This week, we have Rex Slagel and we talk about one of the most fundamental pieces of home brewing equipment out there when people start homebrewing specifically in all-grain- the brew bag.
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Show Transcript
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Colter Wilson: On this week’s episode, we’re going to talk about one of the most fundamental pieces of home brewing equipment out there. When people start homebrewing specifically in all-grain. One of the. Easiest ways to go. All grain obviously brews in a bag. So today I have Rex legal on the show. And we’re going to talk specifically about the brew back this week on homebrewing DIY.
And welcome back to home brewing DIY the podcast that takes on the do it yourself, aspect of home brewing. Gadgets, contraptions, and parts. The show covers it all on this week show, we’re talking to Rex legal, the founder and creator of the brew bag, which is a. BIAB or brew in a bag or filter that you can buy for home brewing.
Rex is a great guy. And we talk about some of the challenges and myths out there about brewing a bag as well as what kind of quality you want to look for when purchasing a bag. So stick around for that interview. But first I’d like to thank all of our patrons over at Patreon.
It’s that ongoing support that keeps this show coming to you week after week. Another way to support the show is to head over to pod. chaser.com or if you’re listening to us on Apple podcasts, just scroll to the bottom of your app and leave us a five-star review. Your views are also will help others find the show.
The last way to support the show is to head over to our website, homebrewingDIY.beer. And you can use our sponsor banners, our sponsor banners also help support the show and just going over there and clicking on one of those, your prices stay the same, but you can buy software like brew father. And they know that we sent you and then they, in turn, support the show.
Another way to support the show is to go to coffee. That’s K O dash F i.com forward slash homebrewing DIY. And there you can give one-time support. So, if you want to leave us a tip or buy us a beer head over to coffee.com forward slash homebrewing DIY. And. Not a lot going on in my brewery right now. I do have a couple of projects where I am starting to work on my group, high remix. I’m in the process of gathering all my parts. I, I almost have them all. I’m now to where I’m just waiting on a single relay and I can start my build.
Also need to do some other things, like get the high voltage side. So a plug, I need to get a power cord and things like that, but that’s just a quick trip to Home Depot, not a big deal. And, you know, just, those are kind of the things that are brewing in my brewery. I’ve now got quite a little yeast bank of
Mike’s right now. And so we’re going to be making lots of beer here at the home brewing DIY world. I’ve got some Oslo, obviously, I’ve just made a beer with that. I also just got some Voss. Some. Garah. And some Lutra as well as the horn and doll strain. So I’ve got quite a little yeast bank of dried
Laying around and I’m going to make some beers out of those. So pretty excited about that. I think I’m actually going to try to squeeze a brew day and tomorrow, and. Just do a quick Pilsner and trade the Lutra. So see how that tastes. I’ll let you know. Cause you know, I’d like to talk about what I’m brewing on the show.
Well, let’s jump into this week show where we’re going to talk to Rex legal and we’re going to talk to him. About the brew back
1-Colter-2: I’d like to welcome Rex Slagle to homebrewing DIY. Hi Rex. How are you?
2-Rex: Doing great. Thanks for that. Thanks for the invitation.
1-Colter-2: Awesome. Rex is the owner and proprietor of the brew bag.com. If you’ve ever seen me talk about it excessively on this show, it’s probably because they are one of our affiliate sponsors for the show and Rex, thank you so much for taking my email and coming down to the show to talk us about brew backs today.
2-Rex: You’re welcome. And I guess right off the bed, I’d like to make this a slight correction it’s brew in a bag.com, but the bag itself is known as the brew bag. So the website is brew in a bag.com.
1-Colter-2: Is right. It is brew in bag.com and it is called the brew bag. So thank you for correcting me. And you’re going to also correct me because I just went off calling it a bag. And I think you like to refer to it as a filter. Is that correct?
2-Rex: Yes, I do. We started that trend a little while ago. Uh, I shouldn’t say a little while ago now. It’s actually probably been four years ago when I, I, no joke was changing the oil in my car and it dawned on me that I was actually selling a filter. And not a bag, uh, and that really changed our approach to how we do business.
So yeah, that’s what it all happened.
1-Colter-2: Well, I’m going to try to change my terminology here on out and call up my, my, my filter for my brew. And w. I also want to just let everyone know. I actually use one of your filters and have since about 2016 and I’ve had the original one that I bought in 2016 and still use it to this day. It is the bag that I use for every beer I’ve made since 2016.
So, and that’s a lot of beer. And so, uh, I want to say it is a great quality bag. I also want to let everyone know, I’m going to ask Rex to take is I own a, uh, Filter company had offered just the beginning of this to talk about, you know, Bruin a bag is a style of beer that has been out, I would say since the late aughts, right.
It really kind of originated in Australia. And before that, It was really specifically in the United States, a style of brewing that was not really around. And then it kind of became a thing. So my question for you would be, how did you feel ruined a bag and what was it like when you got started? Like how did you find out about it?
How did you, what it give you your first experience using a bag?
2-Rex: Yeah. Uh, well, it actually was a bit of frustration on my part. I had been brewing extract for a while, maybe a year and a half or so, and I was ready to, you know, quote-unquote, graduate to all-grain. Uh, and so like everybody else doing that process, I needed to buy the equipment. So, you know, my kids asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I said a cooler, you know, so I could have a mash turn and me.
Uh, bought some, uh, you know, the ball valve and some other attachments and things that I was gonna use Christmas came, opened up. My cooler, went into the basement to put it together. And, uh, I had miscalculated the, uh, the ball bath, LinkedIn STEM, and all that kind of thing. Anyway, it did fit. And I was a little ticked because I was pretty excited about, you know, getting my brew gear, going.
And so I thought, you know, what other people do? How does this all happen? You know, are there any other methods? Do you have to have a mash tun, a six-foot-tall piece of equipment, or all of that stuff? And so I literally got on the internet. I started looking for, uh, other alternatives, you know, in other ways to brew.
And I came across brew in a bag and I didn’t know anything about it at all. But I thought it made sense. And so I started just doing a little investor and I couldn’t find a bag that I thought was either good enough strong enough. Or frankly, there was, there was, a woman in Ireland who was, again, a great bag, a really good bag.
Uh, but she had three children and the deal was you had to give her 20 bucks upfront. And then when she got time to make your bag, she calls you or sends you an email or whatever, and you give her the other 20 bucks and then she’d make your bag. And she said, sometimes it can take six weeks and sometimes it could take three months.
So if you’re willing to wait, I can make you a great bag. And I was like, well, I’m not willing to wait. So, uh, you know, that, that,
1-Colter-2: think back at that time, in those days, the average kind of thing was like, Hey, get a paint strainer bag. Right. This was those times, right?
2-Rex: Oh, yeah, that was in 2011. Right. And so the kick was, you know, just go to the fabric store, buy a piece of fabric and, you know, whack it off at the top, make it fit your cuddle and that’s your bag. Um, and an absolute that. And, and, and so there was another guy who was making bags out there. Um, and I just didn’t think his bags were strong enough.
And so, I, I mean, I guess I took, you know, the Irish woman’s. The bag which had strapping around the bottom, which I thought was odd since that was a stress point. And I just took that sort of concept and I invented the Brubeck, um, the way it’s made now with the strapping that goes all the way around. And I actually took it to a friend of ours, the idea to a friend of ours, my wife and I kind of had it.
The argument about how it should be made. So I thought that might not be a good thing to continue that. Yeah. So I took it to this friend of ours and within about 45 minutes, she made the first brew bag and that was my bag. Um, and that was all there was to it. It was that simple. And so I never even considered that it could be a business at that point.
But, uh, when I went to like brew gigs with other guys and, you know, I was using it and folks started asking me. Where I got it. And then could you make me one, you know, you, you finished and, you know, three hours, I still got another two hours to go. This is amazing. So I started making them extra other people.
I didn’t actually, I’ve never actually made it back myself, but, um, I found someone to serve the bags and the concept was there and that’s really how it started. Um, and you know, I just, one thing led to another and I started just chasing the rabbit. Um, and here we are, you know, two, 2000, 27 years later, eight years later, actually.
And now we sell all over the world. Um, and, um, and it’s, it’s a good thing. So I think I answered your question, but I’m not positive. Did I answer your
1-Colter-2: no, you did. You did. How, how did you get into brewing a bag? And it seems to be out of necessity. And I think that that’s kind of the case with everyone. Right. And I would say I have a very similar story when I was going all-grain around 2013. So a couple of years later than you. It brewed a bag was all the rage.
And that was kind of the thing out there. It was like, Hey, just go get a piece of fabric and it can be a paint strainer bag, or it can just be any type of nylon bag it’s going to work. And I went on to Amazon, I got a bag and it was a really, really coarse filter on it. And. It left a lot of particulates.
And actually, I ended up getting a hot kettle and melting the bag. Right. So I had a lot of issues when I started off with my brew and a bag set up. Then right from that bag, I went to one of your bags and I will say that that was a game-changer. And so what I’d like to talk about specifically is obviously you started off with a bag with straps.
Kind of went from there. What kind of modifications did you make to the bag as you started to brew with it more and started to realize that, Hey, this method actually has ramifications.
2-Rex: Well, the desire of the bank hasn’t changed, honestly, uh, the original bag. I had a photo of the very first time I used it. I was actually lifting it with a piece of wood. How did my kettle and I took a photo of it on my deck, and I still have that photo that ended up in the bag that we sell now is exactly the same design?
What has changed is that okay? I recognized that we were selling a filter. And because we were selling a filter, uh, you know, all sorts of ideas, concepts, and challenges sort of popped in my head. And I started wondering about what if we’re actually selling a filter, what does it really mean?
What does it do to the brewing process? Does it mean to grind? What does it mean to, you know, time? What does it mean to set up? And all of those sorts of questions just popped all over me. And I’ve written a ton of information on our blog and those were all the initial, you know, ideas and concepts and things that I expanded on when I began to understand that this bag would change the way people brew.
Not just as a convenience or as a way to prevent a stuck runoff, but literally could change the brewing community, uh, in their approach to how they brew. Uh, because it becomes, it could become a staple, like a false bottom or like a ball valve or like, or whatever. It really could become a piece of equipment.
Um, and it has, as a matter of fact, right. Folks just go right to that. But I think maybe one of them, probably one of the biggest changes that occurred not too long ago, maybe a year and a half ago is when we started introducing different micron ratings of the fabric into the commercially available bags.
So now folks can, you know, depending on what they’re brewing, what they’re separating, you know, what they’re trying to strain or filter, you know, we, we can give them some recommendations based on. Um, you know, the components, of what they’re manufacturing literally. Um, so we’ve really turned into a, you know, sort of a filter company more than just, uh, you know, brewing a bag sort of thing.
Right. It’s advanced, uh, to a great degree. Um, and we sell, honestly, I don’t know, off the top of my head. I read that. I read that down at one point, I want to say 20 or 25 different industries. Uh, use our bag now for all sorts of things from, from literally straining worm castings to grape juice, to jalapeno sauces.
Um, uh, even rocks people use them to clean rocks. We also make bags for a guy in Hawaii who does micro cleanup on the beach. Um, so, you know, it’s sort of advanced and that sort of way, that’s not, I mean, we’re not talking about beer now, but I’m just saying the filter concept is what really, uh, changed the way we do business and in our application, as far as brewers are concerned too, um, depending on what they’re trying to do,
1-Colter-2: and you guys designed tags based on the type of vessel you’re using. Like for example, for years, I’ve brewed in a Kaggle and you have a specific Kegel bag versus like a bag for a cooler, right.
2-Rex: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. We, we, I conceptually believe that the bag should be, it should act as if it’s not there. Right. So choosing a bag is, and choosing the right size bag is an integral part, of the application itself. So if your bag is too small, for example, simple, and some folks, they all that fit just right, right.
It’s nice and tight on the outside, but if it’s tight on the outside, that means it’s not loose on the inside. And if it’s not loose on the inside, that means the grain is being constricted to some degree. That’s not good. Then you don’t get the proper water to grain contact, uh, that you could or should get, uh, which optimizes conversion.
If the bag is too big, then you get pockets inside the kettle itself or the grain settles. Uh, it does sort of the same thing as constriction where those pockets, you know, sort of settle and you get balls of grain, uh, rather than being the thing, you know, acting as if the bag is not there at all. Um, and stirring then becomes an issue if the bag is too big as well, you pick it up, you kick it, you know, you, you can tear it, um, doing, doing that if the bag is too big.
So now
1-Colter-2: Yeah, so, and one of the things you mentioned just now was the different levels of conversion that you can get via the bag. Let’s say I’m a new brewer. I’m starting out brew in a bag. Obviously, if somebody came to me and they’re asking me questions, Hey, what can I do to help with my efficiency? The first thing I’m going to say is what does your crush look like?
W but. What kind of tips would you give a new brewer when it comes to brewing a bag? When it comes to trying to get a good conversion on a beer?
2-Rex: Yeah. So it’s a pretty simple thing. The folks, you know, kind of go back, go backward instead of forward. Um, when I first began to understand what we were doing, I really began to question. What the mill was all about, right? What’s a meal do. Um, and at one point I thought a three roller mill was the bomb.
Like you got to get a three load mill because that’s got more, got more rollers, right? So it must grind your grain better, right. Or something, but that’s not the case. And most folks don’t know that that’s three roller mill is really only meant to help you avoid a stuck runoff because of the first roller.
Cracks the grain open and leaves the husk mostly intact. The next two rollers actually crushed the green. So that was a tip-off that. Oh, well, why are we doing that? What’s the Husky all about? What’s the point of that? Well, it’s sloughs the grain bed to some degree, right? It prevents the clogging or mushing and you know, you get a stuck run-up cause he doesn’t get through the grind is the flow that water doesn’t flow to the grain, but to roller mill.
Is obviously key to the whole thing. And you can have your mill interview, grain mill that a store, but they most likely aim for, or, you know, three, nine or four, one or something like that because they don’t want to get complaints about people getting stuck. Runoffs. Why? Because if you mill to fine with typical pickups, not using a fabric filter.
Then they get clogged, right? They get clogged because they just do, they fill up with grain, particularly dust, Dustin, tiny bits, or whatever the case. So milling properly, which is what I always tell people is mill as low as yours, as your mill will take the grain. Right. So I set mine at two. Oh, because that’s as low as I could set it and have the grain still go through it.
And you could reduce it. Right. And do it again if you want. And there’s a lot of stuff out there that, you know, people say, well, mill your grain twice. That’s, you know, you’ll get higher efficiency, but I don’t understand that, frankly, because if you don’t, if you don’t have an adjustable mill and you, you know, you mill it one time and then you run it through again, I think, well, what did you just accomplish?
I mean, you just, you know, you’ve, you’ve milled it three. Oh, and you put it again at three. Oh, what did you do?
1-Colter-2: got
2-Rex: Did you still got three? So unless you adjust your meal, you didn’t gain anything, but the proper crush is all about optimizing the grain for conversion. So you want as many green bits particles, dust, flour, you know, to whatever degree you can mill to touch the water as possible because in the water.
Are the enzymes, right? The enzymes convert the starch. So the smaller, the starches, the bits of starch, the greater the opportunity to convert, to convert in a faster time period, but also more thoroughly. So, you know, if you have a thousand bits of grain, as opposed to 10 bits of grain, well, you know, those thousand bits from the same kernel are going to be much, much smaller enzymes can attack them and do what they’re supposed to do quicker, easier, you know, because it’s more available, it’s a broader sort of spectrum if you will, to look at it that way.
Um, so one of the things every brewer should do is. Optimize their grain crush for conversion, not to avoid a stuck runoff. And I’ll, I’ll throw this a little, this, this is a little sample study, a guy in Chicago, and I did sort of for almost a year and a half or two years, I forget how long exactly. But anyway, we, we tracked and put in the spreadsheet, all of our brews and he did roughly 75 in that time period.
And so did I, for that matter? And both of us using, you know, a typical that, that milker, I mean, that mill setting and a 2.6, uh, water to grain ratio mean 2.6 quarts per pound of grain water, the grain ratio, both of us average 78.5% efficiency with no recirculation with no pumps. Without any other equipment of any sort one kettle, one bag grain, that’s it.
We both average 78 and a half percent. So I just tell brewers if you’re not averaging 78 and a half percent, there’s something in your process that is not optimized. And I don’t know what it is. You have to tell me what you’re doing, but usually, it’s water to grain ratio and green crush. And if you get those two things right.
It’s just, you know, it’s just magic. It just does what it’s supposed to do.
1-Colter-2: Yeah. And do you squeeze your bag or not? What’s that? That’s the big
2-Rex: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
1-Colter-2: the hell out of mine, so
2-Rex: Yeah. I always say I always have no reason not to
1-Colter-2: I know, but you get people that are out there, like don’t squeeze the bag, always. Like I’ve not squeezed my bag and I’ve never had an issue. I actually had my original and a bag calculator that I had and I had to make adjustments in it so that I could figure out how much water I was going to have left to calibrate for the squeeze.
Right. And I will tell you that. Squeezing. My bag is something that I do and I, and I try to get every drop of water out of it. It might, my bag is dry when I’m done.
2-Rex: Yeah, closest again. The big argument out there though. It was just a myth, of course, you know, you’ll get tannins if you squeeze your back. And I don’t know how that started. Yeah, somebody must’ve been a geologist or something. And I looked up, you know, how do you get, how do you get tannins out of a rock? I don’t really know.
1-Colter-2: I think it more comes from party guile brewing. Right. And so the idea is that, and I don’t know. Moved into squeezing. But I think that you know, for example, when you’re brewing things like a party and you have your first runnings, then you make a beer from the second runnings. And then when you get into like the third or fourth runnings, it does become a very tannin latent beer.
Right. If you’re trying to get as much out of it with what’s left of the husk, but with Bruna bag, I just don’t think that you’re ever going to squeeze enough to get tenants out of it. You just can’t.
2-Rex: you, you can’t, and, and speaking of the party guy, we’re going to get for a second, third running, right? The primary reason for that and this is the old days we have the advantage now that we didn’t have before is that the pH is the primary factor that brings on the tenants. So when pH goes above 5.8, Then bang, you know, you start getting poly feeler or polymer.
I forget the exact phrase. I apologize for that. But anyway, there’s a phrase by which, you know, uh, tannins are created, um, and it involves pH and enzymes and all the other things in the, in the word, but that’s when it occurs and it has nothing to do with it. So in the old days, right, you just sparked you as far as with water, you get water and your spark.
So as the buffers in the grain move into the boil kettle and they are not in the mash, done the pH rises as you’re sparging. And that sets up the scenario for tan and extraction.
1-Colter-2: Exactly. And I, I think that somehow that is where people got the dull squeeze, the bag you’re going to get tannins. So it’s kind of, but to me, it’s, it, it makes sense if you’re washing your grain and you’ve watched it. The way, all the sugar, all that’s left is going to be basically very basic water going through that.
And you’re pulling out all that’s left and tenants. So yeah. Well, one thing that I think people have when it comes to. A brew in a bag set up is when you get into larger beers, like for example, I find, and this has to do with the size of my kettle specifically that when I get into beers that are tr I’m shooting for a 10 70, or a 10 80 beer, I do start to lose efficiency.
When it comes to brewing in a bag, I’ve actually overcome that. I just mashed twice now, and I have zero issues. That’s actually how I’ve overcome it, but what other kinds of ways could you get better efficiency when you’re looking for big beers in Bruna bag?
2-Rex: Well, the primary way to maintain efficiency and I’ve got records just to verify this is to not let your water to grain ratio change. Instead. I mean, it depends on what you’re after. Right? You gotta make a choice. If you’re gonna do a big beer, you can even say I’m going to brew less beer and have the same efficiency or I’m going to brew the same amount of beer and I’m going to suffer efficiency.
And so the bag is, has pieces of no consequence to reduced efficiency, uh, whether you’re a starch guy or a, or a bad guy, the more grain you put in that kettle. With the water to grain ratio being reduced because of the additional grain in both cases, efficiency will drop. And the reason is the water worked can’t get out or through the grain bed itself.
So if you decide to make a big beer, in my case, I simply adjusted my volumes. Right. So I would lose, I would use more grain and more water, but I would only brew. Let’s say, you know, I always did nine-gallon batches. That’s because that’s what fits in my kettle. And I just did. Um, so if I were going to do a big beer, for example, I might just say, I’m going to do a seven-gallon batch instead of a nine-gallon batch because then my water to grain ratio stays the same.
And I, my efficiency never went down. I never had that issue
1-Colter-2: And see that makes total sense. That makes total sense. Cause I, I just mashed twice to make the same beer. Right. And I matching twice. I keep my water to grain ratio. Correct. And in doing so I don’t lose that efficiency.
2-Rex: Yeah. The convert conversion is a, is a pretty simple thing. I mean, you could, you could not grind grain, put it in a bowl of water, and eventually it’s going to convert, even if you didn’t grind it. Right. So conversion is not the factor in, uh, in, in, in that scenario. Cause it’ll convert no matter what, if you do a one, you know, if you do one core per pound, if you do 2.6 worth per pound, it’s, it’s still going to convert.
It’ll just take longer. The issue is getting it out of the mash tun and into the kettle. In the case of the Bruna bag, it’s already in the kettle. So there is no washing quote unquote of the grain. Uh, and some guys still sparks when they do bring it back. You know, that everybody does their own thing. It’s sort of a mental game.
I think we play with ourselves that, you know, you gotta wash it, you gotta rinse it. You gotta get that sugar off. But the reality
1-Colter-2: seen all kinds of stuff.
2-Rex: yeah. And whatever works for you, you know, that’s what you do. But the reality is all of the grain is in the cattle. All of the water’s already in the kettle. You can’t increase efficiency by sparging.
What’s already there. I mean, you’re in fact, you’re diluting at that point unless you hold backwater, you know, gallon or whatever it is from your total volume, you can’t make more than is already there. I mean, if you’ve got a one, one Oh five Oak beer, well, then that’s what you got. I’ve got to get it.
It can only, you know, it can only get what it can get. It’s just is what it is.
1-Colter-2: And one other kind of thing that I hear from. Three vessel brewers. Uh, I hear this from people that don’t brew in a bag all the time or people who brew in a bag and then decided to go to the three-vessel system or even just to batch sparging. One of the things that I hear from them is that, Hey, when I, when I brewed in a bag or were using, was using a brewing filter, I didn’t get as good a clarity.
And I think that personally, I think that that’s a myth. I have zero issues with my clarity, but let’s talk about it scientifically. Why would somebody?
2-Rex: It has everything to do with the grain bill and nothing to do with the bag. Um, so, so the grain bill, right? All the excess, if you use a lot of, uh, grains that produce high protein, for example, um, you’re going to get a reduction in clarity in the kettle, right. Or in the fermentor. But when you put the beer on the table, if you do everything the way you’re supposed to, you’re still gonna get a nice, clear beer.
Um, and I, you know, even, you know, Marshall and the guys did a clarity test, uh, on bag versus no bag squeeze versus no squeeze. And they said, yup. Yup. You know, we’ve got a little issue here. You can certainly tell the difference, but one brew and one-grain bill and I, I talked to Marshall and said, you know, you really need to, you really need to expand that.
Over different grain bills so that you can see the real results, uh, from all sorts of different grain bills. Because once it’s not going to provide the exact same results, I mean, you can look on the wall of fame on the brew bag, right on our website. We have lots of guys who have got lots of awards. Uh, and clarity is one of the, uh, factors when those judges do the voting, right?
When they make their tests, clarity is a factor and you know, the wall of fame on our website just keeps getting more and more additions to it. I gotta say, you know, it’s hard to refute that you can say, well, I’m using a brew bag. Always gives you a cloudy beer. Cause it’s just not the truth.
1-Colter-2: Hey, I’ve, I’ve won medals for loggers using my brew bag. So.
2-Rex: Yeah,
1-Colter-2: And, and I’m sorry, a lager and clarity and a lager that is everything right there. Right. and we’re talking like I made a Helis, so this was as pale of a lager issue could make, and I want a medal. So, yes. Uh, I, I would, I would completely agree with you on that.
It’s just that I’m trying to back down some of the myths that you hear when people are making that decision to go with either a brewing in a bag or filter style brewing. But
2-Rex: Yeah, well, that’s let me throw this out to you too. Cause it’s sort of, it’s not, it’s not a detriment, but it’s a, it’s a thing that folks say to me and I disagree with them gently, but it’s the truth. I mean, folks tell me, you know, I got your bag and my efficiency went up, my efficiency went up 10 points and I say, well, what did you do?
Different nothing. I just put the bag in that. And I say, well, then it wasn’t the bag. Our bag didn’t increase your efficiency. You know, that didn’t happen. That particular beer you might have. You know, who knows what, but that bag did not do a little Hocus Pocus in your Grainville right. Or your process. It just didn’t happen.
You know, you did something different.
1-Colter-2: Yeah, I agree. It has. I think that people don’t put enough into the water to grain ratio. Cause I would say if there’s something in my personal beers that I don’t change much, it’s that? And I can tell you based on no matter whether I’m brewing in my Kegel or I’m brewing in a mash and boil, which are completely different shaped vessels.
I have zero. I could tell you what my efficiency is going to be. And I usually hit it spot on and that’s it’s because the water to green ratio is I try to keep those exactly the same every time.
2-Rex: That is the magic. And I, you know, that that comes from Brown Kaiser’s website. When I actually read that a long time ago, but as I read through all of his experiments, that was a key factor. And when I cued in on that and started matching, you know, 2.6 quarts per pound, that’s what he that’s when he found the highest efficiency conversion slash.
Occurred at 2.6 per pound or so a little higher even. Um, I cued up on that. I kept doing that and I started telling people to do that. And guess what happened? Everybody started getting 78, 79, 80 twos. You know, it just is what it is. That’s the magic. Yeah.
1-Colter-2: of cool. And now I want it, you know, As I said, when I started with my first bag, I bought an Amazon bag. I’ll go through the list of issues I had with it. Personally. I had issues with it leaving lots of heart. Hotpots not hot particulate, but lots of grain particulate in my work, because it was pretty, it had a lot of.
Space between all in the mesh, I would say very, it was a very open mesh and then it just wasn’t a very good quality bag. It actually tours pretty easily when I was taking it out, I do use a, a kind of lift to get my eye, my bag out. Now I actually just lift my bag out by hand and, and, and push it through a colander to get.
You know, some, some work on it to really squeeze the bag. Yeah. But basically when, when I was, those were some issues I had with a lower quality bag. I want to talk about your filters and really the things that really made it, them different from, you know, your $6 or $10 bag you would see online in comparison to yours.
2-Rex: Yeah. So, uh, we get those questions all the time. In fact, on our, you know, on our Facebook page, frequently, people say, you know, I just bought a pack of pink strangers at the Home Depot, and I’m good to go. I could, you know, I could get five, six batches out of those. They’re only five bucks for a pack. And I say, yeah, how many times do you do that?
In a year or two years, but you keep buying it. Why do you keep buying? Do they, do they break like when you’re spending the same amount of money over time? Why not just buy one bag? Right. And what they don’t consider is what I’m about to tell you. And that is, first of all, is that, is the fabric that you using food safe?
Does it leach in any way? What’s it made of, right. Um, secondly, what’s the composition of the fibers. And you have to consider that. And when I started doing all the research on the fabrics that we use, there’s a primary difference between monofilament and multifilament, uh, in polyester and other fabrics for that men.
Of course, those are, that’s not just specific to polyesters, but you know that under a microscope, a monofilament, uh, the thread is slick, meaning it has very few microscopic. Jags right. Or points that actually, uh, stick off of the thread itself, those microfibers or points, you know, are sticking points for bacteria.
And so that was a consideration of ours. We did mention to make sure that the bag was, you know, as reusable as possible and that folks didn’t have any issues. Of course, we boiled the word after we used the bag that sort of takes away from it, but we also didn’t want people having moldy bags. Right from organic materials and grains and sugars sticking to it, and then airborne mold attracted or catching on the bag.
So we wanted to make the bag as slick as possible. Um, and so we use monofilament fabric, monofilament thread in all of our bags. It’s also a food-grade or food say polyester. I don’t think I know for a fact, because I do the research on other bags. There’s not a single manufacturer anywhere in the world who guaranteed that their fabric is food safe, not a single one.
That’s a plus we think, and we have a food safety certificate. It gets on our website at any time we, okay, add a fabric or a piece of thread or whatever it might be. We run it through Veritas, which, uh, you know, does the research and the confirmations and the studies. And they give us the reports, say, you know, yes, uh, your stuff is good to go.
You can sell it to the public. I think that’s a big deal. People count on that from us. Uh, particularly in all the other industries that use our product as well. In fact, in some cases they require a certificate from us, uh, in order to buy our bags, you can’t get that from anybody else. And you certainly can’t get that at a brew store and there’s not a single wholesaler, you know, space that does that, except us.
If you ask anybody else, walk into a brew store and say, what’s the market I’m reading of this bag. They won’t have a clue. They just don’t. No. And the reason they don’t know cause they think it doesn’t matter. Right. Just use the bag. It doesn’t really make much difference. Um, there are some other things that may be too complicated, but I’ll just say briefly that there, there, there is a difference in the quality of the materials that are used as far as the threat is concerned and also the so you could buy, but 200-micron opening.
But that bag could be made from a smaller diameter thread, which means it’s going to have, uh, more threads in a given inch, then a different diameter thread with the same sort of openings. And I, I won’t go into all that because it’s really a long process. It’s kind of boring for most people, but, um, the bigger diameter thread, smaller diameter thread, those two, those two things are in our opinion, critical to what we buy and why we buy them.
Um, it also determines the weight of the bag. It also determines the PSI, right? How much can the bag hold and why does it hold that much weight? How can it hold that much weight? For example, the 200, uh, micron, uh, fabric that we use with the strapping can hold 200 pounds hanging all day long. They will never fail and it will never come apart in any way.
It will never rip on its own. In fact, you can’t rip that. There’s not a human being alive. That can rip that fabric with their bare hands. So sometimes people, you know, call us, Hey, I used my bag the second time and it’s split wide. Yeah. And I’d take, yeah. You know, that’s not possible. It just can’t happen.
Um, and usually what happens is they catch it on their thermometer and they didn’t even know it. That they could just split open on its own. Uh, but that’s not the case. So the 400-micron fabric that we sell and I don’t publish this. I’m just going to say it I’ve done it. It will hold 400 pounds. That’s pretty hefty when you’re talking about, you know, what, you’re, that’s a pot of grain and we sell bags to breweries for that reason.
They say I’m doing this. What do you get? Like I can help you, right? If you’re doing 55 gallons, if you’re doing a lot of nano and microbreweries, use those bags for that reason. Cause they are monsters. I mean, they hold a tremendous amount of grain, uh, and they allow these guys to make a lot more beer in a shorter period of time.
Then usually your typical setup. Right? So, um, You have to consider what you’re buying. And most people just don’t. Right? Most guys in a brew shop, particularly some of the guys that sell our products, but understand it because I, I talked to those guys and I say, here are the selling points. Here’s what you’re selling.
And here’s what you should do tell people, cause it matters. Um, so understanding what you’re buying is the primary difference. As far as melting the bag. You know, that’s just a process fault. Uh, there’s not a piece of fabric out there. That’s not gonna melt if you put it next to the fire, right. That’s just the way it is.
So polyester melted about 350 degrees, depending on how it’s put together it’s plus or minus 350 degrees, but they are different ways to burn a bag. Right? So I did an experiment where I took the fabric. I’d put it in the bottom of a kettle and I held it to the bottom of the kettle while the flame was on.
Adam was boiling. There was no grain in the book. It just, and it, and it didn’t anything happened. It just did just sat there. On the other hand, I took exactly the same fabric. I filled it with the grain. I put it in a kettle and I turned the flame on and it melted the bag. Why? Because it’s superheated. So between the bottom of the kettle.
And the bag there’s no space whatsoever. So when you turn on propane or you know that that’s 3,600 degrees or 2,600 degrees, I might be wrong. It’s one of those two, but yeah. Anyway, it’s really hot. Uh, there’s no, right. There’s no, there’s no room or space for that heat to go anywhere. It literally gets away from the grain.
And so it’s superheated. Between the bottom and the bag and the grain, it acts as an insulator and it’ll fry your bag right up. So you can melt it pretty easily. If you do that. Um, and nothing can be done about that. It just is what it is. And obviously, it got over 350 degrees or it wouldn’t have melted.
Right. So you’ve got to consider that. And, and I’ll just tag this with this fact, if you’re heating up your mash while the grain is in the kettle. You’re destroying or denaturing, the enzymes that are necessary to convert the starches. So getting a couple of degrees back is really a waste of energy. It’s a waste of probate and it’s a waste of beer for that matter because you’re losing exactly what you’re trying to attain.
Right. Which is. A higher conversion rate, a higher efficiency rate. That’s what, that’s what you’re aiming for. That’s what everybody does. And I’ll also say, you know, B amylase acts on starches between 131 degrees and 150 degrees. So if your mash is somewhere between that 131 to 150, your beer is not going to change.
It’s not going to taste any different. At 145 or 151 or 141 or a hundred, it’s going to change. It’s going to be exactly the same. So chasing temp is a myth in the brewing industry as well. And I’ve posted a number of enzyme conversion charts online, and it always gets a tremendous amount of attention because folks just don’t know, that they don’t realize it.
Um, and in fact that all the magazines that you see for particular. You know, brews award-winning beers. They always have the instructions that always says, you know, mash at 149 degrees for 60 minutes and then mash out at one 70 a night. I just said, well, whatever, you know, it just keeps saying that kind of stuff over and over and over, but it’s, doesn’t matter.
Make any difference whatsoever. Eh, you know, you know, Marshall did an experiment, whether it was 16 degrees or a 14-degree difference, no one could tell the final product was exactly the same. So if, if I, if I had one big tip for the brewing industry or the brewing world for homebrewers, it would be mashed temp, exact mesh temp is a myth.
That’s a myth. Um, and I’ll just leave it at that. And I know people are going to be like, Whoa, you can’t say that, but I can’t say that.
1-Colter-2: absolutely say whatever you want.
2-Rex: Cause it’s the truth and I’m not the one saying it it’s science and I could, I could give you all the information. It is the truth, uh,
1-Colter-2: you look even at historical brewing, right, that’s what step mashes were, right. They were just basically stepping the match all the way through that entire place. Like they, you know, start at the bottom, go in the middle, get to the, uh, on the, on the top side of that. And they were just kind of step matching their way, all the way through all the different, the different temperatures that were.
Doing different things. Right. And so it is, and an example would be, you see, people do stuff mashes at one 30, then you see them do it at one 50. Then you see them do it at like one 60 or one 70. Right. And so when you, when you look at them that they’re all over the place on both ends of that same temperature.
The range that you just gave to me. Right. And so it, and I, and they’re doing that with things like loggers, right. And we’re talking about these are the beers that are supposed to be the cleanest beers that you’re making. So
2-Rex: Yeah. And nobody’s ever done any real hardcore experiments on, uh, mash temp, uh, and. In the product results. What, you know, what if, what, what, what, what is right. Nobody’s ever really done that? I think it’s kind of less like, well, you know, it’s a known fact that if you, you know, you match at one 45, your beer is going to taste like this.
But if you imagine one 50, it’s going to taste different, but it’s not a known fact. It’s, there’s just, no, there’s no information out there proves that in any way. In fact, the opposite is a matter of fact, right? I’m sure. You and the other guys have said, you know, I blew my strike temp or I blew my mash tip.
I forgot. I walked away. When I got back, it knew it was 139 degrees. What am I going to do now? Well, you’re going to have a good beer. That’s what’s great. Yeah.
1-Colter-2: Uh, you gotta be honest, to be honest, I am way lax when it comes to things like that. I’m a big relaxed and have a Homebrew kind of guy. And so, yeah. For the most part, I make pretty good beer. I could tell you when beers go bad. For me, it always happens in fermentation. Yeah.
2-Rex: Yeah. Yeah, yeah,
1-Colter-2: no, I, and the things I care about are, are things like was my pH good, right?
Because those are the things that matter. And conversion is, you know if I have a really high pH, I worry about if it’s going to taste good or not, I don’t worry between a degree or five when it comes to my mash, I. Pretty lax when it comes to that, to be honest, when I was a, I’m now moving to a more electric.
So I think it’s a little easier to keep my mash temperature. But when I was doing a Kaggle on a, on a, on a burner, I got it to match temp. I threw my grain, I stirred it up. I checked it. It said it was right. I wrapped it in a blanket and I walked away for an hour. That’s how I mashed.
2-Rex: Yeah. And you know, another big factor there, most people don’t, they don’t like it doesn’t cue up, uh, that, you know, the conversion happens so fast,
1-Colter-2: Yeah. It’s like, it’s like 15 or 20 minutes.
2-Rex: Yeah. I mean, at 30 minutes you’re about 75% converted.
1-Colter-2: Yeah.
2-Rex: Right. So if that’s the case, you know, adding two degrees between 30 and 60. On 25% of the mash is inconsequential.
1-Colter-2: It’s a, it’s a lot of effort for not really a lot of gain. Right.
2-Rex: Yeah. Just, it just doesn’t matter. But particularly because you’ve got that hot, you know, that wide range, uh, of temp, uh, that, that the enzymes are working at anyway. So it just, it’s kind of, it’s counterintuitive, right? To say you ignore the. Ignore the, uh, the temperature of the mash. That doesn’t mean ignore it.
And just out of a hundred, that doesn’t mean ignore. It gets the 180. That means if you’re in the range, have another beer. You’re good to go. It doesn’t make any difference.
1-Colter-2: I couldn’t agree with
2-Rex: I think I started talking about what the fabric and then,
1-Colter-2: Yeah, we were talking about, we were talking about melting a
2-Rex: yeah. Anyway, sorry.
1-Colter-2: No, it’s a good time. This is, this is why we have a podcast. So, so other kinds of quality things when it comes to your bags. Cause I know, for example, the straps make a huge difference for me and they’re not really something you see in a lot of bags, right?
2-Rex: Well more and more people are starting to use them or put them on because they work. Right. Because they’ve seen our bag and, and our bag is pretty popular now. So, um, more folks are beginning to understand manufacturers, I should say, understand that, that they work. Right. They just work it’s, it’s easy to lift them up that way.
And that increases the strength of the bag. And it’s a. Uh, it allows you to hang it in, let it drink by itself also, you know, it’s just, it’s they just work. Uh, so the strapping is the strapping. Um, we modify our backs. There’s a number of different ways, depending on what people are doing with them. So if we’re making bags for hundred-gallon kettles or 200-gallon kettles, you know, we’ll add more straps or we’ll change the configuration of the strapping.
Uh, so that, that get the. The corrector best, uh, weight to bag ratio. Right? So they’re going under as they get it, it won’t break, it won’t fall apart. You’ve put in 300 pounds in a bag, it needs to be strong and it can’t fail. You know, if it fails, that’s a big problem and it’s dangerous correctly. Um, so, you know, we do other things with them and I think that’s another advantage that, uh, that, that we have is that no one makes a custom bag.
Uh, that I’m aware of in the United States and I’m, I mean, I’m positive. No one does it really well. That’s not true. There’s one. I got to make it’s a bag. Um, but uh, not on the level or scale that we can, and I don’t think as quickly as we can for that matter. Um, they just can’t, they can’t do it, uh, particularly for some, you know, we have a lot of commercial customers now, um, and those guys require specific sizes and micron ratings and that kind of thing.
So. You know, we do that. You can’t go to a homebrew store and say, I need a bag to fit this kettle. And they’ll just say, well, there it is, then you’ll say, well, what does it fit? And they won’t know.
1-Colter-2: No, I can tell you right now, like my, my Kegel bag has like a taper at the bottom. That’s very different than if you just went and bought a bag and it’s, it’s shaped for the Kaggle. It’s, it’s, it’s hard to explain, but it like, the Kegel has a small hole. Right. You use that to get a lid to fit. And so when I pick that back up with a pulley or something like that, and I’m by myself, I can pull that bag out of the ward and it’s not going down the sides.
It’s actually still staying in the hole. And a lot of it has to do with the shape of my back. Right.
2-Rex: Yeah, we designed it purposely that way. Um, yeah, I mean, I purposely designed it so that when you lift it up, The work funnels are focuses to the center of the bag so that it so gush over the sides, uh, right. Because it’s touching or grabbing onto the sides and that would happen, uh, if it didn’t otherwise.
And so we made it, it’s actually shaped like a funnel. So because that’s the way a cable was made, right. It’s, it’s wider at the top. It’s narrow through the body. Um, so we made the bag to fit the kettle. I mean, to fit the it. And I, sometimes I have people say, well, I’ll just take a big bag. I have a Kegel, I just want a big bag.
And I say, well, you know what, I’ll sell it to you, but you’re going to regret this because you might go in the keg, but you won’t get it out of the cake. Right. So it’s up to you, your choice, it’s your choice. Or I’ve had people call me and say, I bought a big bag and. I can’t get it out. Do you have anything to work?
And I’m like, yeah, the Kaggle, then that’s the one that works.
1-Colter-2: I’m sure somebody bought a cooler bag and tried to put it in a Kaggle. I’m sure that’s happened.
2-Rex: I’m sure it has as well. Right? We all outside people. Yeah. Well it can, can you cross over? Yeah. You can cross over if you want. I mean, if it fits, you can, you know, you can make it work if you want to. Uh, if you try hard enough or if you’re not worried about having some issues, but you know, People do what they do.
1-Colter-2: So the one last thing I want to talk about is just kinda caring for a bag, right? W w what would you say, obviously clean up is super easy. Turn it inside, out, flip it out. And it’s pretty easy when it comes to getting the grain out. But what, what kind of tips do you have when it comes to things like washing the bag and caring for the bag so that it can last as long as possible?
2-Rex: Yeah, it’s a pretty simple material. Um, polyester does not absorb water. So, uh, drying it is literally a matter of leaving it out in the air to dry. It’s not like you have to put it in a drier, the air dries quickly, uh, because it’s surface water, right? Anything that’s on the bag is on the surface of the material is not in the material.
So I just, I mean, I wrenched my bag triple, right. So I turned it inside out, give it a shake somewhere. Put it in a bucket of water three or four times and just hang it up and let it dry. Um, when it’s dry, I just pop it like you would a towel, you know, if you hold the towel up and just shake it, um, and all the little green bits and everything else, that’s, you know, on the outside of the material that pops right off you turn it right-side in and.
You’re good to go. That’s really all there is to it. It depends on what you’re doing with it. You, you know, I have had folks say, and this does happen is that there’ll be little tiny green bits or particles that get between the strapping and the fabric. Um, that’s really not a problem. But because we’re so focused on sanitation and cleanliness and all of the things that go, you know, kind of freaks people out that there’s, you know, the stuff underneath the strapping.
And so in that case, it just happens. Right. It’s just flour. That gets, I would just say if it went in there, if it got under there, it’ll come out of there. Um, and so it just takes a little bit of agitation. You could throw it in the washroom, let it, you know, the turbulence of the washer and the friction or whatever.
That’ll draw it out. You could put it as some PVW or something. That’s organic, you know, so we get breaks down organic materials that will break it down and get it out as well. But it’s not an issue because you know, you’re gonna boil after you use it anyway. So even if it stayed in there, Uh, it wouldn’t have any impact on the final product in any way, as long as it’s a drive, it’s not moldy again, you’re going to boil, but nonetheless, if you want to stay clean, you know, you’re going to try to get that out of there, but using something like Dawn, you know, some sort of an emulsifier that breaks up, you know, any sorts of oils, uh, is a good way to wash it.
Um, because it’ll do exactly that. Uh, eventually it will stain. I mean, I’ve seen bags that people have used 150 times and, uh, and they’re Brown. You know, at the bottom instead of white,
1-Colter-2: Yeah,
2-Rex: but they work just fine. Right. That material eventually gets stained.
1-Colter-2: Mike’s the color of
2-Rex: Yeah. Yeah. It just is. It just is, but it doesn’t change anything.
Right. So, yeah, but just Dawn or, you know, some sort of, you know, if you don’t have that, you literally could just rent some really well and hang them to dry and you’re good to go for the next time. Um, it’s a pretty forgiving material.
1-Colter-2: I throw mine in the washer with nothing like no soap, no nothing. Just throw it through the washer. And then when it, actually, when I take it out of the washer, it’s Stripe and I just had my spot for it, folded up in there and it’s ready to go. Pretty easy. . Well, I want to thank you so much for coming on homebrewing, DIY, just a couple quick questions for you. I know we talked about it a bit at the beginning, but if I wanted to find out more information about your filters, where would we go?
2-Rex: uh, the website is a brew in a bag. Got calm. Just like it sounds Bruna bag.com. We also have a full series on YouTube. I think there’s 21 segments or something like that. It covers step by step. So if you want to see it. How to use a fabric filter. That’s the place to go, just go to YouTube and look up the brew bag and you could see all the videos there.
Um, and we, don’t just, we don’t just say we’re going to brew in a bag and take you through that. I, I, as you can tell, I talk a lot. I, uh, I literally provide information. And as we go through the process, of using a fabric filter when you’re brewing, and a lot of the information we talked about tonight, as a matter of fact, is, is in those videos plus more for that matter.
Um, so you can go to YouTube, and then our blog has tons of information and references, uh, to the points that we make in the blog and the point that I make at the blog. Um, so that’s a good resource. There are also full instructions on our website, as well as an instruction page. And it’s, you know, goes through all those steps that you’d need to learn how to brew from for very first time.
Right. You can use that to start, um, I think that’s about it. You know, there’s, there are other things around the internet, you know, that we utilize, but for the most part, those three resources are probably the best
1-Colter-2: And if you’re listening to this show, I will link to it. All of those resources in the show notes. So just if you’re using your podcast app, just open your notes section and you’ll have links to all of these, these resources here, Rex, thank you so much for coming on our show. I’m really looking forward to putting this episode out and obviously, we’d love to have you back some other time.
So thank you so much for coming on homebrewing, DIY.
2-Rex: Yeah. Yeah. There’s lots of talk about it, the brewing world. Uh, and, uh, I appreciate the invite and appreciate the time. Uh, it was worth it, it was fun. I enjoy doing it. So thanks for inviting me.
Colter Wilson: I like to think Rex for taking the time to come on this week’s show. As always. It’s great to learn about even just the most basic piece of equipment, which do you think there isn’t so much to talk about when we think about brewing in a bag, but. Heck, we filled up like an entire hour. So obviously there was a lot to talk about.
That being said, if you want to find out more about the brew bag and Rex and his. Entire YouTube channel. And as well as his website, just look in the show notes and we’ll have links to all of that. There. Also, if you follow us on social media, you can head over to home brewing DIY, all one word we’re on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
One last thing. If you head over to our website, homebrewingDIY.beer, you can also leave us a message. If you would like to give us some feedback. Feedback is always appreciated. Well, that’s it for this week and we’ll talk to you next week On homebrewing DIY.
