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Tuesday 30 November 2010

Monday - Brew Day

Monday arrived and I got busy and started to brew my latest batch. Added 2730 grams of light dried malt extract to 10 litres of water at 40C and poured into the boiler. Topped the boiler up with a further 8 litres of water and switched on. After 20 minutes the wort came to the boil and only just stopped short of the top of the boiler. I added 26 grams of Progress hops and 26 grams of Willamete hops (in lieu of Whitbread Golding hops. The wort boiled away for 80 minutes when I added a further 17 grams of Willamete hopes and 3 grams of Irish moss. After a further 10 minutes the boiler was switched off. The wort was allowed to cool and the trub to settle to the bottom of the boiler. After sterilising the fermenting vessel I poured in 6 litres of cold mineral water. I then ran off the wort from the boiler through a muslin bag stretched over a fine metal mesh strainer to catch any stray hop seeds or other debris that found its way through the hops filter. I then topped up to 23 litres with cold mineral water and placed the fermenting vessel into my fermenting cupboard. I took a gravity reading and was a bit concerned that the reading was 1.032 instead of the expected 1.040. However, I think this may be due to the fact that the wort had not mixed properly with the cold water that was at the bottom of the fermenting vessel. If the final gravity comes out at 1.040 then the brew will only be about 3%. A really, really good session beer but not of sufficient strength. I am hoping that the original gravity was wrong. I shall take another one today. By using cold bottles of mineral water I was able to pitch the yeast straight away. I was, again, a little concerned because the wort did seem a little cold. However, the yeast I used Safale US-05 will work within a temperature range of 15-24C. So my concerns were a bit unfounded. I will just have to make sure that the cupboard stays at a steady 22C for best results.

The brew is bubbling away nicely and should prove to be another good 'un.

Pete is back from his travels in New Zealand and he has been in touch. Looks like a pub stroll tomorrow. Yes I have missed that and am looking forward to it very much.

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