Would it hurt (or help) to make 3 gallons of wort and then add it to 2 gallons cold water, instead of making 1.5 gallons and adding it to 3.5 gallons of cold water?
I've been reading about a full boil or a partial boil... this would sort of make an "in between" point of the two, heh... becuase 5 gallons needs a huge pot, and would take a long time to actually get boiling.
But 3 would be a little more managable... anyone ever try this? Any benefit?
You can boil as much as you want. The only thing in the recipe that it would affect is the hop bitterness utilization. With more water, you'll need slightly LESS hops, because the bitterness is extracted better/easier. I don't know a mathematical formula for figuring it, but it wouldn't be much different, just expect a little more bitterness or take a tiny bit of hops out. If you're using pre-hopped kits and no additional bittering hops, it won't matter at all - they're already utilized.
Does it make it better? It will let you make a lighter colored beer because of less caramelization during the boil. Otherwise, I don't know of anything else that would change significantly (if you're doing extract kits). Extract already has (mostly) had a hot break, so that doesn't change. Cold break... well you probably get the best cold break by adding to the larger cold water volume, so no advantage there.
It depends on your beer style. If you're making a porter, stout, doppelbock, Scotch ale, etc., there would be some benefit to the malty caramel flavors by boiling a small amount such as 1.5 gallons and adding to
3.5 gallons. On the other hand, if you want the color of your beer to be as light as possible, you'll want to do the biggest boil you possible can, whether that means 2 or 3 or a full 5 gallons. If you're doing something halfway in between (a copper colored beer), then you can do whatever you want. In short, the answer is, do whatever you're little heart desires.On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 21:32:21 GMT, kiwi said in alt.beer.home-brewing:
Slightly off the main topic, but if you use a 175,000 BTU cooker (the kind that comes with most turkey fryers) it doesn't take long to get
6.5 gallons of water boiling. The problem is keeping it from boiling over.DrinksForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.