil.

6
dangeratio•

Or you can read How to Brew here: http://www.howtobrew.com/intro.html

4
DrBubbles•

That's a great start, but I prefer a hardcopy. Call me weird, but I love it when books like that get stained, bent, smudged, finger-printed and banged up. I feel like it's an indicator of experience and knowledge.

But yes, the online version is a great start.

/rant

3
DerekCaseOP•

The cost of brewing is somewhat discouraging, but I can buy the things I need piecemeal until I have it all. In the meantime, I'll do what I can with what I already have. Looks like I'll have to get me another book until then.

1
DrBubbles•

but I can buy the things I need piecemeal until I have it all

I would argue that "it all" doesn't exist. There will always be bigger, more advanced, more specialized, more refined, more expensive equipment.

Having said that, collecting gear is half the fun of this hobby (for me at least). I usually try and buy something new with each batch I do, so that no two batches were made using exactly the same equipment. This last time I bought a 2000mL Erlenmeyer flask for starters.

Once you have the absolute basics, you can definitely take your time stepping up your equipment.

And yes, get more books. I have 5 brewing books right now and there are still others that I want to get.

1
[deleted]•

Start with BIAB (Brew in a bag). If you've been making extract kits, you should have everything you need to get started, except maybe the actual bag. That will get you into all grain brewing. I just did my first BIAB (My first beer, actually) and it went great. Read everything you can about all grain brewing, then read everything you can about BIAB. As far as growing all you ingredients, I think the hardest part will be malting your own grains, and I'm sure there are instructions all over the interwebs for that.

6
tenthjuror•

I've been doing BIAB for 6 months or so and it is a significant improvement over my extract and partial grain recipes that lead up to it.

1
DrBubbles•

Any interest in moving up to traditional all-grain brewing?

Just curious. I intended to start with BIAB after my extract batches, but for whatever reason it was easier for me to get the parts for a mash tun etc than it was to get a bag big enough. I decided to just bite the bullet and jump into mashing.

1
tenthjuror•

It is just so easy, I don't know. I have a 15 gal pot and set it up under a deck beam with a pulley system to raise and suspend the spent grain. If I had room to go all out and do a fancy setup with mash tun and hlt, I would definitely be tempted because I like a project. My BIL just went all grain, so next time I visit him, maybe we can do a brew day.

1
DrBubbles•

I still want to start doing some BIAB batches. I love mashing, but it does tend to take up most of my day. I'd love to be able to knock out a BIAB batch after work some days.

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DerekCaseOP•

I definitely will.

1
gestalt162•

BIAB is probably the easiest way to go all-grain. All you need is a big enough kettle, and a fine mesh bag. I did BIAB for 8-10 batches, and was very pleased with the results. Search the homebrewtalk.com forums for "Partial Mash Stovetop Brewing" and "All-Grain Stovetop Brewing", or head over to www.biabrewer.info. All of those have great information. If you want to brew "traditional" all-grain using a dedicated mash tun, the book How to Brew has some great instructions.

As for using you own ingredients, there are pros and cons. Hops are easy to grow in most climates, and grow cones like crazy after 2-3 years, but require a lot of work at harvest time, and you don't know their alpha acid content, so you can't bitter reliably with them. They're good for flavor/aroma hopping though.

Harvesting and saving yeast is easy and can save tons of money, provided you're good about sanitation, have fridge space, brew with the same strains regularly, and aren't lazy like me :).

Growing and malting your own grains, I'm told, is a PITA. Harvesting on the home scale is very time intensive, and home malting is inconsistent. It's absolutely worth the money to buy grain in bulk through a group buy.

3
DerekCaseOP•

Brew in a bag sounds like it's the next step for me. Thank you. We grow a crazy amount of food already, adding more things to harvest shouldn't be too big of a pain. But why is malting your own grains difficult?

1
Placebo_Affectt•

Malting them isn't super tough. Getting 10lb of grain is the hard part. You'll need a whole field of wheat :/

1
gestalt162•

You need to moisten and sprout the grains for a particular length of time- too short and your malt will be enzymatically poor, and you'll need extra mashing steps to break down protein; too high, and you'll get seedlings instead of malt.

Then there's drying- it's very easy to overkiln your malt and make malt that's too dark, or underkiln and not dry in enough. Or you can kiln inconsistently- some may be too dark, some may be too light. This after taking the time to harvest all that grain.

All this inconsistency means your beers are inconsistent- you have no idea how they will turn out, even with the same recipe. That's fairly troubling.

These are things that commercial malt producers, with their industrial machinery, perfectly controlled processes, and hundreds of years of experience, have perfected. And they can get you wonderfully consistent malt for less than $40 for a 50-55 lb bag. If you want to give it a go and experiment, who am I to stop you? I welcome the voice and experience of someone who does their own malting- not many do their own. However, sometimes, some things are better left to the pros.

However, home-toasting commercial malt is easy, quick, and I'm told contributes greatly to flavor. There's little issue with consistency, since you're usually talking a couple pounds or less per batch. There are some books out there like The Homebrewer's Garden and Roasted, which comes from this great blog post

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jturkish•

another option is partial grain, get recipes online and gather the goods at a lhbs

i did a hefe that was $27 with the yeast for 5 gallons

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