Mashing In

Brew Days start at 5am. First we fill up the Mash Tun vessel with hot water. When we have it half full, then we start the mill and begin mashing in. The malt is dumped into an auger that lifts the malt up and drops through the mill and into a chute that sends it into the mash tun below.

The type of crush is very important. If it the malt is too finely crushed, we will have problems with dust later on. If we do not crush it enough, we will not get all of the possible sugars out of the malt. Ideally the malt will be just cracked open, so that the endosperm is exposed, and the husks are intact and available for use in in the next step.

We hold the mash at 155 degrees until all of the starch has been 'magically' converted into sugar by the enzymes naturally present in the malt. This usually only takes a half hour or so. On some beers we will do multiple steps to use different types of enzymes, such as proteases and betaglucanase.

Lautering

When it is ready, we pump the mash over into the the Lauter Tun vessel. This vessel has a false bottom or screen in it that holds back the grains. We slowly run the liquid off the mash into the Grant, which acts like a buffer zone so we don't get suction on the bed. This liquid is now called Wort, a German word for un-fermented beer.

By recirculating the wort back up to the top of the lauter tun, the husks of the barley will rest on the screen and form a filter bed. This clarifies the wort, making it run clear. When it is clear, we start running off the wort into the boiling kettle. We add hot water to the top of the grain bed to fully extract all of the sugars out of the mash. We keep doing this until the Kettle is full.

When we are done, we have to drain the Mash Tun, and shovel the spent grains out into a cart. We push the cart onto the dock and shovel them out onto the farmers truck. The farmer then feeds the spent grains to cattle.

Boiling

When the kettle is full, the wort is then brought to a boil. We boil the wort for a full hour or longer. At certain times during the boil, we add hops to the wort. It is essential that hops be boiled in order for their bitterness to be perceived. Some hops, called finishing hops are added later in the boil for aroma and flavor. The boiling also sterilizes the wort and breaks down large proteins which settle out to the bottom. We measure the success of our boil by the amount of evaporation. A high evaporation rate is good, because you are removing off flavors like DMS that can form in the intense heat of the boil.

After the boil is complete, the wort is transferred over to the Whirlpool Vessel. This tank has a tangential entry, which gives the incoming wort a spin. This makes the hops and protein sediment go to the center, just like how when you stir up a cup of tea, the tea leaves will go to the center.

Cooling

The wort is now drawn off the bottom of the Whirlpool Vessel and pumped through the Heat Exchanger. This cools the wort by passing over many plates that have cold water on the other side. We cool our wort down to 55 degrees, which is an appropriate temperature for lager fermentation. Here also we inject the yeast, which has been harvest fresh that day from last weeks fermentation. We also add a tiny bit of oxygen that yeast need to grow and divide before they begin their fermentation.

After going through the Heat Exchanger, the wort is sent downstairs into a freshly cleaned Fermentation Tank.