Batch #4 Brewing

The other day I brewed my fourth batch. It was AHS Hefeweizen Mini-Mash kit. It was my first time doing a mini mash.

A few notes:

Towards the end of the steeping, I turned the gas back on to keep the temperature up around 155, but I turned my back and it creeped up to about 168. It was probably there for 3-5 minutes. I took it off heat immediately and let it sit and cool down. It was towards the end of it anyway, so I let it sit for the rest of the time (probably another 5 minutes), and then let the grains drip out and poured some 170 degree water through it.

It was the first time I used a yeast starter. The wort I used to make the starter was probably a lot more concentrated than it should have been (I put too much DME in). I decided to even it out with a little more water. The bottle was too small though, so it ended up over flowing when it fermented. I poured into a larger jar (got my erlenmeyer fask in the mail the next day), and it seemed to go alright, but I lost some yeast. There was still a good amount there.

To cool it down, I used a mixture of an ice water bath, and adding cold water to the wort. I was concerned I wouldn't have enough ice and would take too much time (my sink at school is smaller) which is why I did this. Hopefully it doesn't effect it much.


Target OG was 1.050
My OG ended up being around 1.045