Extend Your Session Beer Volume

If you read my recent article on sparging session beers, you’ll know that fully sparging the grain bed for a low-gravity session beer can yield less volume than a typical pre-boil wort target. For a 5.0-gallon (19-L) batch of session beer, you’ll collect less than 6.0 gallons (23 L) of wort and perhaps even less than 5.0 gallons (19 L). The simplest way to deal with this is to add water to your wort to yield a volume you can boil for 60 to 90 minutes. Another way to deal with it would be to boil the smaller volume for your desired boil time, then add cool water to the post-boil wort in the kettle. This way saves you a little time when chilling the wort. 

That baby cracks me up

However, there is a third possibility — one that will yield more beer with the same amount of effort and using your same equipment (except perhaps for a second fermenter). The third possibility is to select an amount of grain that will yield either 6.0 gallons (23 L) or 6.5 gallons (25 L) of wort from a fully-sparged grain bed. This is 9.25 lb. (4.2 kg) and 10.0 lb. (4.5 kg), respectively. This will allow you to perform a 60-minute boil or a 90-minute boil, whichever you prefer. In either case, your pre-boil wort should have a specific gravity (SG) around 1.043. After a 60-minute boil of the 6.0 gallons (23 L), your original gravity (OG) should be close to 1.051. For a 90-minute boil of the 6.5 gallons (25 L), 1.056. Then, dilute this wort in your fermenter to your target original gravity. (In practice, your numbers may vary slightly from these. If you try this, take good notes on your grain weight, your wort yield, and the density of your  pre-boil and post-boil wort. With that information, you can tweak your process, if needed, the next time you brew.)

Dilution tables for 5.0 gallons (19 L) of session beer. Click to expand.

The two tables above show you how much dilution water you need to hit a variety of original gravities in the session beer range. As an example, let’s say you wanted to brew an ordinary bitter at an OG of 1.036. Furthermore, you wanted to start with 9.25 lb. (4.2 kg) of grain and boil for 60 minutes. On the appropriate table, find the OG of 1.036. Look to the left of that number to see you’ll have to add 2.0 gallons (7.8 L) of water to the 5.0 gallons of post-boil wort for a yield of 7.0 gallons (26 L) at SG 1.036. Once you know this, formulate a recipe for 7.0 gallons (26 L) of bitter, but brew it as a 5.0-gallon (19-L batch). After the boil, chill the wort and dilute it to your target strength in your fermenter (or fermenters). 

Using this method, you can make more than 5.0 gallons (19 L) of beer with the almost the same amount of effort as brewing a 5.0-gallon (19-L) batch. And you won’t need a larger mash tun or kettle. All you’ll need is more fermenter space. Since session beers are meant to be “the one to have when you’re having more than one,” it can be good to brew a little extra. 

 

Don’t Oversparge When Brewing a Session Beer

Session beers are low-alcohol beers that allow the drinker to consume a few without becoming too intoxicated. In order to be of high quality, the brewer must pay just as much attention to brewing a session beer as he would to brewing any normal or high-gravity beer. In the next week, I am going to post a few articles with tips on how to make the best session beers. Today’s entry concerns how much wort to collect from the mash.

A session of beers at the pub can lead to stimulating conversation and a wonderful time.

A fully-sparged grain bed has been rinsed of all the sugars the brewer can obtain without extracting excess tannins and silicates. On my homebrew system, using my methods, I can yield around 0.65 gallons per pound of grain (5.3 L/kg). If I collect a volume short of that, I have left fermentable carbohydrates behind. If I collect more than that, and I risk astringency. This has some implications when brewing a low-gravity session beer. 

Below a certain original gravity (OG), a fully-sparged grain bed will yield a volume of wort less than can be boiled for 60 minutes and still yield 5.0 gallon (19 L). In fact, below a certain OG, a fully-sparged grain bed will yield a volume of wort smaller than your batch size. When this happens, the brewer will need to add water to make up his or her full-pre-boil wort volume. 

Below is a chart that shows beers with target OGs in the session beer range, how much pale malt would be required to hit that target (assuming 75% extract efficiency), and the volume of wort the brewer should collect. Use the chart as a guideline, but also measure the pH and specific gravity of your final runnings if you fly sparge. You can also simply taste the runnins to see if astringency is beginning to show. Once your grain bed is fully sparged, simply add water to hit your desired pre-boil volume. It’s that simple. 

Sparging Options for Session Beers

spargeDia1

If you undersparge, you leave usable sugars behind in the grain bed. If you oversparge, you extract an excessive amount of tannins. When brewing a session beer, collecting the proper volume of wort allows you to get a reasonable extract efficiency and brew a beer that isn’t astringent.

Session beers allow beer drinkers to enjoy “a few” without becoming overly intoxicated. They are low-gravity, low-alcohol beers for extended drinking sessions. Brewers can  — and, of course, have — differed over exactly how low in alcohol a beer needs to be in order to qualify as a session beer. For the sake of this article, let’s say session beers are those under 4.5% ABV. (And outside of this article, feel free to apply your own definition.)

Just because these are “little” beers, however, doesn’t mean that they don’t require our full attention. One of the biggest potential problems when brewing a session beer is oversparging. With a smaller malt bill, collecting your full pre-boil wort volume may mean you’ve sparged past the point that tannins become much more soluble. Oversparging in this manner results in beer with an astringent mouthfeel. This is frequently described as the puckering, bitter-like feeling one experiences when drinking tea. [Read more…]

Session IPA

This is part of a continuing series on IPA variants. So far, I’ve tackled black IPAs/Cascadian dark ales, Belgian IPAs, and wheat IPAs. See also the article on rye IPA, by Denny Conn. In addition, I wrote a whole series of articles on “regular” American-style IPAs, along with American pale ales and double IPAs. 

 

Founders

Founders All Day IPA. Not quite an IPA, but is it just a pale ale? (Also, it’s a tasty beer, so does the name matter?)

Beers with “IPA” in their name tend to sell well and commercial brewers are keen to have those three letters on their labels. One style (or substyle) of beer that has emerged recently is session IPA. A session IPA supposedly combines the hoppiness of an IPA with the lower alcohol content of a session beer. Founders Brewing’s All Day IPA was one of the first entries in this category, and continues to be one of the best-known.

When session IPAs first arrived, they tended to get one of two reactions. Beer drinkers either said, “Awesome, now I can get more hoppy goodness, and not have to stop after a couple,” or, “Hey great idea, but I liked it better when it was called pale ale.”

[Read more…]