A few notes on Parti-Gyle

I have previously alluded to using the English Parti-Gyle method of sparging, not necessarily on purpose, but more because of lazy calculations.  For a good article on Parti-Gyle brewing, follow this link.  Or this one.  I don't really follow a hard and fast method for parti-gyle brewing, but my "invented" style usually nets me about two gallons of extra beer to experiment with.  I have so far made three secondary small batches in this way.  The first was an Apricot Wheat which went along with the B.O.T., my first all-grain.  Next I brewed a Strawberry Blonde from the second runnings of the Stone IPA, and finally I have about two gallons left over from my Oatmeal Stout that I will be turning into a Chocolate and Toasted Coconut Stout tomorrow.  The nice thing about this brew method is that it raises my efficiency significantly, and allows me to satisfy my desire to experiment, without risking the loss of a whole five gallon batch of beer if something goes horribly wrong.

I also usually end up with six to seven and a half gallons of beer for the price of one five gallon batch, and it provides immediate usage for any hops that I don't use in the main batch.  Since I usually reclaim my yeast I have extra on hand to pitch and don't spend any extra money on a potentially costly ingredient.

Anyway, just my two cents on an easy way to get some extra life out of your grain and give yourself some low-cost beer to experiment with.

-Foodstyle

Oatmeal Stout

Nick and I brewed an Oatmeal Stout on Thursday.

Grain Bill

• 9 lb. Pale Malt
• 1 lb. Roasted Barley
• 1 lb. Rolled Oats
• .25 lb. Rice Hulls

Hops

• 1.75 oz. Chinook (60 min.)

Yeast

• California Ale Yeast

OG: 1.050 FG:

Had to use a two-stage mash in this one, and had to mash-out.  I hit my target temp for stage one exactly on, but missed my temp for stage two by at least 5 degrees.  Not really sure how this will affect the beer, but I am not too worried.  I also missed my target gravity by .004.  I was a little bummed about that since lately I have been overshooting my target gravities.  I am not worried that this will have too terrible of an impact on the beer though, just a little less alcohol, but if I were going for alcohol content I would have made another IPA.

Anyway, here are some pics.

Here Nick is prepping the strike water.

Here I am adding the grain bill.

Here I am adding the strike water.

First Runnings.

Hops Addition.

Chilling the wort.

Filling the Carboy.

Yeast pitched and airlocked.

The smaller carboy is leftover second runnings, I will siphon it onto toasted coconut in a week just for fun.

Had a lot of fun making this one, can't wait to taste in about a month and a half.

-Foodstyle

Hefeweizen

I brewed a Hefeweizen for a friend last Friday.  It went well, here are some pics.

Adding the strike water.

Stirring the mash.

Mashing.

First runnings.Hops.Yeast.

Left to right: Hefeweizen, Stone IPA, Bloody Orange-Tastrophe, and Strawberry Blonde.

Bottling the B.O.T.

I bottled the B.O.T. yesterday, here are a few pics.

The final gravity reading, 1.004. 

Filling the bottling bucket.

Bottling.

Roll down your pant legs you hipster doofus!

Transferring Stone IPA to Secondary

Transferring the Stone IPA from the primary to the secondary fermentor, as well as my dry hops addition, 2 oz. of Centennial.

Close up of the secondary.

Fully transferred.

The beer I used for the gravity reading, delicious!

B.O.T.

Just a couple pictures of the Bloody Orange-Tastrophe.

Here it is ready for transfer to secondary.

And here we have a shot of the beer I used to take the gravity reading.  Pretty cloudy, of course this is a wheat beer so that is to be expected, but nice light color.  I'll update with another picture after it is carbonated.

Stone IPA

Brewed up my first IPA on Sunday.  Ned and Dan came over to "help".  Started brewing a little after 1 pm and finished around 6 pm.  Pretty good time for a 75 min boil and my second all-grain.  Anyway, here is the recipe.

All Grain Recipe - Stone IPA::: 1.063/1.010 (5 Gal)

Grain Bill

• 13 lbs. - 2 Row Pale Malt
• 1/2 lb. - Crystal Malt (10L)
• 1/2 lb. - Crystal Malt (20L)

Hop Schedule

• 1 oz - Magnum (75 Min.)
• 1 oz - Centennial - at Flameout 
• 2 oz - Centennial - Dry Hop in secondary

Yeast

• White Labs California Ale Yeast (WLP001) - 1800 ml starter

With about a pound of malt dextrine cause we wanted to experiment.

Mash/Sparge/Boil

Mash at 150° to 152° for 60 min.
Sparge as usual
Boil for 75 minutes
Cool and ferment at 66° to 68°


I always forget to take enough pictures, but here are a few.






This is pretty much what Ned and Dan did for the majority of the five hours that we brewed.

Here is our grain after it has been mashed and sparged.

Here is the brew just before the first Hops addition.

Little tough to add a blow-off tube to this air-lock.

And finally, a shot of all of my beer.

Original gravity ended up at about 1.072.

That is all for now.

-Foodstyle