[Hickory]

Doing my first BIAB on Wednesday and was wondering what advice y'all might have. Brewing a Scottish 70 shilling recipe from my LHBS.

6.75 lbs Muntons Marris Otter
4 oz Crisp Crystal 60
4 oz Briess Chocolate
2 oz Briess Carapils
2 oz Peated Malt

1oz UK Fuggles @ 60 min
Wyeast 1728

The recipe has no direction on how to treat water, mash thickness, ferm temp, or anything like that. Using Brewing Classic Styles as a reference.

[HoosierBrew]

Personally, I would drop the peated malt. Scottish brewers don't actually use it - just an American homebrewing myth. You'll like your beer better without it.

[Hickory]

Ya that was my first mistake. I picked up the grains, already milled, THEN read the Scottish portion of BSC. He was pretty adamant not to have the Peated Malt, but it was already crushed and mixed.

[HoosierBrew]

Well, try it and then you can brew it again later without and compare. Stuff happens.

[cascadesrunner]

Do you have your mash temps lined out?

[Hickory]

Right now I'm thinking a 1.5 mash ratio with my strike water at 161 to hit a target mash temp around 150-152. I'm not sure if I should mash in my entire preboil volume or try to sparge my grains.

[Stevie]

I "sparge" when I BIAB but that is purely out of necessity with my smaller kettle that I use for BIAB. I put the bag in a colander and pour the water over it.

I would aim higher on the mash temp. 156-158.

[cascadesrunner]

One thing keep in mind is that your first batch is a learning session.  My first BIAB was joke from a mash efficiency standpoint.  Keep good notes on time, temp and gravity throughout the process for when you drop this without the peat next time.  Good luck and have fun.

[homoeccentricus]

If your kettle is large enough you add all the water for mashing. Using BIAB is supposed to make things simpler.

[erockrph]

If your kettle is large enough you add all the water for mashing. Using BIAB is supposed to make things simpler.

+1 - BIAB was developed to be a one-vessel process using the full volume of mash water in one step. A sparge is not necessary if your vessel can handle the full volume of mash liquor.

[Hickory]

Well everything went alright. Target OG was 1.040 and I hit 1.044 and hit volume within a quart or so. I do have another question though. I used just straight RO water. With everything else I didn't even think about getting the things I needed to treat the water. What should I have done besides used just RO water?

[Phil_M]

Well everything went alright. Target OG was 1.040 and I hit 1.044 and hit volume within a quart or so. I do have another question though. I used just straight RO water. With everything else I didn't even think about getting the things I needed to treat the water. What should I have done besides used just RO water?

Gypsum (CaSO4) and calcium cholride (CaCl2) will really help your mash reach the proper pH. As for how much to use, I'm still working on that myself and can't really by of much help yet.

I BIAB as well, haven't used RO yet but I'm preparing to buy a RO system, I've got lousy water. If you exceeded your target gravity you're doing a lot better than me!