Grain to Extract Conversion Chart

Alcohol is an important part of beer, arguably the most important part, not just because it's mind altering affects have undoubtedly helped to shape the world, but because it adds depth and flavor to beer that can't be duplicated without it. The amount of alcohol in your beer is dependent on the fermentables, or fermentable sugars, in this case from malted grain. Many people use malt exclusively, but many others use malt extract or a combination of both for their fermentables. However, beer recipes often only come in one version (all grain, or extract), so converting the recipe to your desired method of brewing can sometimes be a source of confusion. No need to worry. Use this chart to help you with the conversion and it will get you very close. Save your brain power for choosing which beer to drink while you brew your next beer.

Brewing For Competition

On June 27th our store will be hosting a "Brewing for Competition" class. Aaron Selya from Epic Brewery will be speaking about how to brew to style and how to classify your beer for competition. This Free class will be at Salt City Brew Supply, but space is limited so you must call us and RSVP.

As the Beer Nut's Beehive Brew Off and Grace Lutheran's Bier Brauen Competitions grow closer (registration is already open for the Beehive Brew Off) it is important to know what category you should choose to enter your Oaked Wee Heavy Smoked Scottish ale.

These competition are AHA sanctioned competitions and follow the BJCP Style guidelines. The style guidelines are really interesting to flip through when you are making your beer (or tasting it), and there is a free PDF download here. So download the style guide, set aside some of those awesome beers that you haven't been sharing (because they are just too good), come to the class, and try your hand at being a competitive brewer this year... or next.

 

Homebrewing Jargon - The Sequel

This is the extended Jargon list from the last post, enjoy:

Alpha Acid - the acids in hops that affect their bitterness. Shown as a percentage.

Beta Acid - the acids in hops that help inhibit bacterial growth and spoilage. Not usually a big factor in most home brews.

Hop Utilization - how efficiently your wort is dissolving the alpha acids from your hops into solution.

AAU/HBU – the potential bitterness from hops derived from the Alpha Acids in the hops. One ounce of hops with 1 percent alpha acids contain 1AAU. One ounce of hops with 2 percent alpha acids contain 2AAUs. Similarly, HBUs can be used the same way. Two ounces of hops with 10 percent alpha acids would equal 20HBUs. Because the Alpha Acids change with every harvest, most beer recipes will specify how many HBUs or AAUs of hops are needed.

IBU - International Bittering Units is a measurement gauging the bitterness of your final beer. If you know your boil time and potential hop utilization you can predict your IBUs form the total AAUs/HBUs in your recipe. For a quick understanding of the IBU scale, Blondes can be 10-20 IBUs, Pale Ales can be 20-40 IBUs, IPAs can be 40-80 IBUs, and Imperial IPAs can be 60-120+ IBUs. 

Wet Hops - fresh hops right off the vine. You need 6 times the amount of we hops to equal that of dried leaf or pellet hops.

Dry Hopping - adding hops to your secondary fermenter to boost the hop aroma of your beer.

ABV/ABW - alcohol by volume and alcohol by weight. The alcohol in most beer in most parts of the world is measured by volume. ABV is the easiest and most popular way to measure alcohol in home brewing also. Utah measures alcohol by weight which is a bit confusing for many since it appears lower than when measured by volume. 3.2%abw beer in Utah is the same as 4.0%abv beer everywhere else.

Grain Bill - the type and amount of grain used in your beer. The grain part of a beer recipe.

Lovebond - this is a measurement of the color of grain after it is kilned or roasted.

SRM - this is a measurement of color in your final beer.

Trub - the gross and often smelly stuff at the bottom of your beer after fermentation. This is a mixture of yeast, hops, and grain particulates along with heavy proteins that have been pulled or fallen out of suspension over time.

Cold Crashing - cooling down your fermented beer for a short period of time, usually less than 24 hrs, before bottling with the intention of forcing more particulates to fall out of suspension making for a clearer final product.

Fining - making your beer, mead, cider, or wine clear.

Lagering - cold aging beer.

Ale - warm fermented beer.

Lager - cold fermented beer.

Sour Beer - this refers to beer that has been intentionally infected with specific strains of bacteria or wild yeast to impart a sour or tart flavor.

Pellicle - a lumpy, or slimy film that looks much like mold that forms when wild yeast or bacteria like brettanomyces is introduced to your beer. This can be intentional or by accident, but either way you will want to isolate any equipment you use with this contaminated beer and use it only for sour beers.

Diacetyl Rest - the act of warming your cold fermented beer just before lagering to reduce the amount of diacetyl (butter flavor) in the final beer. Raising the fermentation temp at the end of primary fermentation to 60°F for a couple days before cold aging your beer gives yeast a chance to consume the diacetyl.

Primary Fermentation - the aggressive yeast activity that does much of the work converting sugar to alcohol.

Secondary Fermentation - transferring your beer to a different vessel after primary fermentation. This is where your beer will age and clear in the absence of most of the trub that is produced during primary fermentation. This can also be the time to dry hop or start another kind of fermentation by adding either fruit or other fermentables or by adding bacteria.

Tertiary fermentation - a fancy word for Third fermentation, this is where you age and clear your beer if you started up fermentation again during your secondary fermentation.

Homebrewing Jargon

Just as there is with any hobby, there are a lot of words and terms that are thrown around in the homebrewing world that cause some confusion to people just starting out or are looking to progress in the hobby. Some of these are old words intended specifically for brewing, but I'm fairly certain some are just used so people in the know can feel smarter than the people just starting out. Well, here is a list of words and phrases that will familiarize you with the hobby so you can go into a conversation with a seasoned home brewing veteran and hold your own. Because of the length, I will be splitting this into two posts. Here is part 1:

Crush/Mill - to get at the sugary goodness inside the barley kernel it is necessary to crush it first using a mill to crack open the barley making sure not to crush it into fine powder.

Malt - the sugary goodness inside the grain is only starch when it is harvested, so the grain must be malted by soaking in warm water and tricked into sprouting. This process starts the natural enzymes in the grain to start converting starches to sugars. By drying them quickly the enzymes are halted and you get malted grain, also just called malt.

Steep - just like tea, in order to get the flavor and color from your grain in an extract/grain batch of beer, soaking the grain in warm water will get you much of the character of your beer.

Mash - when you ad your hot water to your grain it is called your mash. If you have ever made Oat Meal, Grits, or Cream of Wheat, you have made a mash before, you probably just never used too much water and collected it to drink later.

Single Infusion Mash - the strike water is added at the beginning of the mash time and the temperature is held during the entire mashing process.

Step Mash - a more complex mashing program where the strike temperature is low and gradually increases over time during the mashing process. For instance you may start at 113°F for the first 15 min, then increase the mash temp to 150°F for the next 50 min and finish the last 10 minutes at 168°F. When viewed on a temp over time chart this looks like steps.

Protein Rest - part of a step mash program. There are different proteins in your beer that will breakdown at certain temperatures during the mash and reduce haziness. Although most brewing grain these days are modified well enough (meaning the starches have already been turned to sugar and proteins have already been broken down), there are circumstances where a protein rest may still be needed.

Sparge - this is just a fancy word to describe the process of rinsing you grain in order to pull out more sugar, color and flavor. If you pour warm water over your bag of grain in a partial mash or grain/extract recipe it called sparging. Draining (Lautering) your mash while you add water at the same rate you are draining is called fly sparging. Draining your mash, then adding a bunch more water, then draining again is called batch sparging.

Strike water - this is the preheated water you add to your grain in the mash.

Hot liquor tank (HLT) - this is a bit misleading since there is no alcohol involved. It really should be called a hot water tank. It is any vessel that holds your preheated water to be used for you mash or your sparge.

Boil Kettle - a big stock pot for boiling your wort and adding hops and other adjuncts such as coriander, orange peel, pumpkin, etc.

Lautering - draining the liquid from your mash.

Mash/Lauter tun - a mash tun is any vessel (commonly a kettle or a cooler) that holds your mash. A lauter tun is any vessel used to drain the liquid from your mash, which in homebrewing is the same vessel as the mash tun. These names can be used interchangeably or combined. It is often referred to as an MLT. Most MLTs use either a false bottom (shown below) or manifold to separate the wort from the grain.

 

Wort - often pronounced wert, it is the sugary liquid that will eventually turn to beer after yeast is added and it is fermented.

Racking - transferring your beverage by siphoning.

Pitching - referring to yeast it just means adding.

Pitch Rate - the ratio between the amount of yeast you are adding to the density and volume of your wort.

Flocculation - how much yeast will stay in suspension.

Attenuation - how much sugar the yeast will eat before falling out of suspension.

Specific Gravity - a measurement of density of liquid. Hydrometers are an inexpensive and reliable way to read your Gravity.

Original gravity - the density of liquid before fermentation. Abbreviated O.G.

Final gravity - the density of liquid after fermentation. Abbreviated F.G. This number will be lower than the O.G. since alcohol is less dense than water.

Plato - another measurement of density similar to Specific Gravity. Often used to yeast pitch rate calculations.