Hey All,
I’m not sure if this will end up being a problem with the beer or not, but curious to see if anyone else has had a similar situation. Here’s the deal:
Today I brewed an Oatmeal Stout, adapted from NB’s All Grain recipe, except I scaled it down to a 3 gallon batch. So I mashed to get 4 gallons (single infusion and batch sparge), boiled that 4 down to 3.5, 3.5 into the fermenter where I’ll expect to get 3 gallons in the end. This was done on my stovetop…so the boil wasn’t too vigorous, but there was a hot break. Boil for 60 minutes. Now, I should also note that I had a LOT of heat loss for some reason when mashing. I use a 10 gallon Igloo cooler (cylindrical) and even after preheating my tun, when I put the strike water in (targeting 156 F), it shot low, in the 148-149 range. Tried adding a couple of quarts of boiling water, and the mash still did not hit 156. Finally I just gave up, not wanting to make the mash too soupy. Also, my target preboil gravity was WAY higher than I calculated…I assumed 60% efficiency (still learning the system) and instead of the 1.039 preboil SG I was going for, I hit 1.056. I’m hoping the beer doesn’t come out too dry.
Anyway, here’s the weird part. I chilled the wort to pitching temp, splashed into the bucket and then proceeded to aerate by rocking back and forth vigorously. The wort did not stay foamy at all…when it did, it collapsed back into the liquid pretty quick. I have never seen anything like that before. Should I be concerned? Anyone else have this happen to them???
Thanks!
El Duderino